If a wall is built along the border, what would happen to the migratory animals?

Question

who migrate during the seasons? I am not talking about birds; althoug, a road runner may not be able to scale a 20 foot high wall.

Answer 1

Which border are you talking about?
There aren't a lot of animals these days that migrate between Mexico and the USA, that can't fly.

Answer 2

Interesting. I read an article on the Chihuahuan Desert in Texas Parks and Wildlife maybe two months ago. The Texas side is known as Big Bend National Park. The Mexican side is .. I forget.
Large animals include Black bears (Grizzlies were hunted out), mountain lions, coyotes, and wolves.
The proposed wall DOES present an unusual problem. When you seperate a habitat, you dimish possible mates, places for feeding, etc. What if a portion of the animals slept and bred in Mexico but drank from a water hole in Texas or found it's prey there.
Remember that large animals have very large hunting grounds.
When a population is split as well, recruitment lowers. There are less animals that will grow to an adult breeding age. Say a mammal's majority is in Texas but have a significiant population in the Mexican state of Chihuahua. If you cut them off, those animals may not have a high enough population to meet carrying capacity. This leads to eventually dieout on that side of the border wall.

Answer 3

From your question it's not clear which country's border you are referring to and therefore which animals.
Generally speaking, true migrators will probably die.
The government of Botswana (in Africa) once put up a "veterinary fence" (the notorious Buffalo Fence) right in the way of a migration route for zebras and wildebeest. When the annual migration happened the poor animals were stopped by the fence. They milled around at the fence for weeks with no food or water , while conservtionists pleaded with the Botswana government to let the animals through. They bluntly refused and the outcome was that between 50 000 and 60 000 animals died.
Today the fence is still there.

Answer 4

Studies of an area are always done before large projects such as walls or pipelines. A wall would not be put up in an area or would have a watched pathway through to allow animals through if the study concluded it was neccesary.

Answer 5

OK, so we have to sacrafice national security for the road runner? I think your Sierra Club Membership is due.