Changing Wildlife Values

 

A wild bobcat pouncing in Marin County, California | Photo credit: Matt Knoth (Shutterstock)

In 2018, a collaborative project led by Colorado State University and supported by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's Conservation Grant program surveyed Americans' values regarding wildlife.  The survey project, called America's Wildlife Values, categorized four different wildlife value orientations - traditionalist, mutualist, pluralist, and distanced.  Traditionalists have a utilitarian view of dominance over nature, and perceive wildlife as a resource to be managed for human benefit.  Mutualists perceive wildlife and wild nature as part of our interconnected community, and prioritize compassion and co-existence with wildlife. Pluralists fit somewhere in between, favoring one orientation or the other depending on the situation, and those who are Distanced are generally disinterested in wildlife-related issues.  The survey lists state-by-state results for these four categories, and compares them with the values of state wildlife agencies, which tend to be disproportionately slanted towards Traditionalist types.  Overall, Mutualists comprise 35% of Americans, followed by Traditionalists at 28%, Pluralists at 21%, and Distanced at 15%.  In addition, Mutualist values are also increasing, while Traditionalist values are declining. 

In addition to an ongoing increase in Americans who identify as mutualists and a decline in traditionalists, ‘non-consumptive’ recreational activities such as birding, wildlife viewing, and photography are growing in popularity.  Today, both urban and rural Americans observe and identify wildlife, providing crowd-sourced geospatial data to citizen science social networks like iNaturalist, which launched in 2008 and has 7.6 million registered users.  Panthera director and leading wildcat researcher Dr. Mark Elbroch has noted shifting wildlife values that the current system of wildlife management does not reflect.  Bobcats are a prominent example, as charismatic carnivores increasingly contributing to ecotourism and wildlife photography, particularly in northern California and national parks such as Shenandoah and Yellowstone.  Additionally, bobcats are recognized as a keystone species important for ecosystem stability.  

Regulations under the current system of wildlife management, which permit exploitative, often unlimited annual bobcat hunting and trapping seasons for pelts, trophy mounts, and so-called "predator control" outside protected areas, are out of step with changing wildlife values in our country.  However, more and more people are appreciating bobcats alive and in the wild.  Wildlife photographers are increasingly enticed by the chance of filming a bobcat in the wild, and treasure the rare encounter with the adaptable yet elusive felines.   

“Cultures around the world are changing, and wildlife managers need to think beyond the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation, which prioritizes hunting and trapping constituents over non-consumptive users.” 

–Elbroch, L.M., et al. (2017). Contrasting Bobcat Values. BIODIVERSITY AND CONSERVATION, 26(12), 2987-2992.