Livestock – large carnivore coexistence practitioners can be more effective by expanding from a direct focus on carnivores and predation-prevention tools to the broader social-ecological context of ranches and rural communities, especially livestock management. The most groundbreaking grazing management is inspired by nature, involving rotations with high stocking density and frequent movement, as recently shown but not yet widely adopted. Modeling livestock management after the grazing patterns and reproductive cycles of wild ungulates in the presence of their predators can improve rangeland health and livestock production—and increase the ability of ranching operations to coexist with native carnivores. The central anti-predator behavior of wild grazing animals is to form large, dense herds that then move around the landscape to seek fresh forage, avoid fouled areas, and escape predators. Strategic grazing management involving high stocking density and frequent movement, such as rotational grazing and herding with low-stress livestock handling, can improve rangeland health and livestock production, by managing the distribution of grazing across time, space, and plant species. Synchronized calving seasons (modeled on predator satiation in wild herbivores) can increase livestock production and reduce labor inputs, especially when timed to coincide with peak availability of forage quality. Such livestock management approaches based on anti-predator behaviors of wild ungulates can directly and synergistically reduce predation risk—while simultaneously establishing a management context in which other predation-prevention practices and tools can be used more effectively. Recent projects on ranches and National Forest allotments in the U.S. Northern Rockies have successfully increased stocking density with temporary cross-fencing and herding, or by rekindling the herd instinct using low-stress livestock handling; such herds have had no or very few conflicts with wolves or grizzly bears.
Oral presentation and poster titles, abstracts, and authors from the Society for Range Management (SRM) Annual Meetings and Tradeshows, from 2013 forward.