As a multi-generational Westerner who works in the forest, I see bears and wolves as totem animals. To me, they symbolize the expansive and rugged wildness of the West that originally defined America. To persecute these top predators for the sake of the comparatively few cows they kill is selfish and short sighted.

If ranchers want to use public lands to raise privately owned cows, they should accept the risk imposed by publicly owned predators.