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Yeah this is a bit premature. I dunno why we don't just pay the ranchers for livestock killed (it's pretty rare) and everyone goes home happy? Apex predator re

Yeah this is a bit premature. I dunno why we don't just pay the ranchers for livestock killed (it's pretty rare) and everyone goes home happy? Apex predator reintroduction is a good litmus test for how much conservation we can stomach, so I think it's important that we get this right.

shadowgovt 6y ago
That would be wealth redistribution, which a critical mass of Americans are pathologically opposed to.
- mtgx 6y ago
  In that case, I guess these people have nothing against the government taking away all of their farm subsidies, too. Better safe than "socialist".
- neaden 6y ago
  The federal government gives farmers a lot of different subsidies already. If we can pay someone to not grow corn, we can pay them for a cow that got killed by a wolf.
  - smabie 6y ago
    Things like that have bad incentive structures and will be gamed
    - aejnsn 6y ago
      You have to understand farmers and farming. Do you think a true farmer is more dedicated to completing government paperwork or more dedicated to raising another head of livestock? For the gamers/hackers, this is why we fund judges, prosecutors, investigators, and the rest of the court system. You cannot make the case that 5% of those with bad intentions ruin it for the 95% of those with good intentions. Not saying the policy will ever be correct, but this is why you introduce thresholds, limitations, and requirements. For instance, using donkeys in the pasture to combat predators should be required. Promote smart farming, not just a pocketbook.
      - shadowgovt 6y ago
        I've never heard of co-pasturing donkeys to combat predators before. How does that work? That's neat.
        aejnsn 6y ago
        My grandparents did some (mostly subsistence) livestock farming when I was a tiny kid. Donkeys are extremely territorial, and snap into this fit of pissed off rage when an intruder threatens their territory or what they identify as 'their' herd. Usually a well-acclimated herd will understand the donkey as their protector. If being ran down by this raging anger-beast doesn't spook a predator enough, a donkey will stomp it bad enough to bring new meaning to the phrase 'ass-kicking'. I've never seen a pasture-mated donkey scared by much of anything other than loud noise, they're brave and loyal to a fault. Great Pyrenees dogs are amazing defenders as well. I've seen those put the brakes on some prowling coyotes and put a chase on them so hard that they defy physics to get over a fence. Exceptionally friendly to humans, and other dogs, outside their pastures. One of the good boys used to visit for pets and treats. :)
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
- pkulak 6y ago
  Everyone is fine when it's distributed to them; half the population will not tolerate it distributed elsewhere. Which means that the only kind of redistribution that's politically feasible is the kind that ends at about half the population. So this plan to pay farmers would likely have broad support.
- dboreham 6y ago
  > which a critical mass of Americans are pathologically opposed to Presumably this is a joke?
  - shadowgovt 6y ago
    it is not. https://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/business/jobs_employment/february_2013/61_think_state_governments_should_give_out_jobs_not_welfare https://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/business/job...
    - willturman 6y ago
      I'd take this with a massive grain of salt. Rasmussen has the highest right leaning bias of any major pollster accounted for in Five Thirty Eight's pollster ratings: https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/pollster-ratings/ https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/pollster-ratings/ Beyond their biased election polls the site seems tailor made to provide links presenting cheap talking points as majority percentages. I won't bother linking anything else on their website.
    - StillBored 6y ago
      That link isn't directly about wealth distribution, more about how its distributed. And given my own biases, I'm not surprised about the results. The Works Progress Administration built a lot of infrastructure we still depend on today with unemployed people. Until we get to the point where all our roads, bridges, airports, etc are looking as good as the ones you find in other parts of the world, underpaying healthy people to run asphalt machines for 20 hours a week (or whatever), or provide childcare, gives us a return on the basic societal need to keep people from starving.
    - dboreham 6y ago
      Obviously nuts. Almost all Americans are beneficiaries of some sort of wealth distribution. Heck wealth distribution is at the core of western civilization. Pretending that a majority is against it is surely delusional.
