Top 5 ways livestock are wrecking the planet

Photo: Sally Kneidel

Helping the environment is just one reason for dumping animal products from your diet. But it's a big one. It may be the most powerful choice you can make to help our ailing planet.

If your family gives you a hard time during the upcoming holidays for rejecting that turkey leg, tell them some of these surprising eco-facts about the havoc wrought by livestock.

1. LIVESTOCK DRIVE CLIMATE CHANGE
The livestock sector is responsible for at least half of the world's greenhouse-gas emissions. That's according to two environmental-assessment specialists employed by the World Bank Group, Robert Goodland and Jeff Anhang. Their meticulous analysis is reported in their landmark Worldwatch article "Livestock and Climate Change". Check out this short summary of Goodland's and Anhang's work. See also "Diet for a low-carbon planet" by Alan Miller, for the same conclusion. How can livestock generate such a volume of GHG? Fermentation in the guts of livestock creates 37% of human-induced methane; methane is much more potent as a greenhouse gas than CO2. Deforestation to graze livestock or to grow their feed is another major source of emissions. Goodland and Anhang also assess the carbon in livestock respiration. "Livestock (like automobiles) are a human invention and convenience, not part of pre-human times, and a molecule of CO2 exhaled by livestock is no more natural than one from an auto tailpipe."

2. LIVESTOCK WORSEN WATER SHORTAGES
Nearly half of all the water used in the United States goes to raising animals for the dinner table, according to calculations by author John Robbins. Water usage is a major environmental concern, given that water shortages are cropping up all over the planet these days. Droughts due to climate change, and the booming human population, contribute to the problem. But the livestock sector is responsible too - using vast quantities of water to irrigate feed crops for livestock. One pound of beef requires 2,400 gallons of water to produce, while one pound of wheat requires only 25 to 108 gallons. Notice, that's the water for just one pound of beef. A typical "2 sides of beef" from one steer weigh 700 lbs when arriving at the grocery. You do the math.

3. LIVESTOCK DOMINATE ARABLE LAND
Livestock production accounts for 70% of all agricultural land on the planet, and 30% of the land surface of the planet. Consider this in relation to the fact that the world's human population has expanded from 6 billion to 7 billion in just the last 12 years - more and more people needing to be fed. Expansion of livestock production is a key factor in deforestation, especially in Latin America. 70% of previously forested land in the Amazon is occupied by pastures, and livestock feedcrops cover a large part of the remainder. In addition to deforestation, about 70% of grasslands in dry areas have been degraded by overgrazing, compaction, and erosion by livestock. These facts are all reported in "Livestock's Long Shadow," a 2006 research document from the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization.

4. LIVESTOCK POLLUTE
Livestock is the world's largest source of water pollution, according to the United Nations' FAO. Major sources of pollution from livestock production include animal waste, antibiotics and hormones, fertilizers and pesticides used on their feedcrops, and sediments from eroded pastures or trampled streams. In the U.S., livestock are responsible for 55% of erosion and sediment, 37% of pesticide use, and a third of all N and Ph pollution of freshwater.

5. BIODIVERSITY SLAMMED BY LIVESTOCK
A third of all mammal species are in danger of becoming extinct. A full 40% of the planet's mammals are victims of habitat loss and degradation. So reported the 2008 conference of the IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature), a group that includes more than 1,000 government agencies and NGOs, conservation groups, and 11,000 scientists in 160 countries. And it's going to get a lot worse before the century is over. The causes of habitat loss and degradation? Livestock is a big one. Conservation International has identified 35 global hotspots for biodiversity, defined by species richness and high levels of habitat loss. Of those, 23 are affected by livestock production. Of 825 terrestrial eco-regions identified by the Worldwide Fund for Nature, 306 are threatened by livestock.

WANT TO HELP?
Choose plant-based foods, and explain why to everyone you know.
Average Americans eat between 216 and 246 lbs of meat per year, far more than residents of any other country. In the U.S., around 60% of our grain goes to livestock, a very inefficient use of our agricultural lands. Feeding the grain to people directly could feed up to 10 times more people than feeding the meat to people. Or, another way of looking at it - we could stop converting natural lands to agricultural lands if we made more efficient use of the farms we have now. What can you do? Simply eating less meat can help. Even a couple of meatless days a week will reduce your ecological footprint. Going vegetarian or vegan is even better. Check out the recipes and new vegan cookbooks reviewed on this site.

