Quote:
Originally Posted by walking buffalo
"Less" wolves does not ensure ungulate populations will increase.
The catch phrase is "Predator Pit".
Prey populations get so low that they can't rebound as long as there is ANY predation mortality. Such as we are experiencing with caribou in many places.
Lewis and Clarke experience such a phenomenon during their travels.
This is why the crew nearly starved to death and resorted to eating their best friends (mules and dogs) in order to survive. The expedition entered a landscape that was so large and completely devoid of life that they ran out of supplies before they could transverse the area. Predators had consumed Everything for hundreds of miles, then themselves died or left.... it took nearly a century for wildlife to repopulate the void. On Nature's terms, this was/is fine.
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So this over-predation has been going on since before white man laid eyes upon much of western North America....but snowmobiles and seismic lines are the problem.