Several dozen farmers exposed the corpse of a heifer killed by a wolf attack in front of the sub-prefecture of Pontarlier (Doubs), to protest against the refusal of state services to carry out defensive shooting, announced the FDSEA and the Young Farmers of Doubs.
“Wolf attacks continue” but “breeders have been facing for weeks the systematic refusal of state services to issue authorizations for defensive shooting outside 17 municipalities” consisting of an experimental zone, regrets the Federation departmental association of farmers' unions (FDSEA) of Doubs.
“Every heifer that will be predated […] will end up in front of the sub-prefecture”
But Florent Dornier, president of the FDSEA of Doubs, indicated that he had been received by the deputy director of the Departmental Territorial Directorate (DDT). “He took note of all the demands,” he declared, but did not give a concrete response to the breeders.
The latter also castigated the legal attacks by nature protection associations against the shootings. “Each heifer which will be predated from today and which will not benefit from a simple defensive shot will end up in front of the sub-prefecture”, concluded Florent Dornier.
In Doubs, two wolves “in an attack situation” were killed in August by prefectural order.
The wolf, a species protected by European law
But in June, the Besançon administrative court annulled two prefectural decrees authorizing shootings against wolves to protect herds, arguing that “the wolf is a protected species under European law” whose “destruction is in principle prohibited”.
However, the law provides for exemptions to prevent “significant damage to livestock”.
The president of the Chamber of Agriculture of the neighboring department of Haute-Saône called, at the end of September, on breeders in his department to arm themselves and illegally “hit” wolves in order to protect their herds.
This position led to condemnations from the prefect and the minister responsible for the Environment.
Metropolitan France has around a thousand wolves and the slaughter quota is set at 19% of the population recorded per year. In 2022, compensation for damage caused by wolves amounted to four million euros.