- StillBored 6y ago
  And weirdly enough, frequently ones that receive the largest proportion of it are the ones most against it. Both at the federal level, where generally the money is redistributed from the coasts to the "heartland", to at the local level where the cities heavily support the rural schools, roads, and general infrastructure. Even semi-private industries like telcom services are heavily funded through things like the universal service fund. In areas where there is less support, like healthcare, you see rural hospitals struggling to stay open and maintain staff. And this continues get worse, as noticed by the recent "trade war" where a large proportion of the returns from the increased tariffs were just given to farmers, while the main goal of increased domestic manufacturing were further collapsing.
  - chmod600 6y ago
    Let's assume that everything has a price, including one's adherance to a political philosophy. Then isn't is obvious that people with a political philosophy of limited government would demand a higher payout to abandon the idea of limited government? And that people who favor government involvement would go along with government involvement even if they end up footing the bill?
  - aww_dang 6y ago
    >And weirdly enough, frequently ones that receive the largest proportion of it are the ones most against it Why is it weird for someone to resent regulatory conditions that necessitate dependence on a handout?
- jolux 6y ago
  This is actually not true, most Americans support higher taxes on corporations and people with high incomes, and a more even wealth distribution: https://news.gallup.com/poll/1714/taxes.aspx https://news.gallup.com/poll/1714/taxes.aspx
- rtkwe 6y ago
  Except they're not really there's all sorts of subsidies in the US economy propping up various industries; oil, farms, manufacturing, etc. It's the specific phrase and label of wealth redistribution/socialism that the US is allergic to the policies are generally individually pretty popular if they're broad based.
adamnemecek 6y ago
They would probably start killing their stock themselves.
- imeron 6y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobra_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobra_effect
- spiderfarmer 6y ago
  Every killed sheep in The Netherlands is tested for wolf marks and DNA.
gbrown 6y ago
Why should we even pay? There's no constitutional right to be able to leave your livestock basically unprotected on vast tracts of land where they're vulnerable to predators. I mean, if it makes it more palatable it's probably worth it to pay farmers... but I viscerally dislike the idea that any industry has the right to: 1. Destroy the environment for their convenience 2. Be indemnified by the government for their inability to run an environmentally compatible business
- MikeKusold 6y ago
  Because the alternative is to say that ranchers need to protect their livestock from wildlife, and then wolves end up back on the ESL.
- nickff 6y ago
  Well, my understanding is that there is no covenant on that land which protects the wolves, so the farmers have some right to shoot them. The states technically own all wildlife within their respective borders, but they’re reluctant to exercise that right against a large and influential lobby. It may also be that harm caused by a re-introduced species is a taking.
- monkeybutton 6y ago
  If it's such a rare occurrence, is there an opportunity for insurance companies to provide solutions instead of the government?
  - allannienhuis 6y ago
    I don't think so - because the ranchers would still bear all of the costs of the problem of having wolves exist. Insurance doesn't transfer costs to the whole group that benefits from the existence of wolves. Having the costs come from the public purse seems like a good way to do that fairly. Although in the case of wolves, it seems like politics seem to play as much or more of a role than fairness.
    - pvaldes 6y ago
grumple 6y ago
Wolves do relatively little predation of livestock. https://www.humanesociety.org/sites/default/files/docs/HSUS-Wolf-Livestock-6.Mar_.19Final.pdf https://www.humanesociety.org/sites/default/files/docs/HSUS-... I’ve also seen it said that wolf populations do two positive things for livestock: keep grazing wildlife to manageable levels (so that fields are replenished for livestock) and outcompete coyotes, who are more likely to prey on livestock than wolves.
- shadowgovt 6y ago
  What effect do wolves have on wild hog population?
  - corty 6y ago
    In Germany, none. Domesticated animals are easier prey (fenced in, not used to predators), and hogs are breeding like a plague, it would take unacceptable amounts of wolves to make a noticable dent.
dboreham 6y ago