Coming up in 2 later posts:

Top 5 Health Reasons to Bypass Animal Products
Top 5 Humane Reasons to Choose a Plant-based Diet

Keywords: livestock Livestock and Climate Change Jeff Anhang Robert Goodland climate change water shortage water pollution land usage biodiversity impact of livestock impacts of livestock bad effects of livestock livestock and land degradation

Review of documentary "PLANEAT: Nothing changes the planet as much as the way we eat"

PLANEAT logo

Carnivores, take heed! The film "PLANEAT" might convince even the most passionate meat-enthusiasts to lay off the stuff. This DVD makes a strong case that our love affair with meat and dairy is ravaging both our planet and our bodies. The filmmakers used extensive interviews with highly credible health and environmental experts (interspersed with cool vegan-cooking scenes) to illuminate the damages inflicted by the livestock sector and our own misguided food choices. Having co-authored a book on the same subject myself, I appreciated the filmmakers' skill in cramming a lot of convincing info into a very watchable film."

Breeding sow on a small N.C. farm. Photo: Sally Kneidel

The film's strength
The strength of the movie, for me, is the breadth of its coverage in addressing different angles of the meat-consumption issue. My husband Ken teaches biology/ecology and is always on the lookout for new tools to use in class to make the point that the livestock industry has a huge environmental and climate impact. The United States is the world's worst offender - we eat much more meat per capita than any other country. And as PLANEAT will tell you, eliminating animal products from your diet will prevent more greenhouse gas emissions than switching to the most fuel-efficient car on the market.

  Dairy cow on a milking machine. Photo: Sally Kneidel

Great teaching tool
This film will be a useful teaching tool for progressive educators, to replace John Robbins' excellent 1991 film "Diet for a New America" - which is aging (although still accurate). PLANEAT is obviously current and features a number of young, pierced, tattooed chefs in the cooking segments. The two films overlap, in that both feature the research of Dr. Colin Campbell, a researcher from Cornell who conducted a landmark study relating disease frequencies to the consumption of animal products. In this study, menus of meat and dairy were implicated big-time as culprits in not only vascular and heart disease, but also numerous cancers. The research is reported in the 1990 publication "Diet, Lifestyle, and Mortality in China: a study of the characteristics of 65 Chinese counties" by Colin Campbell, Richard Peto from Oxford University, and two Chinese scientists. The work is also summarized in the 2005 book The China Study by Colin Campbell and his son Thomas Campbell.

 "The China Study" by Thomas and Colin Campbell

Singer on ethical issues
PLANEAT includes interviews with Peter Singer, famed author and ethicist at Princeton University. In the film, Singer gives voice to moral concerns regarding animal abuses on factory farms. He also points out ethical concerns in our contributing to rising sea-levels that will drown farmers in developing nations - sea-levels that are rising as a result of livestock-related greenhouse gases.

I applaud PLANEAT not only for its broad scope, but particularly for its very detailed review of health effects. I learned a few things I didn't know, even after years of reading and reporting in my own books and blogs.

  Shed of Tyson breeder chickens. Photo: Sally Kneidel

Coulda, shoulda included...
For me, though, the scariest down-side to meat-eating is its destructive effects on the rapidly declining welfare of our green planet. PLANEAT did address some environmental repercussions of livestock, but could have done so more stringently. For example, the film omitted the most significant eco-research I know of: "Livestock and Climate Change" by Richard Goodland and Jeff Anhang, environmental specialists with the World Bank Group. After a meticulous analysis, Anhang and Goodland reported that the livestock sector is responsible for 51% of greenhouse gas emissions! In other words, our eating of animal products is the primary cause of global warming! Surely their meticulous and widely-cited analysis is worth a mention.

"Livestock and Climate Change" gained notice in WorldWatch magazine

The film also didn't address depletion of marine fishes by overharvesting - a topic certainly pertinent to a film on the consumption of animal products. I would've liked to see a word, too, about the massive amount of water required to raise food for livestock, a growing concern as global water shortages escalate.

All filmmakers are limited by viewing time, and the thorough coverage of disease and reversal of disease by meatless diets perhaps merited these omissions - that's all a matter of personal perspective.

I recommend the film
Overall, I highly recommend PLANEAT as an important educational tool for teachers at any level, for parents and families, for environmental clubs or medical organizations, and for the enlightenment of any individual who cares about health, longevity, and solutions for our ailing planet.

