Wolves in Scotland Survey.

[gilesdiss]

Are you from Scotland and enjoy spending time in the countryside? Then you could help me with my dissertation by filling out this survey!
The survey is completely anonymous and should only take a few minutes of your time. The aim of the study is to find out Scottish people’s attitudes towards wolves and any groups of people that may conflict with wolves if they were released into the Scottish countryside.
The study is purely hypothetical and is not related to any real wolf reintroduction project but aims to investigate this relatively new area of discussion. I am myself not for or against the reintroduction of wolves to Scotland, this is just an area of interest with relatively little recent research.
Thank you for any replies.

https://forms.office.com/Pages/ResponsePage.aspx?id=-rKZc65vv0mnaFhQugcXP4hCSKZq3-pDkKNgciG031JUNkw3R1JXRUZZSEM2QzMzNEJOVVZOWkRZVi4u

[Mice!]

I'm not from Scotland fella but have you watched the BBC wildlife doc with Gordon Buchanan on the re introduction of wolves in the USA, a really good watch, shows a bit of both sides, I cant imagine there being enough space nowadays for wolves given the amount of roads and sheep and people but who knows?

[Gordon R]

Is there a point in repeating the same questions? The survey seems slanted towards re-introduction, despite:-

Quote

 I am myself not for or against the reintroduction of wolves to Scotland

 

[jam1e]

2 hours ago, Mice! said:

I'm not from Scotland fella but have you watched the BBC wildlife doc with Gordon Buchanan on the re introduction of wolves in the USA, a really good watch, shows a bit of both sides, I cant imagine there being enough space nowadays for wolves given the amount of roads and sheep and people but who knows?

Hi Mice. I've not watched the BBC wildlife doc with Gordon Buchanan on the re introduction of wolves in the USA. Can't find a decent link. Just 2 minutes or less intro's. Don't suppose you have a link to the whole doc do you?

Cheers

Jamie

[Lloyd90]

If you want true critical feedback - which you should if your doing a dissertation - it’s not a very well constructed survey - lots of the questions are repeated and as noted seem very severely worded. 

[Uilleachan]

2 hours ago, Mice! said:

I'm not from Scotland fella but have you watched the BBC wildlife doc with Gordon Buchanan on the re introduction of wolves in the USA, a really good watch, shows a bit of both sides, I cant imagine there being enough space nowadays for wolves given the amount of roads and sheep and people but who knows?

I used to think that until I started spending time in eastern Europe, plenty people livestock less room and plenty wolves. Different husbandry practice, shepherds spend more time with their flocks and those flocks are defended by Carpathian sheep dogs, scarier in every way than wolves.    

[guzzicat]

All I hear is about the re/in troduction of predators, of one kind or another, what are they supposed to eat? In my area we already have more Badgers than Rabbits,

[Mice!]

46 minutes ago, jam1e said:

Hi Mice. I've not watched the BBC wildlife doc with Gordon Buchanan on the re introduction of wolves in the USA. Can't find a decent link. Just 2 minutes or less intro's. Don't suppose you have a link to the whole doc do you?

Cheers

Jamie

I've not sorry, just had a look to see if I still had it but I've not, the fella who wants to shoot the wolves is such a joke, I like pretty much everything Gordon Buchanan does, his living with predators is good sharks, golden eagles and Hyenas. 

I do remember the program saying that the reintroduction if wolves had changed the landscape, deer elk moose couldn't just graze at will allowing trees to grow again, and they decimated the coyotes which benefited smaller mammals a good watch.

[Mice!]

http://www.ironammonite.com/2012/04/land-of-lost-wolves-gordon-buchanan.html?m=1

just found this for some reading info and gives the program name, longer ago than I thought

[Uilleachan]

10 minutes ago, Mice! said:

I've not sorry, just had a look to see if I still had it but I've not, the fella who wants to shoot the wolves is such a joke, I like pretty much everything Gordon Buchanan does, his living with predators is good sharks, golden eagles and Hyenas. 

I do remember the program saying that the reintroduction if wolves had changed the landscape, deer elk moose couldn't just graze at will allowing trees to grow again, and they decimated the coyotes which benefited smaller mammals a good watch.

