I just received an invitation to meet a live wolf at an event hosted by a nature museum in the Hudson Valley in New York. A few minutes later I found a friend had posted photos of a wolf that had recently been shot in Idaho as part of a licensed hunting season. In one moment the wolf is a curiosity, a draw to an event, a chance to get closer to an animal that few if anyone encounters in the Hudson Valley. In Idaho the wolf has reached a population base that according the Department of Game & Fish the predator can sustain a season of Wolf Management plan to harvest 220. 81 have been harvested to date and a limit of 139 remains state wide. The season was authorized to thin the wolf population and reduce conflicts with wildlife (especially sheep and cattle) that graze on both private and public lands throughout the state.

This all seems an odd juxtaposition since the wolf as a captive creature is the center of a press release to draw visitors to the nature museum and yet a wolf pelt or even a wolf tag is the center of conversation in many communities in Idaho.

Do we fully understand the wolf? Are we reacting to a collective truth as Seth Godin’s blog pointed out his morning? Why is the presence of the wolf seen so differently in two different regions of the same nation? What would it look like if anyone going to see the live wolf had to witness it hunting and killing a band of sheep or vice versa if a hunter had to pet a wolf and stare into its eyes face-to-face before heading out on a hunt? How much does our sense of place define our actions?