Sow in farrowing crate on N.C. factory farm. Photo: Sally Kneidel

How to see PLANEAT
PLANEAT will be released for home, educational, community, and theatrical use in October 2011 from Bullfrog Films. For more details about that, please contact Stephanie at stephanie@bullfrogfilms.com or (610) 779-8226. Meanwhile, you can watch the film right now on the PLANEAT website.

Raising small numbers of pastured animals still generates GG, but less water pollution than factory farms. Photo: Sally Kneidel

Some of my previous posts about animal products' links to illness and environmental damage:
"New studies: cancer linked to milk consumption"

"New studies: Fast food "kids meals" loaded with calories and fat"

"Livestock account for 51% of annual worldwide greenhouse gas emissions"

"New study: meat impacts climate more than buying local"

"Less meat....smaller footprint"

"Is local food the greenest choice? New study says no"

"Earth Day: 3 things you can do"

Some of my previous reviews of food documentaries: 
"Review of new food film 'What's on YOUR plate?' "

"Review of the documentary 'End of the Line: where have all the fish gone?' "

"Review of 'The Cove', an A+ documentary about the slaughter of Japan's dolphins

Keywords: PLANEAT, vegan documentary, Colin Campbell, Peter Singer, The China Study, vegan health, greenhouse gases and livestock, global warming and livestock, Sally Kneidel, review, documentary

Review of new food film: "What's on YOUR Plate?"

This post now on Google News and on the syndicated BasilandSpice.com

Two young girls lead the way

I was asked to review the new DVD, "What's on YOUR Plate? The Film about Kids and Food Politics". The stars of the movie are two 11-year-old multiracial girls in NYC, Sadie Hope-Gund and Safiyah Riddle. The film documents the girls' quest to learn why American diets are often so unhealthy, and why our food travels an average of 1500 miles from farm to fork. Sadie and Safiyah were fantastic in their roles as curious young consumers. They were bright, confident, and completely natural in front of the camera. Great role models for other young girls, who will feel empowered by watching the two in action.
Sadie and Safiyah interviewed a variety of relevant experts: NYC school food executives, an MD specializing in cholesterol management, food author and activist Anna Lappé, a food-conscious diabetic, and Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer. That was just for starters.

After investigating school lunches laden with with fat and empty calories, and the corporate origins of processed foods that fill our supermarkets, Sadie and Safiyah turned their focus to healthy alternatives.

I loved the diversity of local food providers in the film

For me, the exploration of solutions was the most interesting aspect of the movie. I admired the filmmakers' selection of people to represent the local-foods movement in NYC. Three who stood out for me were Maritza Owens of Harvest Home Farmers Markets in Harlem, a Spanish-speaking family of farmers (the Angels) in Goshen, NY, and the founders of Stanton Street CSA (Kevin Walter and Sasha Schulman). A CSA is an agreement that allows consumers to prepay a local farmer for an annual share of his or her produce. All of these people were involved in getting locally-grown produce directly to consumers in NYC. At least some of the produce was organic; it wasn't clear to me whether all of it was.

Organic okra in October. Photo: Sally Kneidel

Ninety percent of farmers need second jobs to support their families

So the movie in a very visceral way illustrated how to seek out and support local farmers and local vendors who provide healthy fresh vegetables. Most such people are barely making ends meet and desperately need community support, so the movie is valuable if it accomplishes nothing more than encouraging support of local farmers. I also appreciated the variety of cultures represented in the film, and the discussions about neighborhoods and demographic groups with little access to fresh produce. The girls' interview with the Manhattan Borough President addressed that problem specifically.

An excellent resource for families and educators

I was impressed with the movie and I applaud the efforts of everyone involved. I highly recommend it for families with children and as a tool for educators, especially educators of young people. In fact, the website of the film's distributor offers a 64-page curriculum and 3 study modules that go along with the DVD, entitled School Food, Health and Access, and Local Food.

Although I liked it, I wouldn't necessarily advise an adult foodie who's already knowledgeable about farmers markets and CSAs to seek out the film. And it's not a movie I would have chosen to watch purely for my own enjoyment or for information about food. However, as a food writer with fantasies about making a documentary, I might watch it again as an example of an extremely well-executed film about food. Sadie's mother, Catherine Gund, produced the movie and her expertise as a professional filmmaker was evident. There was not a dull moment, and I can easily imagine a class of 8th graders or 11th graders riveted to the screen during the entire film.

