The population of wolves in the wild in Washington state is less than the number of cents in a dollar.

Ninety wolves roam in 18 wolf packs, mainly centered in the eastern part of the state, according to a survey by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife in 2015.

And at a meeting between the Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) and newly formed Wolf Advisory Group (WAG) in Issaquah Sept. 14 and 15, the discussion of how to keep Washington’s endangered wolf population growing in a way that’s manageable for ranchers and farmers inspired collaboration and conversation.

The conference-like meeting was attended by parties from both sides of the issue, including animal conservationists, ranchers, hunters, scientists, wildlife photographers and Native American tribe members. Attendees traveled from as far as California and Alaska to be part of the discussion. The aim was to hear all viewpoints and try to find solutions that satisfied everyone.

WAG member Lisa Stone said that the meeting was full of “very diverse people from different interests trying to work toward a common goal.”

“Wolves and cattle are here to stay — let’s make that viable and sustainable … we need to work together,” concerned citizen Larry Larson said.

Stone and fellow WAG member Molly Linville led a work session centered on outreach and education about wolves. They brainstormed the kinds of information that needs to be spread about wolves, such as basic wolf ecology, habitat maps, depredation reports, how to recognize wolves (especially in relation to coyotes) and wolf recovery, and came up with ideas of different groups of people who especially need to be targeted with information.

“People should educate themselves about wolves …because wolves are going to continue to come into Washington,” Stone said.

Stone noted that in a society where children grow up identifying wolves as the terrifying villains of fairy tales, people may have negative preconceived notions about wolves. Even the wolf emoji on Facebook is portrayed to look menacing with red eyes.

The key to solving the conflicts between wolves and people is outreach and education, Stone said. A self-identified hunter, she is especially committed to spreading knowledge to other hunters, hikers and campers so that they will know what to do if they encounter a wolf in the wild.

“If we can get the best information out there …everyone wins,” she said.

WDFW chief scientist John Pierce stated that “social tolerance and acceptance” are the most important factors in bringing the wolf population back to healthy numbers.

Pierce agreed that the real issue is society’s view of wolves.

“In the end, wolf recovery is not impacted by the removals as much as the population is dependent on social tolerance,” he said, noting that “people have a bias” toward wolves even though cases of humans being attacked by wolves are extremely rare.

“Wolf recovery is the goal,” he said. “Everything has to support wolf recovery — getting everybody working together, understanding each other’s issues.”

Pierce gave a presentation on the second day of the conference that showed the Wolf Conservation Management Plan, a study done by WDFW in 2011 that analyzed the ability of wolf populations to grow in the state under different scenarios. The study divided the state into three regions — Eastern Washington, the Northern Cascades and the Southern Cascades — and identified that for wolves to be on track to leave the state’s endangered species list, there need to be 15 breeding pairs statewide, with at least four in each region.

According to findings, if wolf recovery reaches its goal in one region, then the implementation of lethal management strategies in that region “would not impair recovery development in the other two zones,” Pierce said. This means that because there are seven breeding pairs in the Eastern Washington region, it is all right for the state to “address management needs” in that area.

Pierce explained that the reason for this is that wolves have “high dispersal capabilities,” meaning that they can potentially travel from one region to another, and also that they have “high fecundity rates,” as they are able to reproduce their entire adult lives.

Last month, WDFW made national news for choosing to eliminate all 11 members of the Profanity Peak wolf pack in Eastern Washington after the wolves were involved in several depredation incidents with cattle in 2014 and 2016.

Not surprisingly, the public comments time period drew passionate appeals from animal rights activists, especially tribal members. More than a few tears were shed by the time the meeting finished.

“It’s the dollar that people are finding sacred, not the cows,” said Jennifer Fuentes, a member of the Apache tribe. “When will it stop? The wolves are great medicine holders … they hold us in their prayers … without them, we cannot survive.”

“For indigenous people, the desecration of wolves is the desecration of our religious way of life,” said former Alaskan Inter-Tribal Council Officer Nikos Pastos, who traveled from Anchorage to attend the meeting.

Pierce said things have improved in recent decades. When pioneers first moved west, setting up homesteads in wolf habitats, wolves were eliminated through shooting and poison.

However, Pierce said, with the elimination of wolf bounties in the 1960s and establishment of animal protection measures in the 1970s, combined with the wolves’ ability to travel long distances, wolf populations have slowly started to come back. Pierce has a positive outlook for the future.

Still, meeting attendees pleaded with WDFW members to keep the wolves in mind when making policy.

“I’m just asking this commission … to help us save these last poor babies,” Blackfoot member James St. Goddard of Montana said. “Are we so heartless that we can’t do this?”