{"id":2186326,"date":"2025-04-04T12:00:18","date_gmt":"2025-04-04T10:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/focusingonwildlife.com\/news\/?p=2186326"},"modified":"2025-03-29T08:27:52","modified_gmt":"2025-03-29T07:27:52","slug":"in-the-hills-of-italy-wolves-returned-from-the-brink-then-the-poisonings-began","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/focusingonwildlife.com\/news\/in-the-hills-of-italy-wolves-returned-from-the-brink-then-the-poisonings-began\/","title":{"rendered":"In the hills of Italy, wolves returned from the brink. Then the poisonings began"},"content":{"rendered":"
High on a mountain pass near the town of Cocullo in central Italy lay six black sacks. Inside were nine wolves, including a pregnant female and seven youngsters \u2013 an entire pack. They had eaten slabs of poisoned veal left out a few days earlier, dying over the hours that followed, snarls of pain fixed on their faces.<\/p>\n
Three griffon vultures and two ravens were also killed, probably alongside more animals that went into hiding, dying out of sight. Poison creates a succession of death, spreading through entire food chains and contaminating land and water for years.<\/p>\n
The incident in 2023, was described as \u201cculturally medieval\u201d by national park authorities. \u201cIt was a bad day for the whole team,\u201d says Nicol\u00f2 Borgianni, a vulture field officer with Rewilding Apennines, who still remembers what a beautiful May day it was when the animals perished: alpine flowers poking through the grass and snow still dusting mountain peaks on the horizon from the 1,300-metre viewpoint. \u201cBut there are many cases like this one.\u201d<\/p>\nThe bags containing nine wolves poisoned in Cocullo. No one was prosecuted for the deaths. Photograph: Handout<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
Like all poisoning events in this area, no one was prosecuted. The corpses were disposed of and life moved on. Now the ground is grubbed up from wild boars digging their snouts in the dirt looking for bulbs to eat.<\/p>\n
Downgrading wolf protection is a misguided decision. It offers no real help to rural communities<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
In the 1970s, wolves were on the brink of extinction in Italy, but thanks to strict protections and conservation efforts, there are now more than 3,000 of them. In many areas of Europe, farmers are having to learn to live alongside wolves again as they return to places they have been absent from for hundreds of years \u2013 and many are concerned that they prey on livestock. The story unfolding in this small valley in Italy is being repeated all over Europe. \u201cFarmers feel abandoned by government, so they solve their problems on their own,\u201d says Borgianni.<\/p>\n
From March 2025, the EU is relaxing its protections from \u201cstrictly protected\u201d to \u201cprotected\u201d, which means if wolves are perceived as a threat to rural communities, states can organise culls. Poisonings such as the one in Cocullo will remain illegal, but conservationists fear the relaxation of protections will empower vigilantes.<\/p>\n
Angela Tavone, a communications manager from Rewilding Apennines, is worried this will create more \u201cchains of death\u201d like the one two years ago. \u201cGroups of farmers can feel more free to act against wolves because of the change in the EU law,\u201d she says.<\/p>\nAngela Tavone and Nicol\u00f2 Borgianni inspect a horse skull. Photograph: Luigi Filice\/The Guardian<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
Whoever killed the wolf pack in 2023 failed to keep wolves away. Months later, another pack moved in. Nearly two years later, on that same spot, there are half a dozen wolf droppings, some just a few weeks old. The pack\u2019s territory overlaps with mountain pastures used for cattle and sheep in spring and summer. Wild boar makes up most of the wolves\u2019 diet here, but you can also spot hairs from cows or horses in the droppings. Borgianni estimates about 10% of their diet is livestock. One pack monitored by scientists in the region appeared to be eating closer to 70% during winter.<\/p>\n
Vultures are often the sentinels of a poisoning event. The Apennines has the highest number of GPS-tagged vultures in a single population, so observers know something is wrong if their tags stop moving. \u201cIf you investigate, you find these incidents,\u201d says Borgianni. They are social animals and up to 60 birds can feed on a single carcass, so dozens can be wiped out quickly. Since 2021 the Rewilding Apennines team has picked up 85 carcasses across all species.<\/p>\nAn Apennine wolf pup carrying part of a red deer in Abruzzo, Italy. One poisoning event can kill a whole pack. Photograph: Nature Picture Library\/Alamy<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
Predator poisoning is an issue across Europe \u2013 and the world \u2013 but we know little about the extent of it, because animals generally die out of sight. Farmers say these apex predators threaten their livelihoods \u2013 and resolving the conflicts is complex.<\/p>\n
