Farmers and Ursula von der Leyen want them banished at all costs – but there’s a case for bringing the wolf back to Britain, argues Lucy Kenningham
On the night of 1 September, 2022 – coincidentally, a few days after the harvest moon – deep inside a wooded hamlet of north west Germany, a stray Eurasian wolf killed a little horse. The consequences of that fatal night have been severe. The now-deceased pony in question, Dolly, was in fact the preferred equine companion of the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen. And she took the murder personally: not only was this carnivorous animal sentenced to death, the bureaucrat is now waging war against all wolves.
Wolves are protected in Europe; killing them is forbidden except in exceptional circumstances, with a permit. Von der Leyen’s vulpine nemesis was, according to authorities in the Hannover region who used DNA to detect him, part of a “problem pack”.
This wolf, named GW950m, was already headed for the firing squad even before his unwise choice of prey. GW950m, in cahoots with his mate GW1423f, led a pack that killed five other horses, 47 sheep, four cattle and three goats. Hannover court duly issued a bounty on GW950m – allowing hunters to use night vision “devices” and shoot if the pack appeared within 150 metres of Dolly’s demise. Allegations flew that GW950m had trained young wolves to climb fences – implying he was essentially a furry terrorist conspiring to raise an anti-Brussels army. Politico even set up a website with the domain name ‘Ursula Vs the Wolf’ tracking the life of GW950m (it currently shows the culprit as “still alive”).
Ponies and politicians in Britain don’t need to fret; we are currently wolfless. But a growing cohort wish we weren’t. Tory environmentalist Ben Goldsmith (Team Wolf) is calling for the reintroduction of the canis lupus to solve the UK’s excessive deer population – much to the mire of former head of the National Farmers’ Union, Minnette Batters (Team Sheep). The prospect of reintroducing wolves into Britain “isn’t as mad an idea as it seems”, Goldsmith claimed. After all, there are wolves in every other European country. But in a sick and twisted turn of events, wolves have become the victims of their own success with envious farmers on the warpath against these cute and curious little fellows.
The 1982 Bern Convention protects wolves and other species; this, along with reforestation and the abandonment of agricultural land, has gradually boosted wolves’ numbers. From 2011 to 2021, the wolf population increased by 25 per cent.
But the protected status of wolves now quivers on a knife edge, as von der Leyen has proposed to members states to downgrade the protection status of the wolf in the Bern Convention – which has never been curtailed before.
The WWF strongly objects. “This is an outrageous announcement that has no scientific justification but is motivated purely by personal reasons and undermines not just the protection status of the wolf, but with it all nature conservation efforts in the EU,” said Sabien Leemans, a WWF policy officer. The facts are that no human has been fatally injured by a wolf this century. They prefer a diet of deer and wild boar.
But farmers, who – incidentally – von der Leyen’s right-wing European People’s Party is trying to charm, have long rallied against wild wolves, which sometimes eat their livestock. Farmers cast a strange spell over Europe (just look at the impact of the recent farmers’ protests) – for reasons of romance and heritage.
Yet the wolf is popular, due to its disneyfication perhaps, or simply its magnificent beauty.
A recent survey of 10,000 Europeans in 10 member states, showed 68 per cent agreed wolves should be strictly protected. “Wolves are not coming back to the wild in Britain in the foreseeable future, because society is not ready”, as Rewilding Britain points out. Some people object to the idea of dropping a couple of wolves into Richmond Park – but in fairness, it would save a lot of time culling deer. Defra has said there is no plan to reintroduce any species to the UK. So as much as Brits and conservationists may pine for wolves, such suggestions are – sadly – for now just howling to the moon.