Wish it had mentioned the ominous impacts of livestock

As long as we're examining "what's on our plates", I was a tad disappointed that the documentary didn't address the merits of organic food more forcefully, and didn't mention the fact that Americans eat much more meat per capita than any other country. Our over-consumption of animal products has implications far beyond our health. The livestock sector has a huge impact on global warming - a fact well-documented by scientists worldwide. A recent paper published by Worldwatch Institute attributes more than 50% of greenhouse gases to the livestock sector. Although the film didn't get into environmental issues much, it could easily have incorporated both these issues in relation to health - especially given that both girls are vegetarians.

Hogs for a popular sausage brand, raised on a N.C. factory farm. Photo: Sally Kneidel

Despite omissions, the film is a powerful tool

There are advantages though to covering a few topics well rather than touching on everything. No question that Sadie and Safiyah covered a few topics with pizzazz and aplomb. "What's on YOUR Plate?" invites young viewers to boldly seek answers about their own school food and demand access to healthy produce. We all deserve fresh, local, and wholesome food.

Our books about how our food choices affect our health and the environment:

Sally and Sadie Kneidel. 2005. Veggie Revolution: Smart Choices for a Healthy Body and a Healthy Planet. Fulcrum Publishing.

Sally and Sadie Kneidel. 2008. Going Green: A Wise Consumer's Guide to a Shrinking Planet. Fulcrum Publishing.

Some of my previous posts about the effect of diet on health and the environment:

"Livestock account for 51% of annual worldwide greenhouse gas emissions"

"New study: meat impacts climate more than buying local"

"Less meat....smaller footprint"

"Is local food the greenest choice? New study says no"

"Earth Day: 3 things you can do"

"An apple? Bran muffin? or cold cereal? Top ten sources of easy fiber"

"10 hot tips for a green and energy-efficient holiday."

"Obama to fight consolidation of farms: good news for small farms and consumers"

"Smithfield blamed for swine flu by Mexican press"

"The virus is a swine flu and has its roots in North Carolina, the land of Smithfield"

"Tyson and Smithfield drooling over untapped profits abroad"

"Working in a turkey insemination factory"

"A tasty vegan meat substitute: Tofurkey kielbasa"

Key words: DVD documentary movie film review What's on your Plate Sadie Safiyah CSA farmers markets local food NYC Maritza Owens Stanton Street CSA Catherine Gund organic livestock sector Worldwatch

Is local food the greenest choice? New study says no

Dairy cows' rear-ends: bad news for our climate.
Photo by Sally Kneidel

"Local" is the mantra in sustainable food these days. But should it be? Is eating locally-produced food the most powerful thing we can do to reduce our ecological "foodprint?"

A new study from Worldwatch Institute says no indeed. I love Worldwatch. They crank out study after study with lots of hard data, evaluating the environmental impact of various consumer choices. So useful! So fun to quote!

Don't get me wrong - I'm all in favor of local food. We definitely should support small-scale farmers in our own communities who are growing food organically and sustainably. For years now, I've been writing and speaking in support of them, on this blog and in our books and at various conferences.

There's no question that, all other things being equal, buying food grown nearby is better than buying food that's been trucked for long distances. Less transported food means fewer emissions and a smaller carbon footprint. But as Sarah DeWeerdt points out in this new Worldwatch article, we need to look at the whole production picture - not just how far food was transported from producer to market.

As it turns out, when we look at life-cycle analysis, a "cradle-to-grave perspective" on food products, food miles are "a relatively small slice of the greenhouse-gas pie," says DeWeerdt. In fact, according to a comprehensive analysis last year by Christopher Weber and H. Scott Matthews of Carnegie Mellon University, final delivery from the producer or processor to the retailer accounts for only 4% of the U.S. food system's greenhouse-gas emissions! Materials required for cultivation and processing must be transported too; this transport is considered part of the "upstream" miles and emissions. Such materials include fertilizer, pesticides, animal feed, etc. But the transport of these items, together with transport to market, still accounts for only 11% of the food system's emissions.

What's the source of all the other greenhouse gases associated with agriculture? Production. Primarily, production of livestock. Weber and Matthews from Carnegie Mellon found that a whopping 83% of food-related emissions occur before the food leaves the farm. Tara Garnett, in a recent analysis of a U.K. food system reached similar conclusions.

