There have been so many things written about the symbolism and metaphor of peoples fear of wildness. Fencing out the coyotes while they turn their backs to their own wildness, shooting wolves as they kill off every last will full part of themselves. I’m not really up to writing my own rendition, and I’m also more interested in the living breathing reality of things at the moment.
So here’s what’s happening. Wolves are eating peoples dogs. People are upset. They want to kill the wolves, or they want the government to do it. Or allow it.
I’m kind of confused about why wolves are eating peoples dogs. I had only heard of/experienced this once in my life, when I was a little little kid or maybe not even born yet because I don’t remember it, just remember hearing about it. It was when we were out on trapline, and one of the dogs was sick. We went to bed one night and when we woke up in the morning he was gone. There was just his collar, a couple bones, a few drops of blood, and a lot of wolf tracks to show what had happened. The other dogs hadn’t said a peep. My mom told me that that was wolves place in the scheme of things, that they usually only eat sick animals and only resort to healthy ones when there’s nothing else to eat.
So why are wolves coming down into the edges of towns and eating dogs? It might have to do with the men who come from Texas and Montana (I danced for them, dozens of them, this summer) to Kill A Caribou or Kill A Moose. I know it’s a bad year for hares. Some BLM people said that wolves might just be more acclimated to people then ever before. I’m not really buying that as a total cause.
I don’t worry about Bro being eaten by wolves, because I don’t leave him tied up outside where there are wolves. Or bears. Common sense, yanno.
I won’t say anymore because I found an awesome letter to the editor that sums it all up.
Tara-
Why do people so often feel so violated and want revenge when beings act according to their natures, and specifically, when predators behave like predators? Hell, a coyote pack will use a coyote bitch in heat to lure an unneutered male dog out to where they can ambush him and kill and eat him. (Le Belle Dame Sans Merci doesn’t refuse her share, either!) If preferred prey levels are low, why wouldn’t wolves appreciate the housepets that the universe so obligingly provides?
I’m a raised-rural, queer, feminist ProDomme living and working in California, and I’ve has been reading and loving your blog for a couple of months now. I often find your observations to be either fascinatingly applicable to, or weirdly illuminating of, my own life, work, and choices.
However, this entry made me realize that there may be waaay fewer degrees of separation between us than I’d assumed. My little brother is a registered guide in Alaska, and while I think his clients are mostly out for Dall sheep, brown bear and grizzly, I have eaten both ‘bou and moose he’s personally taken. Some of those Montanans and Texans you’ve danced for may have been his clients. I hope they tipped you well! [Hell, I hope they tipped him well, too! 😉 (Sometimes I think his guiding isn’t that much different from your sex work or mine…)]
Be well! You’re fantastic!
-Tatya
Is the food supply scarce (er..more scarce than normal?) You always hear about bears, mt lions, and other wildlife scaveging through the outskirts of towns. It always pains me to hear of people that leave their animals tied up or in outdoor runs with no way to escape a natural predator.
Tatya is correct… Creatures do what’s in their nature and are never hypocrites in behavior. If people are concerned about Fido being eaten, they need to take APPROPRIATE measures to ensure their pets safety. Exterminating part of the ecosystem to do it is just plain wrong.