> why we don't just pay the ranchers for livestock killed Ah ha. A HN thread close to home (I live within earshot of wolves in Montana). So...we do [1], [2]. Ranchers (generalizing, of course) just don't like wolves. It's a really deep cultural thing. So if you as president want to take some step that will cause a bunch of folks in ranching areas to high five, you'd delist wolves. That they may not in fact be impacted by wolf activity is moot. [1] https://missoulian.com/news/state-and-regional/montana-makes-record-payments-for-livestock-killed-by-wolves/article_df2275cc-2a91-5831-b79e-84373526e0f9.html https://missoulian.com/news/state-and-regional/montana-makes... [2] http://liv.mt.gov/Attached-Agency-Boards/Livestock-Loss-Board http://liv.mt.gov/Attached-Agency-Boards/Livestock-Loss-Boar...
- perbu 6y ago
  In Norway we pay ranchers for sheep which are taken by wolves. They still really hate wolves. More sheep are taken by wolverines, lynx and bears yet the ranches are still keen on full extermination of the wolf population.
  - Filligree 6y ago
    It's not unreasonable. Wolves are among the few predators that can and will attack humans. That the wolves, themselves, now have a deep-set fear of humanity and would only dare to do so if they're desperate and starving... is a distant second to that same deep-set cultural fear of wolves. Unpopular Opinion Time: The ecosystem damage from not having apex predators is large enough that it might be worth a few human lives to avoid. Unpopular Opinion Time the Second: But there are other apex predators, such as the lynx, which can take much the same role without being nearly as dangerous to megafauna like humans. Though that's only a decent solution if you don't have problems with megafauna like elk.
    - peterwwillis 6y ago
      "Solutions" like this are how we destroyed Yellowstone the first time, and why deer now run rampant all over the US, literally eroding forests from excessive grazing. A naive assumption about a complex system has knock-on effects that destroy the entire ecosystem.
jmpman 6y ago
I agree. Reintroduce them to Times Square. Until then, why should rural residents have to fear for their children’s and pet’s safety?
- amanaplanacanal 6y ago
  Do you understand that there is nothing in Times Square that is anything like natural wolf habitat?
  - jmpman 6y ago
    I’m sure a coyote can survive in Times Square. Make it illegal to shoot a wolf, and they’ll do fine in Times Square too.
    - spiderfarmer 6y ago
      The people downvoting you are hypocrites.
nkurz 6y ago
> I dunno why we don't just pay the ranchers for livestock killed (it's pretty rare) and everyone goes home happy? I think the answer is that while there is not currently a federal program, many states already do pay ranchers for animals killed by wolves. Searching for "wolf depredation reimbursement" pulls up many details. Here's a High Country News article on the topic: https://www.hcn.org/issues/50.12/wolves-when-cattle-go-missing-in-wolf-territory-who-should-pay-the-price https://www.hcn.org/issues/50.12/wolves-when-cattle-go-missi....
brainzap 6y ago
it more fun to hunt them with helicopter and night vision gear, than to pay for the losses.
pvaldes 6y ago
> why we don't just pay the ranchers for livestock killed This path has been explored in Europe and is a mistake. 1) Killing a few wolves increases, not decreases damages (by altering the social structure of the pack). More paradoxical, killing all wolves in an area increases the attacks to small cattle in that area (even if there is not a single alive wolf anymore). Because wolf attacks are a very special case. There is not a single wolf in UK. Despite that, they still suffer 40.000 attacks to small cattle each year. By abandoned pet dogs, the same species as gray wolf. When government starts paying wolf attacks, suddenly, each stray dog attack (non paid) will be automatically assigned to wolves (paid) and will appear in the newspapers. This creates 'ghost wolves' and panic in the population, and increases the pressure against the environment (that is exactly the opposite that you are paying for). 2) Is an incentive for local corruption. People learn that if they cry wolf receive free money. They became insatiable and will try to game the system again and again. We had documented cases of the same cow "dying" two times, four times in four different places in Europe. By wolves that for some reason always start "eating the cattle tags". We had documented cases of cows dying by a natural accident and being blamed to scavenger wolves visiting the area four days later. 3) Is bad for the real farmers. Losing a cow is not a problem, destroying the cow market with a flood of easy money is. Meat prices are disbalanced by outsiders that release old or diseased cattle in a ranch to die at zero cost and then bill the state for wolf damages. At the end the real farmers figure out that letting the cows die is more efficient than producing meat. Or their activity is destroyed by the spread of new cattle diseases, and are replaced by fake farmers living in a big city. 4) It quickly turns into a sort of acquired right also. People gets upset if you try to stop it (and poison appears).
