Rewilding projects that reintroduce apex predators raise challenging welfare questions about the suffering of individual prey animals, even when population and ecosystem benefits are well-established.
The tension between wild animal welfare and ecosystem health is sharpest in predator-prey dynamics. Individual prey animals suffer genuine fear and pain during predation, yet predator absence can lead to overpopulation, habitat degradation, and eventual starvation — arguably worse aggregate welfare outcomes. Welfare-informed rewilding practice requires honest engagement with these trade-offs rather than treating ecosystem restoration as automatically welfare-positive.