Increased Wildfires, Toxic Smoke & Imbalanced Ecosystems Leading to Depredation of Livestock by Apex Predators

Back in late 2017, I began a conversation with scientists and a few public land managers about what I had learned about Chronic Wasting Disease (‘CWD’), which now 8-years later is a hot public topic. In February 2018, I was asked to speak with Enviro-News about this topic.

The loss of millions of critically important herbivores (deer, elk and wild horses) has resulted in several serious adverse impacts costing American taxpayers hundreds of $-billions annually.

Adverse impacts from collapsed herbivore populations include:

Excessive and accumulating grass & grass wildfire fuels leading to catastrophic, unnaturally hot wildfires, loss of human life and more wildlife, loss of businesses, homes and increased homelessness, deadly toxic smoke killing tens of thousands of Americans each year, as well as the increased depredation by Apex predators (cougars, bears, wolves, coyotes) seeking alternate meat sources, such as domestic livestock, people’s pets, and even a few humans.

Just in California, the deer population is down approximately 1.5-million deer over the past 60-years, and still dropping.

In fact, the current deer population in California is already below the population that triggered a 9-year suspension of deer hunting from 1917 to 1927 (see image below and yellow highlights).

Yet, even though today the deer population is lower than during the 1917 suspension of deer hunting, California Department of Fish & Wildlife is ridiculously still selling deer tags, arguably because self-serving greed and willful ignorance are now driving wildlife management, instead of logical thinking, wildlife ecology and sustainable, adaptive herd management.  

And let’s keep this in mind; there are more hunters today than there were in 1917, a lot more.

If the graph above (courtesy DeerFriendly) was carried out to 2024, the drop shown would be continued. This is an embarrassment to wildlife managers at California Department of Fish & Wildlife, so they sequester the hard un-compromised data, lie to the public by omission. That must end!  We need logic and truth to properly manage our wildlife, which benefits everyone, including ranchers and hunters.

The result of the collapse in our deer & elk herds is that approximately 2-million tons of annual grass and brush, formerly grazed by those 1.5-million deer, now goes un-grazed and is accumulating across the California landscape.  And when it burns, it burns abnormally hot. So hot in fact, that these grass and brush fires melt aluminum engine blocks, mag wheels and ladders. These recently evolved super-hot grass & brush fueled wildfires incinerate many modern homes (even those up to newer fire codes) inside their so-called ‘defensible spaces’. The empirical data from hundreds of recent grass and brush wildfires is that, defensible spaces are rendered far less effective when surrounded by landscapes laden with grass & brush fuels.

The steep loss of cervids in several western states has forced Apex predators to seek-out substitute prey.  

And so livestock have become their chief prey in many areas where deer and wild horses have been mismanged and are depleted or gone altogether.  Matters are made worse by the ongoing willfully ignorant and reckless management of wildlife and wild horses by the Bureau of Land Management, the United States Forest Service and the California Department of Fish & Wildlife, who deserve most of the blame for the collapsed cervid populations in California and Oregon.

Of course vehicular accidents with cervids and poaching are also impacting deer populations, but to lesser extent than licensed hunting. And when there’s fewer prey animals and the ratio of predator-prey is radically disproportionate, the impact of existing Apex predators is greatly amplified.  

And now making matters even more complex for the checkers-players in this game of chess, we have Chronic Wasting Disease (‘CWD’) in California and Oregon.

CWD is a fatal disease in all mammals with no cure.

CWD is a prion disease (not bacteria or virus) and according to Dr. Mark Zabel Asst. Professor at the Prion Research Center in Ft. Collins CO, the vector for CWD disease is vegetative materials (grass & brush) that is contaminated by the feces and urine of infected cervids (deer & elk).  It takes time for CWD to kill it’s victims. And if an infected animal is allowed to wander around the landscape for the weeks it takes to die, it will infect many other animals, thus accelerating the spread of this deadly disease. However, when any prey animal is not 100%, the usual result is a predator quickly removes it from the population.

On an interesting side is that a great case study of the adverse impacts of mismanaging predators comes from Utah. 

When bison were introduced into the area, ranchers with grazing permits were concerned about over-grazing. So a team of scientists was brought-in to determine how much forage was being consumed by the herd of bison. 

At the completion of the Study, the result surprised everyone, especially the ranchers.  Rabbits were consuming more forage than the herd of bison. As a result of the ranchers aggressive extermination of coyotes (and some wolves), the rabbit population exploded and became the new, more difficult problem. 

“The study concludes: “The reduction or elimination of ‘predator-removal programs’ may result in an increase in forage availability for wildlife and livestock.”

Prion diseases can potentially jump species according some published studies and according to Dr. Zabel:

However, assuming that the vector for CWD is vegetative forage (grass & brush), and knowing that studies suggest that the incidence of infection is dose related, any animal that could reduce infected vegetation via grazing without contracting or spreading the disease would be exceptionally valuable on the landscape… guess what? 