- pvaldes 6y ago
  One of the most bizarre cases that I remember is a family trying to bill a wolf attack to the government showing the rests of a barbecue as a proof of the attack. Apparently the (very smart) wolves managed somehow to shoot the cow in the head with a firearm before to cook it. And this is a real history.
corty 6y ago
Simply paying for cattle that wolves have eaten isn't enough. Wolves induce panic in herds, causing them to go over cliffs or trample down fences and cross busy roads, causing accidents. In Germany this isn't currently paid for by the state, because the law doesn't say so, the causality is hard to prove (basically you need a piece of flesh with a wolve's dental pattern) and the farmer is often first in line and goes bancrupt, because damage to the vehicles was done by his sheep/cows/whatever, not the wolves directly. Also, grazing cattle outside is desirable for better land use (usually grassland isn't good for much else) and keeping the current state of ecosystems (without grazing, bushes and trees will take over). Also, regions where cattle is grazed are typically also tourist hotspots, but cattle frequently scared by wolves is much more aggresive towards hikers. So basically, wolves screw over a lot more than just the few cows they eat...
- spiderfarmer 6y ago
  In The Netherlands people who "love" wolves say farmers should put up 3m high fences around their fields. Other people are telling farmers to get rid of all sorts of fences and just use ditches and hetches, because they like to see that on their Sunday stroll. The amount of criticism and conflicting opinions that farmers face is unbelievable.
- jhayward 6y ago
  > Also, grazing cattle outside is desirable for better land use (usually grassland isn't good for much else) and keeping the current state of ecosystems (without grazing, bushes and trees will take over) This is complete nonsense. Cattle grazing has been devastating North American habitat for a couple of centuries, and current BLM practices just continue the same abuse. The Texas Hill country is badly damaged from overgrazing, this had led to loss of topsoil, massive loss of groundwater, and completely altered habitat for native species.
  - corty 6y ago
    well, yes, Germany used to be all forrests, around 1BCE. Since then, people changed all kinds of habitats, often in a very radical way (burning and razing down the forest, lots of towns ending in -roth because of that). Nowadays, conservation aims mostly for the status quo, not for 1BCE. It might be different in North America, it might not. I'm not really convinced that there should be much of a difference just because it happened over the last few centuries instead of millenia ago. Just preserve some small parts of the previous ecosystem, ignore the rest. The whole planet has been terraformed already anyways, undoing human presence is pointless to try...
kylebarron 6y ago
Reintroducing gray wolves to Colorado is a statewide referendum on the ballot this week [0]. Part of the ballot language requires paying ranchers for livestock killed: "...requiring the commission to fairly compensate owners for losses of livestock caused by gray wolves". [0]: https://ballotpedia.org/Colorado_Proposition_114,_Gray_Wolf_Reintroduction_Initiative_(2020) https://ballotpedia.org/Colorado_Proposition_114,_Gray_Wolf_...
devwastaken 6y ago
Most wolf attacks are not reported. Wolves don't just attack once and leave. They come back. Sometimes it's not livestock. Many have horses or donkeys, or goats and sheep that they don't turn into meat. Also it's about the rights of your own land. If wolves kill the lives you take care of, they cannot be allowed to continue. The fact they are killing your animals means they're not finding other prey and are overpopulated at that location.
rmah 6y ago
First, I think ranchers are paid. The US has around 18,000 wild wolves. And another 60,000 wolves in Canada. In comparison, all of Scandinavia has maybe 400 or so. IOW, US+Canada has 200x the wolf population in 17x the land area (human population density is roughly the same). While apx 80,000 wolves does not seem enough to be considered "thriving" IMO, they're in no danger of extinction anymore. So while some care should be taken to maintain populations, it seems reasonable to take them off the endangered list. There are also 10's of thousand mountain lions, 10's of thousand bears, and millions of alligators in the USA. The USA/Canada is not exactly lacking in dangerous apex predators.

