Economic Impacts of wolves

 In the 1970s, people in the United States began to look at the environment in a new way, calling for policies that would protect the environment. In 1973, President Nixon passed the Endangered Species Act (ESA), and since then, groups including environmentalists, ranchers, and hunters have been debating the economic impact of endangered species. This blog post will discuss the economic impact of the endangered species known as the wolf. 

To begin, President Richard Nixon put the wolf on the endangered species list in 1974. The ESA calls for the U.S Fish and Wildlife Service to take the necessary actions to restore a species to its historical numbers and habitats. Federal laws are also placed to protect the species from being hunted or their habitat further being threatened. While the Fish and Wildlife Service have successfully restored certain species populations, like the bald eagle's, other species have proven to be more challenging. The wolf has proved to be a tricky species to work with because no one knows how many wolves is enough. For example, the wolf used to roam a greater part of North America, known as the lower 48 states. Today wolves roam parts of the Western Great Lakes states, parts of the Northern Rocky Mountain states, Washington, Alaska, Arizona, and New Mexico, about 20% of their original range extent. The current wolf population has recovered to about 6,000 wolves. This is where the arguing begins. Some argue that this is plenty of wolves. Others argue that it is not enough and that they must return to more of their historical territory. 

An environmentalist economic conception of the wolf species' reintroduction into Colorado and other states incorporates the benefits the wolf provides to an ecosystem. The wolf is a cascading trophic species, meaning that it impacts the ecosystem it lives in by positively changing the landscape. The wolf is valuable to an ecosystem because they control deer and elk populations. In turn, reducing the deer and elk population reduces grazing, allowing natural grasses to flourish and regrow. The regrowth of grasses reduces erosion around river banks. Wolves are also valuable to an ecosystem because they promote biodiversity. Wolf hunts attract other animals like bears, coyotes, and birds to feed off the wolves' kill, causing them to move in from other places creating biodiversity. 

Hunters and ranchers, on the other hand, have a different economic perspective on wolves. Since the days of the settlers, wolves have been the enemies of the ranchers. Wolves are notorious for killing livestock from foal to larger livestock like sheep, cattle, and horses. A dead animal not only costs the rancher the animals market value worth but also the opportunity cost of all the milk or meat that would have been produced by the animal. Wolves have also been known to push cattle from fresh pasture to the overgrazed pasture. This leads to a decrease in the weight of the cattle and a reduction in meat sold. The stress the wolves put on the cattle also causes fewer cows to get pregnant. Hunters also oppose wolves because the elk and deer wolves kill leaves less deer and elf for the hunters to kill.

In all, the reintroduction of wolves has its costs and benefits. Benefits are biological for ecosystems, and costs are economical for ranchers and hunters. The wolf is a difficult species to work with because no one can agree on how many wolves are enough and what extent of land should be covered by wolves.