Wildlife course 2003

Szent Istvan university of Veterinary Science

Erik Granquist 3rd year

Careless predator culling in Norway

Since the ancient times, Norway has been the country of great traditions with its close relationship to the nature. We can refer to great, world famous explorers and scientists placing Norway on the world map as one of the leading nations concerning biological studies and ecologically based theories. This image has now started to fade away as a forgotten history.

Norway has a great nature. With its magnificent alpine landscape, deep forests and a beautiful coastline, the preconditions of having many perfectly fitted ecosystems are present. But what has happened during the last century? With the industrializing pressure, Norway has used its natural resources to become a rich nation. With its oil and great waterfalls, energy production has become one of the main industries of Norway. This means that the industry is moved out in the nature and the ecosystems are used on high costs. The pressure has become too great. The traditions of living with the nature has been wiped out and the respect of living systems does not any longer exist in many peoples mind.

As an agricultural community, there has always been conflicts between the interests of the farmers and our big predators (wolf, bear and lynx) which has led to the aggressive culling and elimination of these individuals. In the 1950’s the Norwegian government decided that free hunting of the predators without restrictions was to be introduced. The conflict between domesticated animals and the wild carnivores was turned against the nature and to the benefit of the farmers. This led to an enormous eradication of the predators in the Norwegian fauna. The situation was out of control. In the 1970’s some scientists started to map the populations to try to establish data on how threatened the big predators were. They found out that the predators were really close to extinction. For many years it was only registrated a handful wolfs and bears on the Norwegian soil. This led to a new trend in the way of thinking. Now it was time to save the little left over of Norwegian identity and fauna which had been so unscrupulously mistreated for decades. The population of predators started slowly to grow in numbers and the interest of these animals got a place in the Norwegian minds. This was to last for some years as the sympathy for nature was a priority of political parties and mindsetting.

Then suddenly, this changed in the closest future. When the populations where measured during the 80’s and 90’s and the losses of domesticated farm animals again where evident, the panicking of farmers led to a change in the political programs. Now it was again time for war against mother nature. In 2001, 28 wolves lived in Norway. In January 2002 only 13 individuals were left on the Norwegian side. The Norwegian authorities had succeeded on getting rid of more than half of the wolf population in one year.

The family groups in central parts of Hedmark (a community of Norway), was wiped out during the winter 2001. Atndal (a place in Norway) family was exterminated in February and March 2001 (all but one were killed with automatic shotguns from helicopter). The Norwegian environmental authorities succeeded in killing the alpha male of the Koppang (a place in Norway) family in August 2000.

This was a family group with more than 10 members, but after the loss of the alpha male the number of individuals has gradually decreased. Today only two wolves have been tracked in the area - probably the alpha female with one of her offsprings from earlier years. In Co. Hedmark the Grĺfjell pair repruduced during the summer of 2001, but at present, only the alpha pair is found in the territory (no tracks after the pups - killed illegally?). Further south in Co. Hedmark a radio collared female is staying in an area south of Elverum - representing the fifth Norwegian wolf in this part of the country. In Co. Řstfold, the pack in the Moss-Vĺler-Hobřl area had pups both in 2000 and 2001. In the autumn of 2001 all contact with the radio collared alpha male (born in Sweden in 1998) stopped, and this wolf has probably been killed illegally. The number of individuals tracked so far in the Moss territory has been 8 - representing the only pack on Norwegian soil. In mid November 2001 a female wolf (probably 1,5 years old) turned up in the northern part of Co. Buskerud in central parts of Southern Norway. This was the first female documented west of Oslo after the wolf tracking/research started in southern parts of the country in 1978. In December 2001 the authorities arranged for this individual to be placed in a wolf park - representing another loss of a wild Norwegian wolf. The number of intact family groups in Norway in January 2002 was with other words 0 (cero). In addition to the 13 Norwegian individuals there, are some wolves in the border area. These Swedish/Norwegian animals are found in 3-4 packs/pairs - most of them staying on the Swedish side. In Sweden the situation is better. Norwegian authorities had plans for culling more wolves in Co. Hedmark winter of 2003. First of all they wanted to get rid of what is left of the Koppang pack, and the same hunting methods from winter of 2001 were planned to be used, but these plans were stopped just in time. The strategy used by Norwegian authorities is all the time referring to the numbers of Scandinavian (Swedish) wolves - for killing individual after individual in Norway. The 1998 Norwegian - Swedish cooperating plan for wolf management has been broken so many times from the Norwegian side that it is probably just a matter of time before Swedish authorities resign completely. When concerning the lynx, the situation is not any better. During the winter 2001/2002 50 individuals of this redlisted species were shot through the hunting period (licence). The last years hundreds of lynxes have been killed in Norway (more than hundred killed every year in a period during the 1990´s) - most of them during the hunting season in February and March. This species, also on the Norwegian red list, has now been exterminated in large parts of our country, and in the best lynx areas in Central/Northern Norway less than a fifth is left of the 1990´s population level. Still the authorities operate with a Norwegian lynx population on 500-600 animals, but the high hunting pressure has without doubt reduced the number of animals dramatically. The number of Norwegian lynxes is probably not more than 200. Therefore the environmental authorities do not want to give preference to research for bringing the new figures up. Norway was the initiative (main) country for the Bern Convention. Today our authorities have brought the management of threatened species - particularly large carnivores - into a situation where this convention has little signification for the endangered fauna (if any). Not even the slaughter of the few Norwegian wolves, preventing an establishment of a population on the Norwegian side of the Scandinavian peninsula - made reactions in the secretary of Bern Convention.

Norway is a country of many traditions, especially concerning the wildlife management, fishing, hunting and agriculture. I am very surprised that this can happen in the year of 2003, when protection of the environment and threatened animal species should have the highest priority on the international level. I hope that someone will come up with a reaction to this problem soon and put this slaughtering of our great predators to an end.

The Norwegian government and authorities should start to listen to the many scientists that work with the mapping of populations and the reestablishment of a rich Norwegian fauna. There has been attempts to come up with alternative solutions for the farmers to compensate for the great losses of sheep and cattle, but these solutions are not very much appreciated. There is a negative attitude amongst Norwegian farmers which cannot be understood from the ecological point of view. Wake up and start to care for our beautiful nature!!!!

I found this caricature of the Norwegian minister of environmental affairs, she has been much criticised for her handling of the situation.

The text says: “We can learn the world much through noble hunting on endangered species”

On the wolf’s fur it is written: “Norwegian environmental politics”