What you eat may matter more than where it came from

Numerous studies reviewed by DeWeerdt have found that livestock production generates a much higher volume of greenhouse gases than does plant production. Beef and dairy cattle are the worst culprits; DeWeerdt calls them "agriculture's overwhelming 'hotspots' " in terms of greenhouse-gas emissions. A group of Swedish researchers has calculated that meat and dairy account for 58% of that country's total food emissions. In Garnett's study, meat and dairy accounted for half of the U.K. food system's greenhouse gases. Garnett writes, "Broadly speaking, eating fewer meat and dairy products and consuming more plant foods in their place is probably the single most helpful behavioral shift one can make" to reduce food-related greenhouse gases. Weber and Matthews reached a similar conclusion: "No matter how it is measured, on average red meat is more GHG-intensive than all other forms of food. " The dairy industry, in their study, was the second-biggest contributor to greenhouse-gas emissions.

A large proportion of emissions associated with beef cattle and dairy cows are the greenhouse gases methane and nitrous oxide. Methane is 23 times more potent at trapping solar heat than is carbon dioxide; nitrous oxide is 296 times more potent (molecule per molecule). Methane comes from the rear-ends of ruminants such as cows. Both methane and nitrous oxide come from manure, especially the vast, open "waste lagoons" associated with factory farms.

Well then, just how much does food contribute to the planet's overall carbon footprint? I reported on that in a previous post. In 2006, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization published a live-wire of a paper entitled "Livestock's Long Shadow." According to that research document, livestock account for 18 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions. And here's the kicker - that's more than all forms of transportation combined! You can easily google that document for yourself. Just read the 3-page Executive Summary in Part I, which summarizes the the whole 400 page report.

After concluding that red meat and dairy are emissions hot-spots, DeWeerdt does go on to review the merits of buying local food. One clear advantage, which Sadie and I talk about in our presentations, is that local food is in general grown by small-scale farmers who are openly accountable for their treatment of the environment and their livestock. The farmers I know who sell food to their own communities welcome visitors to inspect their methods. This is a far cry from industrial producers who keep their exploitive and often abusive operations shielded from public view.

So buy local. But, if you want to contribute to a liveable planet for your grandchildren, eat low on the food chain too. And join me in a tip of the hat to Worldwatch for another fine study.

by Sally Kneidel, PhD

Sources:
Sarah DeWeerdt. Is Local Food Better? Worldwatch Institute. Accessed May 15, 2009.

Livestock's Long Shadow. United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. Rome, 2006.

To see my primary post about Livestock's Long Shadow and about Weber & Matthews' research, click here

To see all my, Ken's, and Sadie's posts that mention Livestock's Long Shadow, click here

To see my favorite Worldwatch Institute document, Happier Meals: Rethinking the Global Meat Industry by Danielle Nierenberg, click here

Key words:: Worldwatch Livestock's Long Shadow meat industry local food red meat cattle dairy livestock greenhouse gases carbon emissions food carbon footprint foodprint Sarah DeWeerdt Weber and Matthews Matthews and Weber Carnegie Mellon

Less meat...smaller footprint

photo by Sally Kneidel

Sally often says, when speaking to others about the impact of eating less meat, that what you eat is more important than what you drive. The UN document "Livestock's Long Shadow" says that our diet choices impact climate change more than transportation. I shared that with my Biology class and sensed some disbelief, so I decided to use www.myfootprint.org, a website where you can caluclate your ecological footprint, as a way to convince them that this is true. Your footprint tells you how many worlds it would take to support the human population if everyone in the world lived just like you.

I worked through the footprint questions, choosing all of the default or "average" values as answers. The only answer that I intentially set away from the average, was my diet. First, I chose "top of the food chain - I eat meat, seafood, or dairy at almost every meal" as a description of what I eat. This trial resulted in a footprint of 7.04 worlds. I then repeated the questionnaire, changing only one thing - my diet from "top of the food chain" to "vegan". The footprint dropped to 5.24, a 26% reduction. Impressive!

I then repeated the footprint two times. Both times I let my diet description stay at "omnivore", the default setting, so food choice didn't vary. What I did change was the car I drive. Both times I chose 20,000 miles as the amount that I drive each year, but in one run I chose a "truck or SUV" as my car (this resulted in 7.34 worlds), and the other I swtiched to a hybrid (resulting in 5.99 worlds). The reduction this time was 18%.

Looks like the UN report is right! (Or, more likely, the footprint modelers used the report in writing their computer model.) I know I could have had my students read the report (it's on-line), but this was a much simpler way to get the point across. They had already calculated their footprint, so it was a result they could easily grasp. Most of the students had calculated their footprints to be in the 5-7 range. They were distressed and felt trapped a bit. As teenagers they couldn't easily change the house they live in or the cars their family drives. But they do have control over what they eat. Eating less meat offers an easy way to lower one's environmental impact.

