When I read Bryce Andrews’ line, “Ranchers lose
sleep, money and their tempers (due to wolf depredation of
livestock),” it raised my hackles (HCN,
8/20/07). I’ve heard this several times over the last decade. No
doubt ranchers are good at losing their tempers, but are they
losing money? Doesn’t Defenders of Wildlife have a fund to
reimburse ranchers, at going market rates, for cattle killed by
wolves? Hasn’t this fund paid out hundreds of thousands of dollars?
If so, how are ranchers losing money to wolves?
What
ranchers seem to be losing is credibility and sympathy. And that
could prove important. I read somewhere that over 85 percent of the
beef on the market shelves comes from cattle that never set hoof on
a ranch or range, but instead spent their entire lives on feedlots.
If that factoid is true, then big agribusiness is a greater threat
to the rancher than wolves will ever be. And if ranchers want to
beat agribusiness, they’ll need all the credibility and sympathy
from consumers that they can muster.
It’s ironic because
big business tends to be just like the ranchers, concerned only
with themselves and the almighty dollar … screw everything else.
At this point, I’ll pull for agribusiness to devour the
rancher.
Randy Lantz
Albuquerque, New
Mexico
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Wouldn’t Tyson Inc. shoot wolves too?.
Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.
