Of all the romantic places where sheep roam like the Shetlands or Ireland or Iceland, one thing they have in common is a lack of four legged predators.

I read suggestions livestock could be raised in a way that is predator friendly.  This has been defined as not killing predators that attack livestock, but instead finding other means to protect the domestic animals.  The people who were the among the major promoters of "predator friendly" livestock, Predator Conservation Alliance, are the only ones who can certify that a producer is "predator friendly."  Their brochure touts the financial

advantages of this designation, indicating among other things that one can sell items on the website predatorfriendly.com.

Woolgrowers who sign onto the predator friendly agenda are not allowed to

kill predators.   They are encouraged to protect their sheep with burros, llamas, dogs or other means.  Neither llamas nor burros can protect sheep against cougars, bears or wolves and would likely be killed along with the sheep.

Livestock guarding dogs are not an option in many settings because some dogs  have a casual attitude towards fencing and in many areas frequent barking would disturb neighbors.  Nonetheless black bears, cougars and coyotes live in or move through populated areas.

Some environmentalists believe that predators only take the old, weak or sickly and presumably decide to go hungry when faced with perfectly healthy specimens. While the wolf population has increased about 26% on average each year for the past decade in Montana, Idaho and Wyoming, the elk herd has declined by half in Yellowstone and other areas. In Yellowstone, an all-time low in elk calf "recruitment" has been reached with only 14 calves surviving to join the herd each year for every 100 elk cows.

Black bears have to share some of the blame for killing elk calves.  The Pennsylvania a Game Commission study found black bears equally responsible for white-tail deer fawn predation with coyotes. In Minnesota one study showed black bears kill as many fawns as wolves.

Some people believe that black bears survive on nuts and berries.  The truth is that black bears need to consume massive amounts of food, especially in the fall. The calorie count (20,000 calories) needed for one bear for one fall day is 70 lbs of blueberries or 12 lbs of meat.

Big (300 to 400 lb) black bears have attacked and killed our sheep - - once while my grandkids were here visiting.  There is nothing friendly about waking up in the morning and looking out the window to see a black bear

eating one of your sheep in the pasture or dealing with mauled-but-living sheep. When livestock or guarding dogs are mauled, disfigured, but not killed and eaten, vet bills can run to thousands for just sewing the animal

up and treating wounds.

One time a black bear came into our barn and killed one of our dairy goats. A black bear ripped the doors and steel track off a barn belonging to a friend to kill a sheep inside his barn. On many occasions black bears have tried to get into our home while we slept.

Electric fencing is our main defense against black bears.  The PA Game Commission advised us to bait the electric fencing with bacon so that black bears would find it quite unpleasant to be around our pasture.

Bear baiting and dog fights are regarded to be cruelty of the worst sort.  How different is it to offer up a bunch of tasty livestock fenced in for the predator's convenience?  How different is it to make it necessary for livestock guarding dogs to go up against a wolf or a bear?

And then what is a predator anyway?  Is it something that kills and eats animals?  Some predators - - coyotes, for one - - start eating before the prey animal is dead.  That would seem to make internal and external parasites predators.  Maybe they should be allowed to feast on the blood and tissue of our livestock?

Predation increases with the increase in predators.  Around 1980, Pennsylvania had about 2,500 black bears with a big chunk of that population near where I live. We rarely saw them and they were not much of a problem. Today PA has some 15,000 to 18,000 black bears and they are constantly breaking into people's homes, killing livestock and trying to hibernate under decks and in crawl spaces under occupied homes.

The suggestion is that people who raise livestock need to respect the wolves, bears, cougars and coyotes for their position in the grand scheme of things.  I prefer to respect the experience and knowledge of my ancestors to whom I owe so much, but as usual, the lessons of history are ignored.