Wild animals experience suffering from predation, disease, starvation and parasitism on an enormous scale. Whether and how to address wild animal suffering is one of the most contested questions in animal ethics.
Wild animal suffering presents a genuine moral challenge that mainstream conservation has historically avoided. Conservationists optimise for ecosystem function and population size, not individual animal welfare - a predator-prey ecosystem is valued regardless of the suffering it produces. From a welfare perspective, the question is whether individual wild animals' suffering matters morally, and if so, what responsibilities this creates. The scale is staggering: estimates suggest wild vertebrate population numbers in the trillions. Small probability of significant individual suffering across this population implies enormous total welfare significance. Practical intervention is nascent but growing, including wildlife disease vaccination programmes and fertility control for pest species.