Photographer Cheryl Alexander was ‘horrified’ to see her iconic image of the Canadian sea wolf Takaya being used for a wolf hunting ad

Ever since he was killed by a hunter in 2020, the Canadian sea wolf Takaya has appeared all over the world.

Paintings, poems, sculptures and statues – including a 150lb (68kg) mixture of driftwood, sea shells and dried kelp – have memorialized a wolf whose legacy reflects the complex relationship between humans and wildlife.

But photographer Cheryl Alexander, a relentless advocate against government-sanctioned wolf culls, was shocked to see her most famous image used to advertise a big game hunting company.

“I was shocked and a bit horrified. And it really pissed me off that company was using Takaya as an advertisement to come up to Canada and kill a wolf,” she told the Guardian. “It hurt too because Takaya has become, in many ways, an international image for positive coexistence with humans.”

  • enkers@sh.itjust.works
    0·
    3 months ago

    “We are a legal family-run business.”

    Just because it’s legal doesn’t mean it’s moral or that it should be happening at all. Hunting tourism is gross.

    • jumjummy@lemmy.world
      0·
      3 months ago

      I think it depends on the types of hunting. If it’s truly conservation focused, and culling is good for the broader population, then the hunting license fees can help support other conservation efforts.

      That’s what a lot of the African big game hunting seems to be. Personally I still think those hunters are assholes, it if local wardens are targeting specific animals that are harming the population (usually older aggressive males), then is sounds like it benefits the local conservation efforts with large license fees.

    • floofloof@lemmy.caEnglish
      0·
      3 months ago

      People engaged in something immoral often use “There’s no law against it” as a defense. If you have to resort to that, it’s time to reconsider what you’re doing.

  • 🇦🇺𝕄𝕦𝕟𝕥𝕖𝕕𝕔𝕣𝕠𝕔𝕕𝕚𝕝𝕖@lemm.eeEnglish
    0·
    3 months ago

    Heres the issue nobody has the balls to talk about tho. We have fucked the environment and the ratio of wildlife within it. You cannot simply let nature do as it pleases becuase we have destroyed the carful balances that was created by millions of years of evolution. Since we have fucked nature to a point where it cannot naturally mediate itself it is now our responsibility to ensure a sustainable environment is maintained. Such maintenance involves the management of all species and management means everything from introductions to controlled culling.

    For example in australia we have wayyyyy to many kangaroos to the point that they are harmful to the environment itself. We caused this and if is our responsibility to cull a certain number every year to ensure the environment is sustainable.

    I know many american states and would assume Canada follow a scheme where the number of animals that can be killed is limited to to keep populations at correct levels. Hence government sanctioned wolf culls. We chose to reintroduced wolves (I would argue for the better) we have thus taken on the responsibility to manage said populations in a sustainable manner.

    And if this artist has any claim then sue on copyright grounds dont spread misinformation in a factually incorrect sob story.

    • corsicanguppy@lemmy.caEnglish
      0·
      3 months ago

      we have wayyyyy to many kangaroos

      Yes. At the third intersection, take a left onto Cameron St. Continue for 12km and the Zoo will be on your right.

      That is the way to many kangaroos.

    • lath@lemmy.world
      0·
      3 months ago

      I’m probably going to contradict you a little.

      The only balance nature has without our intervention is one or several species having a very good growth environment, which leads to an explosion of numbers, an exhaustion/extinction of their food source, collapse through mass starvation, then rinse and repeat with other species in the food chain.

      Nature’s balance is a serial unchecked growth through collapse. Lots of killing and dying over and over again.

      Our problem is that we think we’re above it happening to us if we even think about it at all. We’re not. We’ll grow until we collapse. And then something else will grow uncontrollably, likely feasting on our corpses.

    • girlfreddy@lemmy.caOP
      0·
      3 months ago

      would assume Canada follow a scheme where the number of animals that can be killed

      Only non-residents have to pay for a wolf hunting license. Canadian residents can kill as many as they want.

      The province also has a wolf cull that uses helicopters to hunt.

      is limited to to keep populations at correct levels

      "The province sets a goal of reducing the wolf population in targeted areas by 80 per cent, documents read. This includes the elimination of entire packs so that population density is below three wolves per 1,000 square kilometres." Source

      The province isn’t looking to keep the wolf population in check. It’s looking to decimate it because hunting is BIG business in BC and brings in millions per year.

