As wildlife management increasingly focuses on climate adaptation, welfare considerations for individual animals must be integrated into translocation, assisted migration, and managed retreat programs.
Climate adaptation wildlife management creates new welfare challenges that are not well-covered in existing frameworks. Assisted migration programs that move animals to predicted future habitat involve translocation welfare harm. Managed retreat — reducing management effort for populations in declining habitat — involves allowing population decline with welfare consequences. The welfare considerations in climate adaptation are complex: intervention may prevent larger welfare harm through population extinction while causing individual welfare harm through capture and movement. Integrating welfare science into climate adaptation planning ensures individual animal welfare is considered alongside population and ecosystem objectives.