Slow news day

That must be the explanation for today's News-Press editorial, one of Wendy McCaw's trademark, over-the-top animal rights screeds. Just for variety, today's object of violent solicitude is not the feral pigs of Santa Cruz Island, but some 200 coyotes in Arizona:

We doubt any of the killings really had to take place. The government lacked documentation that the coyotes posed huge threats to calves. If they did--and that is a big if--non-lethal alternatives surely had to be available.

The best course would have been to just leave the coyotes alone. They were, after all, there first. The ranchers could simply better manage their cattle if the coyotes truly were preying on them.

I don't know the facts of the case, but I doubt Wendy does either, and I'm sure her knowledge of cattle ranching is approximately zero. I do know that coyotes are not an endangered species (we could certainly do with less of them here in Santa Barbara), and that I'm more inclined to trust cattle ranchers in Arizona than I am Wendy when it comes to evaluating the threat that coyotes pose to cattle herds. But animal rights activists know best--the threat was not "huge," non-lethal alternatives were "surely" available (coyotes make great pets!), and, best of all, the coyotes were there first. I suppose that last point would also be a good justification for razing Wendy's seaside estate and re-establishing the native plants and animals. After all, they were there first.

Wendy McCaw is zealous in protecting her own property rights; witness her long, costly, and ultimately futile battle with the Coastal Commission to prevent public access to the beach below her Hope Ranch home. Other people's property rights? Not so important, it seems.