There no doubt about that. They'd do plenty good, especially in the open expanses forcing deer off the better ground and ridding the high hill of foxes, which tends to be a bit of a bastion for the fox now that there no one on them 24/7 this last 50 or 60 years. . 

I can see it from both sides, I've friends and family on both sides of the argument so normally tiptoe around the issue. Stalkers would need to re learn their patch as the deer would be favouring different ground and, livestock would certainly be on the menu. Then there's the little red riding hood irrational fear the wolf instills.   

That said, the wolf is making his own way back to former ranges on mainland western Europe, with a lower than expected impact, exaggerating compensation addicted French sheep farmers aside.

It could be done, where public subsidy applies recipients are going to have to be a little more accepting of different views on land use and more accommodating, especially when subsidies are back in the hands of westminster as they'll be a little more visible to the largely urban tax payer. Something I've argued for quite sometime among my largely rural posse. The times they are a changing and we're all going to have to adapt to the new realities.

If wolves don't work out, someone would have to go shoot them. In this day and age they've no place to hide so we've little to fear....  

[scotslad]

I'd agree with some of the above points about it not being particularly well written, but in defence to the boy nowadays even lecturers are leaning so far left and anti hunting/killing stuff even for conservation its not real.

 

For me the 2 biggest problems are Scotland simply isn't big enough. Ur never truly that far away from houses, roads or civilisation, I bet it is fairly hard to find a spot where u don't have a house within 20 miles, considering the vast distances wolf's can travel in a short time. 

The other big problem would be no matter how it turns out (wether a brilliant success and wolf's everywhere or a complete disaster eating sheep everywhere) they would never allow u to shoot 1 even if it was destroying ur liveliehood.

U only have to look at the way they are with Badgers and certain numerous BoP species, they can't do any wrong

[scotslad]

I meant to add, I really dunno why all these conservationists are fasicinated by wolves (or only predators in general) when they're is plenty of other birds/animals in desperate need of money time, work. From grey partridge, waders, red squirrel, wildcat, black grouse and capercallie and many many more far more deserving causes

 

But if they really do need to re-intro a apex predator I don't know why they always focus on wolves, lynx would make far more sense, smaller ranges/territories, really a woodland animal so would be semi restricted in travels. Basically a far easier mammal to release,  monitor and 'control/contain' with many of the same 'supposed' benefits

 It could help to keep deer numbers down and also alter there behaviour in time to keep them out of forestry which might help ease some of the conflict between forestry and sporting estates. Bizzarely enough the landowners hardest and most ruthless with there deer culls tend to be the 'conservation' charities (JMT, NTS and rspb) ep when trying to establish natural unfenced woodland regen

[Benthejockey]

There really is no need to reintroduce an apex predator such as wolves or lynx back into the countryside in this country. There may well be pockets of countryside where deer numbers are very high but on the whole there’s quite good population control. So if the deer population is relatively well regulated by stalkers, professional and recreational alike, what else will they eat? Rabbits? Rabbit populations fluctuate massively especially with the prevalence of myximitosis. One year the predator is full of rabbit and the next year there’s no rabbits left. Foxes? The situation with foxes is probably a combination of both deer and rabbit. The populations get large quite quickly but also get hammered by shooters. The only safe place for a Fox is in the towns where they’re effectively bullet proof! That leaves a large bitey predator with limited food sources that are boom or bust populations, in boom times you’d never see old toothy but when they’ve got limited resources because everything has been eaten/shot/died they’ve got two choices, find the nearest farm and start eating livestock or find the nearest town/village and start eating pets. They’re in that situation in America now where they’ve got an exploded coyote population enroaching on towns eating cats and dogs. They’re also hybridising with wolves and getting bigger and stronger. And in Alaska where they have reintroduced the wolves very successfully they have had to reintroduce cull measures because they have been so successful in their repopulation they were becoming a nuisance to farmers/trappers and homesteaders. 

You cant introduce a foreign species regardless of whether it used to be native, that has no predators without introducing a means of controlling the population. But it will get discussed over and over again because they’re impressive creatures rather than invest time and money in things like grey partridge because to the general public a grey partridge is just a small pheasant and there’s loads of them. 

[henry d]

I started to fill it in but stopped, you have asked two different questions twice and I`m not convinced this is for a dissertation.