      • 🇦🇺𝕄𝕦𝕟𝕥𝕖𝕕𝕔𝕣𝕠𝕔𝕕𝕚𝕝𝕖@lemm.eeEnglish
        0·
        3 months ago

        Only non-residents have to pay for a wolf hunting license. Canadian residents can kill as many as they want.

        Up to the area limit?

        The province also has a wolf cull that uses helicopters to hunt.

        What does the means by which this is accomplished matter?

        targeted areas by 80 per cent

        Key word there being targeted areas.

        Where does the 3wolves/1000km^2 come from. Is this in certain areas or nationally surly in cities u would want this number a lot closer to 0wolves/1000km^2.

        Attributing this purly to hunting being big business seems a little extreme. We need someone with an actuall degree in proper environment management for Canadian wilderness to way in on appropriate numbers/density but the odds of such a person being on lemmy seems low.

        • girlfreddy@lemmy.caOP
          0·
          3 months ago

          Area limits …

          • Region 1 Vancouver Island and Channel islands - 3 wolves
          • Region 2 Lower Mainland - 3 wolves
          • Region 3 to 5 - 3 wolves, except multiple areas where there are no bag limits
          • Region 6 - 3 wolves
          • Region 7A - no bag limit
          • Region 7B - 3 wolves
          • Region 8 - 3 wolves Source

          By using helicopters the kill rate is high (not limited by elevation, snow pack, etc) and the fur is not harvested.

          Where does the 3wolves/1000km^2 come from.

          From a Freedom of Information (FOI) request sent by the CBC to BC’s Ministry of Water, Land, and Resource Stewardship.

          “Documents obtained by CBC News through a freedom of information request provide a glimpse into how the wolf cull has been operating.” Source

          Is this in certain areas or nationally surly in cities u would want this number a lot closer to 0wolves/1000km^2.

          Wolves live in packs so do not enter cities. Coyotes do, but not wolves.

          Attributing this purly to hunting being big business seems a little extreme.

          Ok. Please show your data that supports that.

          Here’s my data.

          • I will amend my assumption that hunting income is a prime reason for the wolf cull as BC does not publish income data specific to the wolf cull (except for costs of the heli cull) here. The primary reasons are that mountain caribou populations are severly impacted by the harvesting of old growth forests. In 2021 logging (in BC) brought in $1.8 billion in stumpage fees (fee paid when timber is harvested from Crown land) (Source) and construction of the Coastal GasLink pipeline (which will destroy vital caribou old-growth habitat). Source

          • Wolf control, often presented as a ‘solution’ to stabilize caribou populations, ultimately allows continued approval by governments of resource exploitation, including logging in habitats deemed “critical” to caribou. That’s the central message of a new letter in Science, published by Raincoast scientists. Source

          • Deep-Snow Mountain caribou are obligately bound to forests old enough to support accessible arboreal hair lichens in quantities sufficient to offset the costs of locomotion and other physiological processes (Antifeau 1987), a habitat requirement incompatible with large-scale clearcut forestry (Stevenson et al. 2001). PDF source

          • A government-sponsored wolf kill in Western Canada has had “no detectable effect” on reversing the decline of endangered caribou populations, a study says. Source

          • For Van Tighem, the winter cull is a symptom of an ecosystem out of balance, a natural world so disturbed by human activity that we are forced into playing an ecological version of whack a mole (or, in this case, shoot a wolf). All the while, we clear-cut the old-growth forests on which southern mountain caribou depend, seeding their habitat with oil and gas operations and splintering it with roads. Source

          • Intensifying resource extraction poses an existential threat to the world’s biodiversity. This threat is exemplified in the case of British Columbia’s (BC) endangered woodland caribou herds (Rangifer tarandus), which are facing extirpation due to extraction-driven habitat destruction, primarily from oil & gas development and forest harvest. Source

          • The acceptance of triage (allowing the smallest herds of mountain/woodland caribou to die off) could even provide perverse incentives for this outcome, as exemplified by the disturbingly common frequency with which decisions to approve major industrial projects have used the rationale that caribou habitat in the project area was already degraded or caribou were extirpated (Collard et al., 2020). Source