Culture and Coexistence into the Great Unknown
The film ‘Corazón Vaquero: The Heart of the Cowboy’, documents the rural “Californios,” raising livestock in the way of their Spanish ancestors in the Southern Baja California mountains. Facing tourism development, road building, and cultural changes, the isolated ranchos still persist with their self-sustaining subsistence-based way of life.
Washington State’s move to extirpate an entire pack of wolves near the Canadian border for the infraction of killing a few alien domestic cattle grazing public lands is reprehensible. That wildlife agencies would kill any wolves to benefit the profit margin of private businesses utilizing public resources is an outrage. George Wuerthner writes how the tragedy of this slaughter of wild predators repeats itself over and over throughout the West.
Western environmental groups oppose the anti-scientific “political” Endangered Species delisting of gray wolves across the U.S. by Fish and Wildlife Service. Reduced wolf numbers will reduce positive ecological effects of these top predators and permit barbaric hunting methods.
“Severe grazing is absolutely essential to maintain biodiversity,” argues Allan Savory in a recent TED Talk. Of course, this is the opposite of scientific truth for the sensitive desert ecosystem. Advocating “holistic grazing,” Mr. Savory pieces together false assumptions to produce ineffective but popular recommendations on climate change.