There is such an animal, the wild horse!  Horses are resistant to CWD and do not spread the disease. Wolves, cougars, bears, coyotes and dogs are also resistant to CWD and can quickly remove diseased deer from the herd, and eat them, and do not spread the disease themselves.  So we now have catch-22… If we kill the predators that can protect livestock from CWD, that disease may overcome the landscape and the livestock industry causing $-billions in losses.

The data shows that it makes far more sense, ecologically and economically, to mange Apex predators by allowing them to engage in Natural Selection (removing sick deer and elk), and also making sure they have plenty of wildlife prey (includes wild horses, which benefit genetically from Natural Selection), and aren’t limited or forced to consuming domestic livestock for their survival.  

As we have seen over the past decade, wolves (and other Apex predators) are taking cattle and other livestock as prey in the agricultural areas of Siskiyou and other Counties in California and Oregon, which like many other areas in the western U.S. are suffering from a well-documented collapse of deer and elk populations.  This ongoing depredation and loss of economic benefit puts Apex predators in jeopardy for removal via one means or another. However, we have to fully understand the situation before we take any actions we might later regret. 

Because of the mismanagement of cervids, coupled with the intentional ill-conceived removals of the few remaining wild prey animals left, the wild horses, the prey choices for Apex Predators has mostly narrowed-down to domestic livestock and the scant few remaining deer, and the result is economic hardship for ranchers from the loss of livestock, which includes losses of calves and breeding stock.

This reckless wildlife management and agency malfeasance is costing our ranchers their livelihoods, and maybe at some point soon, even their ranches.  And the ongoing promotion of false information by these same government agencies is misinforming ranchers and the public, which may be part of the plan to run them out of business and off the landscape. 

Recently, Wayne McCrory a wildlife biologist made a presentation at the Wild Horse Summit, as did our Org. the Wild Horse Fire Brigade.

Wayne had some very interesting things to share, which can assist our Counties in reducing depredation of our local cattle and other animals:

Here are a couple relevant slides from his presentation:

In the foregoing screenshot of the abstract of the Study by Andreasen, et. al. we read that 59.6% of the diet of the cougars studies was in fact wild horses. 

In our local herd of cultural-heritage horses at Wild Horse Ranch in Siskiyou County, over the past 10+ years, we have observed very similar predation patterns by the local Apex predators here, which include wolves, mountain lions, bears, coyotes and coyote-wolf hybrids (coy-wolves). 

It’s clear from these and many other example studies that can be readily produced, having wild horses in the appropriate wild-lands outside the WUI, and beyond the lands used for livestock grazing can provide co-evolved prey for the Apex predators in lieu of cattle, sheep and goats. 

Clearly, if we continue on the path we are on today, a failing path, and we allow the malfeasance by these agencies to continue, not only will ranchers be put out of business, but all Americans will suffer ongoing massive economic losses from these grass & brush fueled wildfires and the resulting massive death-toll from deadly toxic smoke.

There Is Hope:

The research that has been conducted over the past decade and is ongoing has led to new information that can implement superior management of wild horses. Several leading equine scientists agree with this perspective, including professors from California State University-Sacramento and Arizona State University:

Wild Horse Fire Brigade has pioneered and developed an empirically-proven, cost effective tool and partial solution that in one move helps mitigate several serious and costly problems. And it’s virtually free of cost, so it is very cost-effective.

In remote vacant wild-land areas well beyond agricultural areas and the WUI, we introduce an indicated number of wild horses that can be gotten from the BLM at virtually no cost.

And under existing Law, the HUMANE TRANSFER OF EXCESS ANIMALS ACT, we can obtain and deploy those non-breeding wild horses (sterilized by the BLM) as ‘Work Animals’ (defined by Law under the Act), doing the ‘work’ of wildfire fuels management, which is what these horses do naturally and happily  More about the LAW (some say doesn’t exist) can be found at the BLM’s website: https://www.blm.gov/policy/im-2022-035

The Legal Path and Process for this Plan, was vetted by a Law Professor-JD trial lawyer and equine expert, also a J.D.  It can be read here:

A LEGAL PATH TO REWILDING HORSES UNDER H.R. 1625

We are already grazing cattle on the close-in edges of USFS managed lands that are stuffed with grass and brush wildfire fuels through annually renewed cooperative grazing agreements between Siskiyou County and the USFS (I can produce those documents on request).  So it’s no stretch whatsoever to use legal ‘Work Animals’ (horses) obtained from the BLM in the areas (remote vacant lands) unsuited for domestic livestock fire-grazing for various, obvious reasons.  It’s all about using the right species of herbivore in the right location.

I.E. Goats are great for many landscapes inside the WUI that are free of threatened or endangered flora.

---