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I got a letter from a university telling me that it was pursuant to some law that they needed to get my “opinion” about the impending release of wolves in the “wild” in my area. The enclosed survey was not a survey of my opinion at all. Each question was about how to react if I was suddenly faced with a wolf. I could, A run, B yell at it...etc. The answers to the “survey” were given. There was a place to write my comment. It was large enough for a sentence of two. I wrote a full, single spaced letter.

There is no “wild” in my area. There is lots of forest on the maps, but it is broken up with subdivisions, farms and roads. Almost all the forest was close enough that there was essentially no area where wolves would not encounter people. I pointed out that eventually, I would not be confronted by “a” wolf, as they are pack animals. What happens when a pack drags off a small child waiting for the school bus? And if the program was successful, that would surely happen eventually.

I pointed out that my neighbor was a farmer raising free range animals, most of which would be potential prey. Our ancestors did not kill the wolves because our ancestors were horrible people with no respect for nature. They killed them because wolves prey on people and the farm animals those ancestors needed to survive. Only academics in their ivory towers could think that setting carnivores loose near subdivisions was a good idea.

The “survey” reminded me of a Farside cartoon. A bunch of cave men were running in terror from a charging saber-toothed lion. Another cave man stood in raptured delight saying, “My word, what a magnificent animal!” The caption read, “Liberals, the early years.”