Predator Control = Sustainable Agriculture

As published in the Eugene Weekly on July 26, 2007:

COUGARS MENACE FARMS

Please keep in mind that a moratorium on predator control can be inconsistent with sustainable agriculture, global warming policy and a healthy environment ("Cougar Kill: Will Oregon hound cougars to death," 7/19).

I can already imagine the conversations at the Market of Choice about those evil cougar hunters as your readers peruse the shelf for their locally grown, antibiotic-free lamb and free-range chicken. All the while, shoppers are clueless of the connection between our local hunters and what they consider their guilt-free sustainable meat choices. However, our food supply is all about balance and sacrifice.

On our farm we balance killing raccoons with protecting a flock of 70 flavorful free-range chickens (no, chicken doesn't really taste like chicken), turkeys and ducks that are free from antibiotics, inhumane quarters and clipped beaks.

We balance killing skunks with protecting hundreds of thousands of our nation's biggest pollinator and with our desire for a healthy, unprocessed sweetener without a huge carbon footprint from shipping.

We balance killing cougars and coyotes with protecting our beef calf, herd of Boer meat goats and our three little piglets. Alternatively, I suppose we could buy grocery store meat shipped via an enormous carbon footprint and fed grain through chemically dependent corporate farming techniques.

Being omnivores isn't pretty. As much as I don't enjoy killing predators and harvesting our livestock, I prefer that vastly over assuming that meat magically appears in the grocer's freezer. Consequently, the tools of our farm will continue to include the hoe for removing garden threats and firearms for removing pasture threats.

C. Michael Arnold, Creswell

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Here are some responses (Eugene Weekly 8/9/07):

PRETTY VEGETARIANS

While I applaud C. Michael Arnold's awareness of his carbon footprint (7/26) and his efforts to live sustainably, I fear he misses the obvious and simple solution to his discomfort in killing predators and livestock. Don't do it!

As he states, "being omnivores isn't pretty." So don't be one. Becoming a vegetarian would eliminate his discomfort, save the lives of his farm animals and the predators he currently competes with and maximise his ability to live in a sustainable and healthy world.

I agree with and appreciate his pointing out that shoppers are clueless regarding "what they consider their guilt-free sustainable meat choices." There simply is no such thing as a guilt-free meat choice.

For more information check out http://www.goveg.com/

Bryan Wilson, Eugene

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My response: I agree that vegetarianism would be the total solution. It is far more sustainable than livestock. For instance, the energy (calories) needed to grow feed for livestock nets meat calories that are far, far lower than the orignal calories. So instead of growing grain for cattle, it's more efficient for us to eat that grain. However, this misses the fatal flaw to this logic: hamburgers.....yum.....

- Mike Arnold, 1/16/08

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BLOODY FOOTPRINTS

Although I applaud C. Michael Arnold (7/26) for his foray into sustainable farming with a smaller carbon footprint, I query why your alternative footprints have to be soaked in cougar blood. As you're obviously not a "cat person," I wonder what you have against using dogs to keep the purring panthers at bay. Enter the noble Great Pyrenees, bred specifically to defend your free-range critters against coyotes so you can sleep easy and save your shells. Scads of evidence from Montana farmers prove conclusively the ever-vigilant furballs fare equally well against cougars, wolves, raccoons, fishers, foxes and even skunks. If you really don't enjoy killing predators and would be happy to just scare them away, then it's a no-brainer.

After living in a teepee through two Montana winters with nothing between the Rattlesnake Wilderness and me but some cold canvas, straw and whatever wits I could get to function at -20§ F, I soon learned what it was like to be stalked and confronted by a cougar. The best survival advice I found is to not act like prey — jumping up and down, waving my arms and shouting "I'm not prey!"

Hunting such an invisible and majestic animal with or without dogs is barbaric, inhumane and ineffectual. Let's look at it another way — cougars need more room. There is still a movement to create wilderness corridors connecting their dwindling postage stamp ecotones from North to South America called the Path of the Panther, and Oregon should pounce on it if we desire any wilderness heritage at all. Sound better than paying for the new NAU Superhighway?

A.F. Nash, Eugene

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My response: Livestock Guardian Dogs (LGDs) are a wonderful solution for cougars, bears, and coyotes. However, I can't rationalize fifty pounds of dog feed a week to protect our small farmstead.