Wildlife management by metropolitan residents in the United States: practices, perceptions, costs, and values

I examined wildlife management practices and opinions of metropolitan residents in the United States concerning urban wildlife by: (1) mailing questionnaires to a random sample of residents from 10 of the 100 largest metropolitan areas in the United States, (2) telephoning a random sample of nonrespondents, and (3) mailing questionnaires to a random sample of metropolitan residents taken from a list maintained by Survey Sampling, Inc. With the exception of a single question, there were no significant differences among these 3 sample groups. Most respondents (69%) stated they or their households actively managed wildlife in the prior year, and 61% reported a problem caused by a wildlife species during the last year that resulted in a mean of $63.68 in damage. Forty-two percent stated they or their households tried to prevent or solve wildlife problems in the prior year, spending an average of $32.48 and 7.2 hours in the attempt; of these, 52% reported that their efforts were unsuccessful. Most respondents (57%) stated that they or their households encouraged wildlife around their homes and spent an average of $60.42 and 22.2 hours in the process. If these results are extrapolated to the 60 million households in the 100 largest metropolitan areas in the United States, then these households annually suffered an estimated $3.8 billion in damages caused by wildlife, despite spending $1.9 billion and 268 million hours trying to solve or prevent these problems. Additionally, they annually spent $3.6 billion and 1.3 billion hours encouraging wildlife around their homes. Combined, these estimates ($5.5 billion and 1.6 billion hrs) indicate that metropolitan residents in the United States are deeply interested in urban wildlife and are willing to spend both their money and time on its management.