Imagine you’re a land manager whose job it is to protect the ecological communit

Question

Imagine you’re a land manager whose job it is to protect the ecological community of Yellowstone National Park. You’ve been asked to allow people to acquire permits that would let them hunt wolves from the reestablished population in and around the park.

What would the direct consequences of allowing this hunting be?

What would the indirect consequences be?

What factors would be important to consider in making the decision of whether or not to allow hunting?

Why do you think decisions of this sort often have unexpected or unintended consequences?

Explanation / Answer

A lot of research on this reintroduction has increased our understanding of the effect of large carnivores on an ecosystem. Earlier belief that an ecosystem is built from the bottom to upwards with plants forming the base from which everything grew has been improvised. In past all the conservation was done by rebuilding the plant life in a damaged area and it was thought that once the plants were established the insects, rodents, birds, carnivores and top predators will form a well balance trophic structure. But now it is well observed that some ecosystem could not be fixed without reintroducing an endangered top level animal for example in Yellowstone National park the reintroduction of wolves.

A very important ecological effect called trophic cascade has taken over the park with the reintroduction of the wolves. In other words the effect of introduction of top carnivore at the top of trophic structure will flow down to all trophic levels like a small stream of water and eventually it will lead to balanced ecosystem.

In other words, when wild wolves return to an ecosystem, by chasing and hunting their prey and competing with other species, they help restore balance to the ecosystem.

After wolves reintroduction the following effects has been observed;

Thus, we can say that wolves play a positive role in making the ecosystem stronger, healthier and more balanced.

This visualises the idea of Leopold a forest service employee put forth 50 years ago that ‘Predators control Ecosystems’.

We can conclude that wolves have played a great role in a balanced ecosystem therefore their hunting should not be allowed as it would disturb this balance and cause harm to biological diversity at large.

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