Being killed by a bear re-introduced by humans? No thanks

Natasha Pszenicki
WEST END FINAL

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There are many great causes in green activism — perhaps the most important causes of all — but they’re not all created equal. Not by a long shot.

Saving the planet from ourselves is one thing. Rewilding is quite another. In theory, I’m in favour. How could you not be, especially given the rates at which we extinguish other species?

Then comes news out of Italy this week. A 26-year-old man, Andrea Papi, was in the prime of his life before he was mauled to death by a brown bear while out running in the Alps near Trentino. Horrible and awful. Worse, the bear was only there because it was reintroduced by humans.

The Ursus project brought the bear back to the Alps in 1996. I think it’s fair to say having the bears start killing people wasn’t part of the plan.

The craze for rewilding has reached these shores too. I’m not saying it’s the same, you’re not about to have to face down a brown bear while trying to jog round Hampstead Heath — this is Britain after all. Things tend to the faintly ridiculous, not deadly, here.

Recently a couple in Wales noticed trees in their garden were disappearing (imagine that! having a garden big enough for a tree) and so set up a camera to catch the culprit. It was the work of a wild beaver. Hooray. Who would not want to celebrate the return of these handsome animals we cruelly hunted to extinction 400 years ago? Well...

My problem is this: cute beavers (an important keystone species) aren’t the only ones. There are growing calls to bring back lynxes and even wolves. Have their advocates really thought through the range of consequences of reintroducing species we have learned to live without?

Lynx (sizewise somewhere between a fox and an Alsatian) may well curb out-of-control populations of roe deer and they may cause little trouble outside the forests in which they live, but the bears in Italy were supposed to spread throughout the Alps. Instead they concentrated around Trentino. With lynx it’s not humans who have too much to fear (though I’d rather not meet one on a lonely mountain), but farmers worry about their livestock.

The tragedy in Italy shows where unintended consequences of rewilding can lead. Fuzzy thinking in a noble cause does nobody any good.

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