How Language Shapes the Fight Over Wolves

As wolves make their way back to California, the language used to describe their return reveals a lot about how entrenched views can shape conservation. For instance, when the California Department of Fish and Wildlife announced that a pack of wolves was preying on a herd of cattle last year, outlets latched on to words like unprecedented and surge to describe the 175 cases of livestock killed or injured by the pack.

Despite multiagency efforts, the conflicts continued for months, ending when wildlife officials killed all four members of the pack.

The killing of the wolf pack sparked debate about conservation policy and management tools. Many leaders at environmental groups and wolf experts argued that deterrents came too late and that the wolves had already been habituated. Others, in the ranching community, said the killings were a step in the right direction, citing public safety. However, wolf attacks on cattle are exceptionally rare. For instance, California has over 5 million cattle, meaning that even with the exceptionally high year of wolf-caused cattle mortality, wolf kills accounted for less than 1 percent of the cattle population. Attacks on people are even rarer. 

Beneath the discourse, however, was a less salient cultural dynamic that is so omnipresent it’s barely noticed—the language often used to describe wolves. In a local news report, a Northern Californian livestock owner described the wolves in familiar terms: good wolves and bad wolves. The word choices invoked certain moral connotations based on their behavior toward cattle.

But animals—with all their complex thoughts, feelings, and interactions—cannot understand human-created moral frameworks, said Kristy Ferraro, an ecologist and presidential postdoctoral fellow at the University of Michigan. A wolf is a wild animal, acting according to its biological and cultural imperatives.

In the human world, animals like wolves are often portrayed as villainous predators. Fairy tales such as “Little Red Riding Hood” as well as books and their adapted movies, including White Fang, frequently reinforce these stereotypes. This negative bias is also reflected in news reports and on social media, further cementing the narrative that these creatures are somehow flawed.

“Our culture and our fables from childhood have made it so that when we look at landscapes, we're primed to see the landscape as stages with heroes and villains within them,” said Ferraro. 

Kaggie Orrick, the director at the California Wolf Project, said she encounters this binary language when she meets people affected by wildlife conflicts. They often ask her if there is such a thing as a “good” or a “bad” animal. “What I’ve seen is that the most productive conversations happen when the language becomes more precise and less moralized,” said Orrick.

A recent BioScience paper by Ferraro and Adam Meyer urges scientists to be mindful of the language and narrative tools they use when communicating their scientific studies because their word choices can shape how ecosystems are understood—and ultimately, managed. The paper’s target audience is fellow scientists, but its lessons resonate beyond academia. Experts say word choices, such as problem wolves or depredation, can influence how people see these animals in real life. One study suggests that negative perceptions toward wolves persist in many regions. For those with deeply entrenched views, language alone may not change opinions, said Amaroq Weiss, senior wolf advocate at the Center for Biological Diversity. 

“For that vast swath of people in between,” she added, “language is really important.” If, for example, a person is continually described as untrustworthy, that reputation tends to stick, said Weiss. The same is true for wildlife. “I think how we talk about them affects how other people think of them,” she added.

Scientists call this “message framing”—presenting the same issue in different ways to shape how people understand it. Many people have strong feelings about wolves, which can lead to fixed ideas about wolf management, said Rebecca Niemiec, assistant professor and co-director of the Animal Human Policy Center at Colorado State University.

In 2020, message framing came into play in Colorado, where voters faced a ballot measure that required the state to reintroduce gray wolves into the landscape. A survey that same year, led by Niemiec, tested six different ways of framing this issue. While messaging alone did not change votes, the survey found that more extreme or one-sided language made people with neutral views less likely to share positive information about wolf reintroduction.

The types of stories the media chooses to tell can also shape how people see wildlife. Another Colorado State University analysis of local news coverage of wolves found that articles focused on the creature’s negative impacts, including livestock losses, appeared nearly twice as often as those highlighting the animal’s potential ecological benefits. Since 2023, when wolves were first reintroduced to Colorado, the rollout has remained contentious with ongoing media coverage of livestock conflicts and continued debate over the program’s future. As a related outcome, the state offers one of the highest livestock compensation programs in the US. On average, ranchers are paid up to $15,000 for every confirmed cattle killed by a wolf. 

When state wildlife agencies document livestock losses, the language used to describe those incidents becomes part of this negative bias that disadvantages wolf conservation. In 2021, the Center for Biological Diversity and its partner organizations developed a State Wolf Conservation Planning Guide to help wildlife agencies, policymakers, and advocates design management plans that emphasize nonlethal conflict prevention. The guide included an appendix, “Words Matter,” focused on how language can shape public perception. Weiss said the guide was widely shared, but its recommendations have seen limited implementation.

The appendix calls for clearer language, noting that agencies often use terms such as management, lethal removal, control, or harvest to describe what is simply killing, said Weiss. If agencies choose to kill wolves or other animals in response to conflicts, she argues, the language should be explicit.

The guide explains that the term depredation, which is used by wildlife managers to describe livestock losses linked to wolves, means pillaging. “The term connotes violence and suffering that humans inflict on each other,” said Weiss. “And it implies cruelty and malice.”

But language doesn’t only shape perception in negative ways. It can also influence how people feel invested in an animal’s survival. A case in point, Weiss said, would be the lone wolf nicknamed Bey (BEY03F) that captured public attention as she traveled through Southern California in search of her mate. Her nickname and quest for love launched “Be My Bey” memes and jokes about small dating pools. This language choice is valuable, Weiss added, because it helps to turn a wild animal into a character—and even a species—that people want to root for.

In a landscape where wolves and humans overlap, some policymakers are prioritizing coexistence. California lawmakers are considering a bill that would mandate the use of nonlethal wildlife management approaches and direct CDFW to create a Wildlife Coexistence Program focused on public education and a statewide reporting system. “Even using the word coexistence has a more positive framing than a conflict program, right?” said Weiss. The bill, introduced by Senator Catherine S. Blakespear (D-Encinitas), is set for a committee hearing on April 27.

For conservationists like Orrick, human-wildlife coexistence is the goal. To get there, she meets with livestock owners whose livelihoods are directly affected by wolf conflicts. The system can feel like a pressure cooker. “Wolves are trying to survive. Ranchers are dealing with economic and emotional stress,” said Orrick. “Wildlife agencies are navigating the conflicts and undergoing intense scrutiny on an underfunded budget.”

When the language of these experiences focuses on shared constraints and realities between humans and wildlife, she said, it can help move the conversation forward. “That shift in language can open the door to solutions that feel more grounded and collaborative,” said Orrick, “rather than polarized.”