Down in the valley, Cristian Guido\u2019s family farm and restaurant Il Castellaccio back on to fresh mountain pastures. Twenty years ago, when he started farming, there were not many wolves around. Two nights ago, CCTV cameras captured a pair of wolves wandering through the yard. Guido can sometimes hear them howling from the woods by the farm.<\/p>\nCristian Guido at his family farm and restaurant. Photograph: Luigi Filice\/The Guardian<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
From May, his 90 sheep go up into the hills every day to fatten on the succulent grasses, and come down in the evenings. One day last October, 18 of them didn\u2019t come back. Guido believes wolves were to blame, perhaps chasing the sheep off a cliff.<\/p>\n
I find wolves beautiful, but I keep asking for help. It is just not possible to keep them away \nCristian Guido, farmer<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
There was no evidence they had been killed by a wolf (there often is not) so he got no compensation. Now, when he takes his animals up in the morning, he doesn\u2019t know if they will all come back. \u201cI fear that will happen again,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
He is not alone. \u201cOther farms suffered the same loss,\u201d he says. In the past few years, half a dozen dead wolves have been hung up by roads and bus stops by people protesting at their return.<\/p>\n
\u201cI find wolves beautiful, but I keep asking for help. It is just not possible to keep them away. And I\u2019m aware if you shoot them, you will get more and more damage,\u201d he says. Guido believes protections for wolves should not have been downgraded, but that farmers must be given more support.<\/p>\nThe bones of a horse in \u2068Cocullo\u2069, \u2068Abruzzo. Photograph: Luigi Filice\/The Guardian<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
This would include making compensation easier to claim and quicker to be distributed. There should be more support for farmers constructing wolf-proof fences near their properties, he believes.<\/p>\n
Research this year looking at wolf-farmer conflicts in northern Greece found wolves were often scapegoats for deep-rooted issues, such as financial challenges, poor government policies on protection of livelihoods, a changing climate, lack of services and rural depopulation. \u201cOur findings emphasise that while wolves impact farmers, economic and policy-related factors play a greater role,\u201d the researchers concluded. The study found fair compensation schemes were essential for coexistence.<\/p>\n
These findings are echoed by a coalition of NGOs, including BirdLife Europe, ClientEarth and the European Environmental Bureau, which say that instead of providing support for farmers living alongside wolves, the EU has allowed them to be culled. \u201cDowngrading wolf protection is a misguided decision that prioritises political gains over science and will further polarise the debate,\u201d say the NGOs. \u201cIt offers no real help to rural communities.\u201d<\/p>\n
Virginia Sciore is a farmer with 150 goats grazing on pastures in the Morrone mountains. Since 2018 she has lost five goats. \u201cYou can see in the eyes of the goats they are terrified \u2013 something happened in the mountain,\u201d she says. Sometimes, she finds a collar or tuft of hair, but usually they disappear without a trace, so she doesn\u2019t claim compensation. \u201cI don\u2019t know if it was a wolf,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe majority of farmers don\u2019t believe in coexistence,\u201d Sciore says. \u201cThey have stories about wolves that have been imported. They want to believe these things. People are angry and it\u2019s projected on to the wolf.\u201d<\/p>\nVirginia Sciore has lost five of her 150 goats since 2018. Photograph: Angela Tavone\/Rewilding Apennines<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
The conflict over wolves comes amid a wider shift away from environmental protections across Europe. Last year, EU leaders scaled back plans to cut pollution and protect habitats after angry protests from farmers, as a law to restore nature was turned into a political punching bag. \u201cIt\u2019s a low moment historically to face this issue,\u201d says Tavone.<\/p>\n
The Cucollo incident was a turning point for the Rewilding Apennines team. In response, they created their first anti-poison dog unit. A malinois dog called Wild \u2013 who at six months old is still in training \u2013 will, in the coming months, sniff out potential poisoning incidents.<\/p>\n
As spring approaches, so too does the most dangerous time for poisoning events, as farmers look to protect young and vulnerable livestock. Catching poisoning incidents quickly is key \u2013 and Wild will help with that. Those fighting to protect wildlife are increasing their efforts. \u201cThe struggle is still going on,\u201d says Tavone.<\/p>\nThe mountains around Cocullo\u2069. As spring approaches, poisoning events usually spike as farmers try to protect young animals. Photograph: Luigi Filice\/The Guardian<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n