Farmers and villagers deal with more wildlife conflicts

In Bahraich, India, a series of wolf attacks in a recent six-week period claimed the lives of over 10 people, including nine children, and injured 36 more. In Zimbabwe, young children must walk through dense forests to get to school, sometimes making a 9-mile trek before daybreak, when hyenas remain active. Afraid of increasing wildlife encounters, some parents no longer send their children to school, and even some teachers stopped going.

Experts estimate that the world population passed the 8 billion mark in 2022 and will grow to 10.4 billion in the 2080s. As human population growth creates the need for more land development, wildlife habitats shrink, forcing animals into ever-closer proximity to humans as they seek food and shelter. That can result in dangerous situations for both humans and animals.

According to a University of Michigan study released in August, the global overlap between animal and human habitats will increase across 57 percent of the land by 2070, posing particular difficulties in already densely populated areas such as China and India. The expanding overlap, fueled far more by human population growth than by animal movement, will affect agricultural and forest regions the most.

The New Indian Express reported that, in the state of Odisha, about 68 people died this year in wildlife encounters that also damaged 1,087 houses and 2,315 acres of crops. Earlier this year, a mountain lion in northern California killed a 21-year-old man and badly wounded his younger brother in the first fatal mountain lion attack in the state in two decades.

Replacing forests with sugarcane plantations in the state of Maharashtra, India, has greatly escalated human-leopard conflicts. The deforestation diminished natural prey for the leopards, leaving them struggling for survival. Mother leopards often mistake the dense agricultural fields as a safe place to birth their cubs, increasing the likelihood of dangerous situations for both the leopards and humans.

Although killing nuisance wild animals through hunting, trapping, and poisoning can help reduce conflicts, many people want more humane, non-lethal ways to coexist with wildlife.

Jessica DeFord, a wildlife biologist and expert in wildlife ecology with Answers in Genesis, notes that while God has given humans a mandate of “righteous dominion” over animals, we should not elevate creatures over human life. Populations are meant to expand, she told me, referencing God’s command that we be fruitful and multiply.

“There are a lot of environmental activist groups who see humans as a blight on the earth that needs to be reduced and removed,” DeFord said. She agreed that people should care for God’s creation in a way that brings him honor and glory. “But I don’t think that should negate the ability to expand human development, or consider the best interest of people, especially in vulnerable communities,” she said, explaining that many non-lethal methods to manage wildlife allow both human development and animals to flourish.

A recent scientific review suggested farmers protect their livestock by keeping dogs, llamas, or donkeys that can help protect smaller animals from coyotes. Keeping livestock near human activity at vulnerable times, like in the first few weeks of life, can reduce predation, as can decreasing vegetation near livestock that provide food and cover for wild animals. The use of lights, loud noises, and disagreeable smells can discourage wildlife from an area.

Last year, the U.S. Congress passed a federal spending bill that included $4.5 million to support non-lethal practices, such as specialized fencing to keep wolves from calving pastures and electric fences to keep grizzlies out of chicken coops. It also allotted for horseback riders to patrol and protect livestock in wild animal territories and water flow devices that prevent beavers from building dams that flood human properties.

In the Chandaka forest of eastern India, the Forest and Environment minister announced a pilot project using artificial intelligence surveillance to enable authorities to send advanced alerts regarding wild animal movement. Farther north, in the state of Assam, the government warns people via a mobile app of incoming herds of wild elephants. In Zimbabwe, schools teach children about animal behavior to help them recognize and deal with dangerous wildlife situations.

“It helps, we now know a lot of things about animals that we didn’t know before,” Esther Bote, a 14-year-old Zimbabwean student, told the Associated Press.