| Sumario: | For over half a century, wolves in France were extinct. In the absence of predators, the shepherds became accustomed to leaving the sheep roaming freely in the mountains in relative safety. However, at the end of the 1980s, wolves returned, resulting in many victims, conflicts, and a stark division between those either for or against the wolf. Those against, sometimes framed the conflict in terms of survival for the mountain pastoralism tradition. This study looks at the caring relationships humans, such as shepherds, villagers, and others, have toward sheep, wolves, and the landscape in the Roya Valley in the Maritime Alps. It also examines the discourses surrounding these relationships and their implications for management. Via an ethnography of connection, the analysis focuses on what care means to whom, what it reflects of the carers, and what consequences it has on those subject to care. Showing the ambiguity of care practices by shepherds, hunters, écolos, and the state, this article invites us to reevaluate what we care for and whom we connect to open for new relationalities.
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