shadowgovt 6y ago

That would be wealth redistribution, which a critical mass of Americans are pathologically opposed to.

mtgx 6y ago
In that case, I guess these people have nothing against the government taking away all of their farm subsidies, too. Better safe than "socialist".
neaden 6y ago
The federal government gives farmers a lot of different subsidies already. If we can pay someone to not grow corn, we can pay them for a cow that got killed by a wolf.
- smabie 6y ago
  Things like that have bad incentive structures and will be gamed
  - aejnsn 6y ago
    You have to understand farmers and farming. Do you think a true farmer is more dedicated to completing government paperwork or more dedicated to raising another head of livestock? For the gamers/hackers, this is why we fund judges, prosecutors, investigators, and the rest of the court system. You cannot make the case that 5% of those with bad intentions ruin it for the 95% of those with good intentions. Not saying the policy will ever be correct, but this is why you introduce thresholds, limitations, and requirements. For instance, using donkeys in the pasture to combat predators should be required. Promote smart farming, not just a pocketbook.
    - shadowgovt 6y ago
      I've never heard of co-pasturing donkeys to combat predators before. How does that work? That's neat.
      - aejnsn 6y ago
        My grandparents did some (mostly subsistence) livestock farming when I was a tiny kid. Donkeys are extremely territorial, and snap into this fit of pissed off rage when an intruder threatens their territory or what they identify as 'their' herd. Usually a well-acclimated herd will understand the donkey as their protector. If being ran down by this raging anger-beast doesn't spook a predator enough, a donkey will stomp it bad enough to bring new meaning to the phrase 'ass-kicking'. I've never seen a pasture-mated donkey scared by much of anything other than loud noise, they're brave and loyal to a fault. Great Pyrenees dogs are amazing defenders as well. I've seen those put the brakes on some prowling coyotes and put a chase on them so hard that they defy physics to get over a fence. Exceptionally friendly to humans, and other dogs, outside their pastures. One of the good boys used to visit for pets and treats. :)
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
pkulak 6y ago
Everyone is fine when it's distributed to them; half the population will not tolerate it distributed elsewhere. Which means that the only kind of redistribution that's politically feasible is the kind that ends at about half the population. So this plan to pay farmers would likely have broad support.
dboreham 6y ago
> which a critical mass of Americans are pathologically opposed to Presumably this is a joke?
- shadowgovt 6y ago
  it is not. https://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/business/jobs_employment/february_2013/61_think_state_governments_should_give_out_jobs_not_welfare https://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/business/job...
  - willturman 6y ago
    I'd take this with a massive grain of salt. Rasmussen has the highest right leaning bias of any major pollster accounted for in Five Thirty Eight's pollster ratings: https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/pollster-ratings/ https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/pollster-ratings/ Beyond their biased election polls the site seems tailor made to provide links presenting cheap talking points as majority percentages. I won't bother linking anything else on their website.
  - StillBored 6y ago
    That link isn't directly about wealth distribution, more about how its distributed. And given my own biases, I'm not surprised about the results. The Works Progress Administration built a lot of infrastructure we still depend on today with unemployed people. Until we get to the point where all our roads, bridges, airports, etc are looking as good as the ones you find in other parts of the world, underpaying healthy people to run asphalt machines for 20 hours a week (or whatever), or provide childcare, gives us a return on the basic societal need to keep people from starving.
  - dboreham 6y ago
    Obviously nuts. Almost all Americans are beneficiaries of some sort of wealth distribution. Heck wealth distribution is at the core of western civilization. Pretending that a majority is against it is surely delusional.
StillBored 6y ago
And weirdly enough, frequently ones that receive the largest proportion of it are the ones most against it. Both at the federal level, where generally the money is redistributed from the coasts to the "heartland", to at the local level where the cities heavily support the rural schools, roads, and general infrastructure. Even semi-private industries like telcom services are heavily funded through things like the universal service fund. In areas where there is less support, like healthcare, you see rural hospitals struggling to stay open and maintain staff. And this continues get worse, as noticed by the recent "trade war" where a large proportion of the returns from the increased tariffs were just given to farmers, while the main goal of increased domestic manufacturing were further collapsing.
- chmod600 6y ago
  Let's assume that everything has a price, including one's adherance to a political philosophy. Then isn't is obvious that people with a political philosophy of limited government would demand a higher payout to abandon the idea of limited government? And that people who favor government involvement would go along with government involvement even if they end up footing the bill?
- aww_dang 6y ago
  >And weirdly enough, frequently ones that receive the largest proportion of it are the ones most against it Why is it weird for someone to resent regulatory conditions that necessitate dependence on a handout?
jolux 6y ago
This is actually not true, most Americans support higher taxes on corporations and people with high incomes, and a more even wealth distribution: https://news.gallup.com/poll/1714/taxes.aspx https://news.gallup.com/poll/1714/taxes.aspx
rtkwe 6y ago
Except they're not really there's all sorts of subsidies in the US economy propping up various industries; oil, farms, manufacturing, etc. It's the specific phrase and label of wealth redistribution/socialism that the US is allergic to the policies are generally individually pretty popular if they're broad based.

