Rewilding America
It sounds so cringey nowadays when you hear someone express their disdain for certain animals with blanket statements like,”wolves are bad, sharks are bad…etc.” Whenever I hear stuff like that I want to make a fist, knock on their heads and ask them if ‘there is anyone in there?’
Seems like almost everyone nowadays knows that animals are parts in a greater system that support the environment we live in. Yet, there seem to be a few that still don’t.
In the past, we have seen animals through the lens of ”things that eat other things” ie: wolves are deer and elk eaters. We’ve then made the assumption that if we just hunt the deer and the elk we have successfully substituted ourselves for the wolves. It’s a start, but that’s a big jump to make. Their general behavioral patterns are variables that are very hard to replace.
Through recent repatriation experiments, we have learned that animals are more than what they eat. They are dynamic, living creatures that affect nature in a number of different ways that we have a hard time replicating.
They react with other animals. If they are predators (like wolves), they bully them and affect their movement patterns. Their dung (elephants) changes the land. The way they roam can affect the whole landscape (bison vs cattle). Bison, for instance, are selective eaters in comparison to cattle and leave the prairie in better shape than their cattle counterparts. Their patterns of play might have an affect on other animals. One variable in a system with a lot of other variables can change things.
Have you heard of the repatriation of wolves to the American west? Probably. It’s been recieved with good and bad remarks. People are up in arms on both sides of the argument. Cattle farmers are complaining that their cattle are being killed and stressed to the point of eating less (this is documented). The environment seems to be benefiting though. Deer and elk aren’t over grazing, beavers have more fodder for their dams and thus fish and waterways are doing better, the number smaller animals typically eaten by coyotes is up as coyote numbers are down, and the landscape itself is changing for the better.
(1) Picture taken from Wikipedia
Speaking of apex predators, here’s one that is not being ‘repatriated’ per se, but rather just protected. Everyone seems to like coral reefs. I worked as a snorkeling guide for a little bit more than year in the USVI. Do you know that sharks are an integral part of maintaining our coral reefs? Parrotfish maintain our coral reefs by eating the algae off them. Parrotfish are eaten by groupers though, which are in turn eaten by sharks. The problem is that our hatred for sharks has resulted in greatly diminished shark numbers. Fewer sharks means more groupers and less parrotfish, which means less healthy coral reefs. But coral reefs are vitally important to aquatic ocean animals and us as well by way of feeding millions of people worldwide and providing a barrier between us and the waves. Last, like I mentioned earlier, it’s not likely that sharks’ eating habits are the only thing that we would have to replace should they disappear, but rather their behavioral patterns too.
I’ll let you in on a little secret: our reactions to attacks on human beings, in general, are extreme in comparison to the attacks themselves. Globally, unprovoked shark attacks were responsible for two deaths last year (2). Wolves killed 26 people globally over the span of 18 years between 2002-2020: that’s 1.4 people per year in the whole world (3). It might be that we just have to change our swimming patterns in open ocean, put up nets at the beaches like the Japanese and the Australians, and walk through the woods protected in one way or another in the future. Not a big deal, in my opinion. It’s better than killing off vital parts of the food chain.
Here’s another question: have you heard of the repatriation of jaguars to the United States? Are you even aware that jaguars are native to the United States? The last jaguar is said to have been killed in 1963 in Arizona, four months after the female below was shot (4). Prior to that though, jaguars roamed the entire American southwest and even further in the days prior to and during the time of European settling. Jaguars have since occasionally roamed back up into Arizona from Mexico.
*Supposedly, the last American female jaguar killed in 1963 by a man who thought it was a large bobcat. ”Today, he said, he would put down his gun and report his sighting.” The shooting was legal at the time.
”El Jefe,” a slightly more frequent jaguar visitor to Arizona.
Jaguar repatriation is something I am particularly interested in and have even gotten somewhat involved in. Not only are they beautiful, but we have reports of them spotted in Colorado, where I live (in the 1800s)! (5)
Rewilding is based on the idea that good results come from good processes. That good components make a good system and that a good cake is made from good ingredients. The good system I’m referring to here is the healthy, robust environment we have enjoyed for millennia up until the last 200 years or so. Rewilding is attempting to put back in some of those good ingredients that we have lost over the last two centuries so as to make a good cake!
The problem is that the system has adapted over the years and is rejecting some of its old components. Apex predators aren’t the only ones missing from the food chain any longer: much of their food, in the middle of the food pyramid, is too: prarie dogs, marmots, ferrets, beavers…etc (all dramatically reduced). Farmers are having a fit over the wolves. The idea of jaguars roaming around Arizona, Texas and New Mexico sounds totally crazy to the American modern day man. It might be that, similar to suddenly taking a single species out of a system, putting one back in after a hundred years is so not easily done seemlessly either. It might be that these animals have to be reintroduced as a package deal: the jaguars, their preferred food (supporting animals), land, education….etc all in one (and even then there will be bumps along the road). In regards to the Jaguar, that is actually what is being done in Mexico and South America with great deal of success.
“Wolf.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 17 Mar. 2024, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolf.
Yearly Worldwide Shark Attack Summary.” International Shark Attack File, www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/shark-attacks/yearly-worldwide-summary/#:~:text=Global%20total%20of%20unprovoked%20shark%20bites%20slightly%20higher%20than%20average&text=The%202023%20worldwide%20total%20of,which%20are%20assigned%20as%20unprovoked. Accessed 19 Mar. 2024.
Are Wolves Dangerous to Humans? New Report Shares Key Detail.” International Wolf Center | Teaching the World about Wolves., 2 Dec. 2021, wolf.org/wolf-info/factsvsfiction/are-wolves-dangerous-to-humans/.
Star, Tony Davis Arizona Daily. “’63 Jaguar Killing Echoes Today in Habitat Debate.” Arizona Daily Star, 13 Jan. 2013, tucson.com/news/science/environment/63-jaguar-killing-echoes-today-in-habitat-debate/article_9048bb7d-0729-51f9-b544-653ac5b82450.html.
“Jaguar.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 14 Mar. 2024, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaguar.