Rewilding large carnivores — wolves, lynx, bears — has cascading ecosystem benefits but raises welfare questions about individual animal adaptation, prey welfare, and human conflict.
Large carnivore rewilding generates welfare impacts at multiple levels simultaneously. Individual reintroduced animals face adaptation challenges and mortality risks. Prey animals experience behavioral ecology changes — the landscape of fear — that affect energy budgets and ranging. Livestock producers face predation losses. Human-wildlife conflict can result in retaliatory killing. Yet the welfare benefits of restored ecosystem function are substantial — natural predator-prey dynamics create healthier prey populations with natural culling of weak individuals. The welfare accounting for rewilding must include these multiple layers.