adamnemecek 6y ago

They would probably start killing their stock themselves.

imeron 6y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobra_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobra_effect
spiderfarmer 6y ago
Every killed sheep in The Netherlands is tested for wolf marks and DNA.

gbrown 6y ago

Why should we even pay? There's no constitutional right to be able to leave your livestock basically unprotected on vast tracts of land where they're vulnerable to predators. I mean, if it makes it more palatable it's probably worth it to pay farmers... but I viscerally dislike the idea that any industry has the right to: 1. Destroy the environment for their convenience 2. Be indemnified by the government for their inability to run an environmentally compatible business

MikeKusold 6y ago
Because the alternative is to say that ranchers need to protect their livestock from wildlife, and then wolves end up back on the ESL.
nickff 6y ago
Well, my understanding is that there is no covenant on that land which protects the wolves, so the farmers have some right to shoot them. The states technically own all wildlife within their respective borders, but they’re reluctant to exercise that right against a large and influential lobby. It may also be that harm caused by a re-introduced species is a taking.
monkeybutton 6y ago
If it's such a rare occurrence, is there an opportunity for insurance companies to provide solutions instead of the government?
- allannienhuis 6y ago
  I don't think so - because the ranchers would still bear all of the costs of the problem of having wolves exist. Insurance doesn't transfer costs to the whole group that benefits from the existence of wolves. Having the costs come from the public purse seems like a good way to do that fairly. Although in the case of wolves, it seems like politics seem to play as much or more of a role than fairness.
  - pvaldes 6y ago

grumple 6y ago

Wolves do relatively little predation of livestock. https://www.humanesociety.org/sites/default/files/docs/HSUS-Wolf-Livestock-6.Mar_.19Final.pdf https://www.humanesociety.org/sites/default/files/docs/HSUS-... I’ve also seen it said that wolf populations do two positive things for livestock: keep grazing wildlife to manageable levels (so that fields are replenished for livestock) and outcompete coyotes, who are more likely to prey on livestock than wolves.

shadowgovt 6y ago
What effect do wolves have on wild hog population?
- corty 6y ago
  In Germany, none. Domesticated animals are easier prey (fenced in, not used to predators), and hogs are breeding like a plague, it would take unacceptable amounts of wolves to make a noticable dent.

dboreham 6y ago

> why we don't just pay the ranchers for livestock killed Ah ha. A HN thread close to home (I live within earshot of wolves in Montana). So...we do [1], [2]. Ranchers (generalizing, of course) just don't like wolves. It's a really deep cultural thing. So if you as president want to take some step that will cause a bunch of folks in ranching areas to high five, you'd delist wolves. That they may not in fact be impacted by wolf activity is moot. [1] https://missoulian.com/news/state-and-regional/montana-makes-record-payments-for-livestock-killed-by-wolves/article_df2275cc-2a91-5831-b79e-84373526e0f9.html https://missoulian.com/news/state-and-regional/montana-makes... [2] http://liv.mt.gov/Attached-Agency-Boards/Livestock-Loss-Board http://liv.mt.gov/Attached-Agency-Boards/Livestock-Loss-Boar...

