Border Wall Proves Effective in Stopping Mexicans (Wolves)
For all those who said that Trump’s border wall would “never work” or that it would be “ineffective”…we now have proof of just how good the wall is at keeping Mexicans out. That is, if by “Mexicans” you mean “Mexican Gray Wolves” and if by “out” you mean “in”.
The Center for Biological Diversity says that, for the first time, they’ve DIRECTLY observed a wolf being stymied by the border wall.
Mexican gray wolves were reintroduced to the American Southwest in 2011. The wolves, numbering just a couple of hundred, were all fitted with GPS trackers. In a press release on December 13, the Center for Biological Diversity (CeBiDiv?) showed the frustrating travel of one of the wolves named Mr. Goodbar. He clearly wanted to get from north of the border to south of the border but was unable to because of a section of the wall that was completed during the Trump presidency.
GPS tracking shows that Mr. Goodbar (it’s unclear if ALL tracked wolves are named after chocolate-based junk food or just this one) was traveling south on the morning of November 23rd.
That afternoon, he hit the wall. Then, he spent the next four days pacing along the wall line. Mr. Goodbar (the wolf) walked 23 miles in those four days before giving up and heading north.
Conservationists have warned, even long before the Trump era that a manmade barrier like a border wall would have a devastating impact on wildlife in the area around El Paso.
So, a wolf couldn’t cross into Mexico. Big whoop, right? Actually, it IS a big whoop. A VERY big whoop, indeed!
Because of the small number of MGW’s in the wild, there is a very real danger of inbreeding, according to Michael Robinson, a senior conservation advocate at the Center for BiDiv. “The wall separates wolves in the Southwest from those in Mexico and exacerbates inbreeding in both populations.”
So what can be done to help the wolves? Robinson has a straightforward solution: “President Biden should knock down the wall. We can’t allow this stark monument to stupidity to slowly strangle a vast ecosystem.”
But, for now, the wall remains and Mr. Goodbar the Mexican gray wolf can’t get around it. That is until wolves figure out a way to overstay their Visas, I guess.