By Ken Kneidel, PhD

Keywords:: ecological footprint effect of meat on environment environmental effect of meat livestock's long shadow impact of animal products

Wolves in Danger from the US Government - Once Again

It’s been only 12 years since gray wolves, after years of near-extinction, were reintroduced into Yellowstone National Park. The initial group of 66 wolves were transplanted into the park from Canada beginning in 1995. Now, more than 1,545 wolves roam Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming. Biologists say that a minimum of 2,000 to 3,000 wolves are needed within the area in order to keep them from disappearing again.

The wolves have had tremendous popular support from the beginning. Their reintroduction has been by far the most publicized and celebrated of any wildlife reintroduction in the U.S. The wolves complete the Yellowstone ecosystem, which, without them, had too many hooved animals. The overabundance of some of the wolves' natural prey was altering the natural plant communities along stream banks, due to excessive trampling. With the wolves back on the scene, the Yellowstone natural community is much closer to what it was before most of the surrounding states were profoundly altered by development and livestock ranching.

The success of the growing wolf population has made a lot of money for the park, in sales of wolf paraphernalia, such as wolf T-shirts, sweatshirts, coffee cups, and books from park gift shops. The wolves have also drawn thousands of tourists and wildlife supporters to the area, people who pay to sleep and eat in the park's expensive lodges. My family has been to Yellowstone twice to seek wolf-sightings. We've camped at the Slough Creek primitive campsite, close to the northeastern corner of the park where the wolf dens have often been fairly close to a park road. Every morning in this part of the park, passionate wolf-addicts gather before dawn along the roadsides where certain packs of wolves are most likely to cross in their daily foraging rounds. The hopeful wolf-watchers set up spotting scopes on tripods, and bring out the high powered binoculars and telephoto lenses. Then everyone scans the horizon. Every few minutes a murmur goes up and down the string of watchers "Is that a wolf?" Nope, a coyote. "What's that?" Nah, a fox. "Wait...what's that? Is it? IS IT?"

On our first trip to Yellowstone, we never saw the wolves, due to inexperience about where and how to look. We were so disappointed, even though we enjoyed being there for the hiking and the wilderness and the camping. We saw lots of coyotes, even packs of coyotes, as well as black bears and grizzlies, elk, and pronghorn, and so on....but no wolves.

But on our second trip, we got up at 5:30 every morning and waited for sometimes hours, in the spots where they'd been seen recently. We were rewarded by seeing members of the Slough Creek pack almost every day. We felt lucky to see them eating an elk they'd brought down, although we didn't see them make the kill.

Ranchers and hunters have been opposed to the wolf reintroduction from the beginning. Hunters say the wolves compete with them for native game, particularly elk. Ranchers say the wolves kill their calves. Wolves do occasionally kill calves and sheep. This year they've killed 330 domestic animals. But the U.S. Fish & Wildlife service compensates ranchers for loss of livestock.

The ranchers and hunters apparently are concerned only with their own livelihoods and recreation, respectively. They don't appear to care about wolves, which were here long before we were. Wolves in the U.S. were decimated by an unprecedented extermination campaign in the early 1900s, funded by the U.S. government, which distributed posters encouraging people to shoot wolves on sight, and even offered a bounty for dead wolves. It worked. There were virtually no wolves left in the lower 48, although before Europeans settled North America, wolves were common throughout every region of the continental United States.

If US Fish&Wildlife's plan to take wolves off the endangered species list goes through, hunters and trappers would be allowed to obtain permits to kill wolves. As long as at least 450 wolves survived, the animal would remain fair game. If their numbers dropped below 300, they'd be put back on the endangered species list.

Environmental organizations are planning lawsuits to halt the delisting. US Fish & Wildlife has a backup plan that would keep wolves on the endangered species list, but loosen restrictions on when the wolves can be killed, and would allow hunters to kill wolves for going after their natural prey - elk. This provision is to accommodate hunters who hunt elk for recreation.

If you want to help protect wolves, consider supporting Natural Resources Defense Council's campaign to protect them from delisting.



Source: Matthew Brown. Associated Press. "Ranchers howling about rise in population of gray wolves". Charlotte Observer, Nov 24, 2007.

Key words :: wolves, Yellowstone, endangered species, USFW, hunters, elk, ranchers, livestock