perbu 6y ago
In Norway we pay ranchers for sheep which are taken by wolves. They still really hate wolves. More sheep are taken by wolverines, lynx and bears yet the ranches are still keen on full extermination of the wolf population.
- Filligree 6y ago
  It's not unreasonable. Wolves are among the few predators that can and will attack humans. That the wolves, themselves, now have a deep-set fear of humanity and would only dare to do so if they're desperate and starving... is a distant second to that same deep-set cultural fear of wolves. Unpopular Opinion Time: The ecosystem damage from not having apex predators is large enough that it might be worth a few human lives to avoid. Unpopular Opinion Time the Second: But there are other apex predators, such as the lynx, which can take much the same role without being nearly as dangerous to megafauna like humans. Though that's only a decent solution if you don't have problems with megafauna like elk.
  - peterwwillis 6y ago
    "Solutions" like this are how we destroyed Yellowstone the first time, and why deer now run rampant all over the US, literally eroding forests from excessive grazing. A naive assumption about a complex system has knock-on effects that destroy the entire ecosystem.

jmpman 6y ago

I agree. Reintroduce them to Times Square. Until then, why should rural residents have to fear for their children’s and pet’s safety?

amanaplanacanal 6y ago
Do you understand that there is nothing in Times Square that is anything like natural wolf habitat?
- jmpman 6y ago
  I’m sure a coyote can survive in Times Square. Make it illegal to shoot a wolf, and they’ll do fine in Times Square too.
  - spiderfarmer 6y ago
    The people downvoting you are hypocrites.

nkurz 6y ago

> I dunno why we don't just pay the ranchers for livestock killed (it's pretty rare) and everyone goes home happy? I think the answer is that while there is not currently a federal program, many states already do pay ranchers for animals killed by wolves. Searching for "wolf depredation reimbursement" pulls up many details. Here's a High Country News article on the topic: https://www.hcn.org/issues/50.12/wolves-when-cattle-go-missing-in-wolf-territory-who-should-pay-the-price https://www.hcn.org/issues/50.12/wolves-when-cattle-go-missi....

brainzap 6y ago

it more fun to hunt them with helicopter and night vision gear, than to pay for the losses.

pvaldes 6y ago

> why we don't just pay the ranchers for livestock killed This path has been explored in Europe and is a mistake. 1) Killing a few wolves increases, not decreases damages (by altering the social structure of the pack). More paradoxical, killing all wolves in an area increases the attacks to small cattle in that area (even if there is not a single alive wolf anymore). Because wolf attacks are a very special case. There is not a single wolf in UK. Despite that, they still suffer 40.000 attacks to small cattle each year. By abandoned pet dogs, the same species as gray wolf. When government starts paying wolf attacks, suddenly, each stray dog attack (non paid) will be automatically assigned to wolves (paid) and will appear in the newspapers. This creates 'ghost wolves' and panic in the population, and increases the pressure against the environment (that is exactly the opposite that you are paying for). 2) Is an incentive for local corruption. People learn that if they cry wolf receive free money. They became insatiable and will try to game the system again and again. We had documented cases of the same cow "dying" two times, four times in four different places in Europe. By wolves that for some reason always start "eating the cattle tags". We had documented cases of cows dying by a natural accident and being blamed to scavenger wolves visiting the area four days later. 3) Is bad for the real farmers. Losing a cow is not a problem, destroying the cow market with a flood of easy money is. Meat prices are disbalanced by outsiders that release old or diseased cattle in a ranch to die at zero cost and then bill the state for wolf damages. At the end the real farmers figure out that letting the cows die is more efficient than producing meat. Or their activity is destroyed by the spread of new cattle diseases, and are replaced by fake farmers living in a big city. 4) It quickly turns into a sort of acquired right also. People gets upset if you try to stop it (and poison appears).

