By Marc Bekoff, Ph.D. on December, 02, 2014 in Animal Emotions
An “experimental” study performed under the guise of conservation involved killing 890 Canadian wolves (and other animals) using aerial gunning, trapping, and strychnine poisoning. This research and publication represents the moral failure of the Alberta government, participating universities, the Canadian Journal of Zoology, and the scientists, and it didn’t work. Read More
Exposing the Big Game 
This planet and its inhabitants are not the playground of scientists! Sometimes I don’t know who is worse – the psychotic hunters, or the psychotic scientists, both allowed and even encouraged to act without restraint by our awful society. But legitimizing it with science I think is even worse. We put whatever need or interest, or morbid curiosity, of humans, no matter how trivial, ahead of the lives of animals.
It’s important also to note that this mass killing did not work, not that it would even be remotely justified if it did. As stated in the abstract of the research paper, “Although the wolf population reduction program appeared to stabilize the Little Smoky population, it did not lead to population increase [of caribou] …”
I didn’t expect it would, because the decline of caribou is caused by human activities, no matter how trivial, such as taking habitat for snowmobiling! Why on earth was something like this done? It’s obscene.
We’ve become a society where reason is prized over emotion – or maybe we always were that way. Nazi Germany comes to mind. Or else lack of empathy is becoming so prevalent that it is now the new normal.
Unethical Wildlife Agencies and Governments
Barbaric idiots amongst us, not matter what their titles or rationalizations: It is a violation of public trust and ethics tor agencies, state or federal, in this country or another, to be having killing contest on public land as was going to be the case in ID, which under protests BLM cancelled their permission for the event. It was a contest targeted at wolves and coyotes. It is also inappropriate, unethical and violation of the public trust mandate to be hunting wolves, killing predators (lions, wolves, bears, coyotes), and manipulating normal prey-predator relationships, established through millenniums of time to follow the unethical and mythological hunter myth of bolstering ungulate populations for hunters to kil, such as is happening in the USA, Canada and other counties. This amounts to game farming in the wilderness and is a violation of the trust put in state and federal wildlife agencies to protect the natural balance of wild places, which is basically to leave them alone and protect them from humans. Wildlife viewing is usually much more remunerative than wildlife killing. The American public pays for wilderness, wildlife, preserves and national parks much more than hunters and trappers. Nationally, hunters only represent 6% of the population and fishermen 15%. It may be higher in Alaska, as it is in a couple of western states, but not that much higher. Wolf viewing alone in Yellowstone brings in $35 million to the states surrounding Yellowstone. It is my understanding that the Denali wolf packs have already been diminished by hunters outside the park, indicating that there should be a buffer zone around Denali as there should be around Yellowstone, Glacier and other national parks, game preserves, and sanctuaries. There should be no hunting on preserves and state or national parks. We are losing wildlife to encroachment on a large scale. Hunting per se is a major form of encroachment; and is way out of bounds in the areas and conditions described above. People come to states that still have significant wilderness to see wilderness and the wildlife that should not be diminished by an unholy alliance between hunters, trappers, their fees and sports game targets and wildlife agencies. The role of wildlife agencies: wilderness and wildlife conservation and protection, not slaughter.