If American history is any indication, when people are free to shoot any predator that they see fit, predators learn to stay out of sight.
The issue is not whether there are predators near man, the question is “ARE THE PREDATORS AFRAID OF MAN?”
“When gunpowder speaks, beasts listen.”
Repeal the Endangered Species Act and allow the citizen to carry openly in all state and Federal recreation lands.
I’m with you part of the way but not all the way. I might be misreading the intent of your post, but you seem to be advocating that all predators be shot on sight. I’m not for that. I don’t want a sanitized, Disneyfied world. I enjoy going out into the wilderness knowing that there are all kinds of insects, spiders, snakes, and big mammalian predators that could kill me. That’s the real wilderness, and I don’t want to see all the “dangerous” fauna killed off.
I feel the same way on a global scale. Does anyone here really want a world without lions, tigers, hyenas, leopards, tigers, crocodiles, cobras, etc.? That’s the very definition of “Disneyfied.”
That said, as I make clear in my post, I do believe that all aggressive predators that prowl near human population centers need to be dispatched. I want to see cougars in the mountains, but not in my backyard.
Now there is something that bears repeating. And I believe all manner of beasts listen. :^)