pvaldes 6y ago
One of the most bizarre cases that I remember is a family trying to bill a wolf attack to the government showing the rests of a barbecue as a proof of the attack. Apparently the (very smart) wolves managed somehow to shoot the cow in the head with a firearm before to cook it. And this is a real history.

corty 6y ago

Simply paying for cattle that wolves have eaten isn't enough. Wolves induce panic in herds, causing them to go over cliffs or trample down fences and cross busy roads, causing accidents. In Germany this isn't currently paid for by the state, because the law doesn't say so, the causality is hard to prove (basically you need a piece of flesh with a wolve's dental pattern) and the farmer is often first in line and goes bancrupt, because damage to the vehicles was done by his sheep/cows/whatever, not the wolves directly. Also, grazing cattle outside is desirable for better land use (usually grassland isn't good for much else) and keeping the current state of ecosystems (without grazing, bushes and trees will take over). Also, regions where cattle is grazed are typically also tourist hotspots, but cattle frequently scared by wolves is much more aggresive towards hikers. So basically, wolves screw over a lot more than just the few cows they eat...

spiderfarmer 6y ago
In The Netherlands people who "love" wolves say farmers should put up 3m high fences around their fields. Other people are telling farmers to get rid of all sorts of fences and just use ditches and hetches, because they like to see that on their Sunday stroll. The amount of criticism and conflicting opinions that farmers face is unbelievable.
jhayward 6y ago
> Also, grazing cattle outside is desirable for better land use (usually grassland isn't good for much else) and keeping the current state of ecosystems (without grazing, bushes and trees will take over) This is complete nonsense. Cattle grazing has been devastating North American habitat for a couple of centuries, and current BLM practices just continue the same abuse. The Texas Hill country is badly damaged from overgrazing, this had led to loss of topsoil, massive loss of groundwater, and completely altered habitat for native species.
- corty 6y ago
  well, yes, Germany used to be all forrests, around 1BCE. Since then, people changed all kinds of habitats, often in a very radical way (burning and razing down the forest, lots of towns ending in -roth because of that). Nowadays, conservation aims mostly for the status quo, not for 1BCE. It might be different in North America, it might not. I'm not really convinced that there should be much of a difference just because it happened over the last few centuries instead of millenia ago. Just preserve some small parts of the previous ecosystem, ignore the rest. The whole planet has been terraformed already anyways, undoing human presence is pointless to try...

kylebarron 6y ago

Reintroducing gray wolves to Colorado is a statewide referendum on the ballot this week [0]. Part of the ballot language requires paying ranchers for livestock killed: "...requiring the commission to fairly compensate owners for losses of livestock caused by gray wolves". [0]: https://ballotpedia.org/Colorado_Proposition_114,_Gray_Wolf_Reintroduction_Initiative_(2020) https://ballotpedia.org/Colorado_Proposition_114,_Gray_Wolf_...

devwastaken 6y ago

Most wolf attacks are not reported. Wolves don't just attack once and leave. They come back. Sometimes it's not livestock. Many have horses or donkeys, or goats and sheep that they don't turn into meat. Also it's about the rights of your own land. If wolves kill the lives you take care of, they cannot be allowed to continue. The fact they are killing your animals means they're not finding other prey and are overpopulated at that location.

rmah 6y ago

First, I think ranchers are paid. The US has around 18,000 wild wolves. And another 60,000 wolves in Canada. In comparison, all of Scandinavia has maybe 400 or so. IOW, US+Canada has 200x the wolf population in 17x the land area (human population density is roughly the same). While apx 80,000 wolves does not seem enough to be considered "thriving" IMO, they're in no danger of extinction anymore. So while some care should be taken to maintain populations, it seems reasonable to take them off the endangered list. There are also 10's of thousand mountain lions, 10's of thousand bears, and millions of alligators in the USA. The USA/Canada is not exactly lacking in dangerous apex predators.