I live in Scotland and the beavers which were released locally to me, possibly by SNH (if not they knew who did it), which were supposed to have escaped (but noone knows where from) and I would imagine that wolves will escape be released no matter what.

[Walker570]

Re introduced wolves in Slovenia have been a serious pain and are becoming so all over mainland Europe.  Deer control, don't make me laugh. Wolves are not stupid and a fat old ewe sheep is a darn site easier to catch than a roe deer or even a red hind.   Fabulous animal but even in the wilds of Scotland there is just not enough room and in my view totally crazy to suggest returning them.

[jam1e]

22 hours ago, Mice! said:

http://www.ironammonite.com/2012/04/land-of-lost-wolves-gordon-buchanan.html?m=1

just found this for some reading info and gives the program name, longer ago than I thought

Thanks. 

[Uilleachan]

3 hours ago, Walker570 said:

Re introduced wolves in Slovenia have been a serious pain and are becoming so all over mainland Europe.  Deer control, don't make me laugh. Wolves are not stupid and a fat old ewe sheep is a darn site easier to catch than a roe deer or even a red hind.   Fabulous animal but even in the wilds of Scotland there is just not enough room and in my view totally crazy to suggest returning them.

Wolves weren't "reintroduced" to Slovenia, they never left. Sure they may have been shot out from time to time but they're part of the balkans and from the european wolf stronghold in Romania they simply move back in. There's also a population in Italy that may or may not be connected genetically with those in the balkans. The italian wolf is expanding into France via the maritime alps, not sure about the Julian alp and surrounding mountain zone, a cross roads between Italy Slovenia and Austria. 

The wolf is recolonising other parts too, not just France, Germany, Austria, western Poland etc. they've even had a road killed wolf recovered from the Netherlands, it's reckoned to be only a matter of a decade or two before the eastern populations reestablish genetic contact with the isolated iberian wolf. The brown bear to is staging a remarkable comeback, with some help in places but off their own back too.  

For or against is irrelevant, if wolf packs can reestablish territories in the above countries they have plenty of room in a place like Scotland. Which has 15,000 msq of uninhabited ground, there's no space like that anywhere in western Europe. The eurasian wolf has a different pack behaviour to their grey cousins, viable packs are smaller and don't need the vast territories that are required in the americas, they're also more accustomed to living cheek by jowl with humans in a man made landscape, as thats how they've evolved.    

I say irrelevant because it matters not what you or I think, policy like this will be decided by townies, townies = the people who subsidise the rural areas of the UK through tax, tax for infra structure, tax for agricultural subsidy. Only a fool would imagine that the townie tax payer will have no say on rural matters in brexit Britain  

[Walker570]

You can take it from me the Slovenian country folk are not happy about the situation of the wolves being allowed to re enter Slovenia. A few tree huggers probably but they close their eyes to the damage wolves do. The brown bear is also now starting to venture into towns. my last visit I saw video a friend took of a large female walking through the shopping centre.  Again magnificent animal and fortunately the Slovenian Government agency are allowing the harvest of brown bears to try and keep numbers down. Bear goulash was on offer at my hotel last time I was there. Delicious.

[Dekers]

This isn't a new topic, it has been discussed over many years and will never happen LEGALLY.

******* stupid idea if anyone spends more than a heartbeat thinking about it.

The fact is there are several sites in Scotland with wolves, and it is simply a matter of time before some escape!

 

Edited December 14, 2017 by Dekers

[12gauge82]

I'd love to see it happen, the practicalities of if it would work, I really have no clue, but feel it would if the effort were made.

[Mice!]

Well if they do escape I hope there wearing radio collars because it didn't go well for the last lynx that escaped did it?

[Uilleachan]

22 minutes ago, Walker570 said:

You can take it from me the Slovenian country folk are not happy about the situation of the wolves being allowed to re enter Slovenia. A few tree huggers probably but they close their eyes to the damage wolves do. The brown bear is also now starting to venture into towns. my last visit I saw video a friend took of a large female walking through the shopping centre.  Again magnificent animal and fortunately the Slovenian Government agency are allowing the harvest of brown bears to try and keep numbers down. Bear goulash was on offer at my hotel last time I was there. Delicious.

Bear steak too. Popular in Macedonia. Tasty especially with a few good tots of good palinka