Environment·AnimalsCattle ranchers talk to wolves by blasting AC/DC’s ‘Thunderstruck’ or dialogue from movies: ‘I am not putting up with this anymore!’By Cedar AttanasioBy The Associated PressBy Cedar AttanasioBy The Associated Press Ranchers are getting creative with Gray Wolves.Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife via AP, FileFor millennia humans have tried to scare wolves away from their stock.
Most of them didn’t have drones.
But a team of biologists working near the California-Oregon border do, and they’re using them to blast AC/DC’s “Thunderstruck,” movie clips and human voices at the apex predators to shoo them away from cattle in an experiment.
“I am not putting up with this anymore!” actor Scarlett Johansson yells in one clip, from the 2019 film “Marriage Story.” “With what? I can’t talk to people?” co-star Adam Driver shouts back.
Gray wolves were hunted nearly to extinction throughout the U.S. West by the first half of the 20th century.
Since their reintroduction in Idaho and at Yellowstone National Park in the mid-1990s, they’ve liferated to the point that a population in the Northern Rockies has been removed from the endangered species list.
There are now hundreds of wolves in Washington and Oregon, dozens more in northern California, and thousands roaming near the Great Lakes.
The recovering population has meant increasing conflict with ranchers — and increasingly creative efforts by the latter to tect stock.
They’ve turned to electrified fencing, wolf alarms, guard dogs, horseback patrols, trapping and relocating, and now drones.
In some areas where nonlethal efforts have failed, officials routinely apve killing wolves, including last week in Washington state.
Gray wolves killed some 800 domesticated animals across 10 states in 2022, a previous Associated Press review of data from state and federal agencies found.
Scientists with the USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service developed the niques for hazing wolves by drone while monitoring them using thermal imaging cameras at night, when the predators are most active.
A preliminary study released in 2022 demonstrated that adding human voices through a loudspeaker rigged onto a drone can freak them out. The team documented successful interruptions of wolf hunts.
When Dustin Ranglack, the USDA’s lead reer on the ject, saw one for the first time, he smiled from ear to ear.
“If we could reduce those negative impacts of wolves, that is going to be more ly to lead to a situation where we have coexistence,” Ranglack said.
The preloaded clips include recordings of music, gunshots, fireworks and voices.
A drone pilot starts by playing three clips chosen at random, such as the “Marriage Story” scene or “Thunderstruck,” with its screams and hair-raising electric guitar licks.
If those don’t work, the operator can imvise by yelling through a microphone or playing a different clip that’s not among the randomized presets.
One favorite is the heavy metal band Five Finger Death Punch‘s cover of “Blue on Black,” which might blast the lyric “You turned and you ran” as the wolves flee.
USDA drone pilots have continued cattle tection patrols this summer while reing wolf responses at ranches with high conflict levels along the Oregon-California border.
Patrols ext south to the Sierra Valley in August for the first time, according to the California Department of Fish and Wildlife. It’s un whether the wolves might become accustomed to the drones.
Herders and wolf hunters in Europe have long deterred them with long lines hung with flapping cloth, but the wolves can eventually learn that the flags are not a threat.
Environmental advocates are optimistic drones, though, because they allow for scaring wolves in different ways, in different places.
“Wolves are frightened of novel things,” said Amaroq Weiss, a wolf advocate with the Center for Biological Diversity.
“I know that in the human imagination, people think of wolves as big, scary critters that are scared of nothing.” There are also drawbacks to the nology.
A drone with night vision and a loudspeaker costs around $20,000, requires fessional training and doesn’t work well in wooded areas, making it impractical for many ranchers.
Ranchers in Northern California who have hosted USDA drone patrols agree that they have reduced stock deaths so far. “I’m very appreciative of what they did.
But I don’t think it’s a long-term solution,” said Mary Rickert, the owner of a cattle ranch north of Mount Shasta.
“What I’m afraid of is that after some period of time, that all of a sudden they go, ‘Wow, this isn’t going to hurt me.
It just makes a lot of noise.’” Ranchers are compensated if they can ve that a wolf killed their stock.
But there are uncompensated costs of having stressed-out cows, such as lower birth rates and tougher meat.
Rickert said if the drones don’t work over the long term, she might have to close the , which she’s been involved in since at least the 1980s.
She wants permission to shoot wolves if they’re attacking her animals or if they come onto her perty after a certain number of attacks.
If the nology ves effective and costs come down, someday ranchers might merely have to ask the wolves to go away.
Oregon-based Paul Wolf — yes, Wolf — is the USDA’s southwest district supervisor and the main Five Finger Death Punch fan among the drone pilots.
He recalled an early encounter during which a wolf at first merely seemed curious at the sight of a drone, until the pilot talked to it through the speaker.
“He said, ‘Hey wolf — get out of here,’” Wolf said.
“The wolf immediately lets go of the cattle and runs away.”Introducing the 2025 Fortune Global 500, the definitive ranking of the biggest companies in the world. Explore this year's list.