The Big Bad Wolf is misunderstood – so why do we fear its return to Britain?
Reintroducing the ‘fear factor’ to Britain would significantly improve biodiversity, ecologists argue. But if plans go ahead, we will have to face our fears too, writes Phoebe Weston
I was a few hours from Rome listening to the primordial howl of a wolf pack in the half light of the moon. This could be the opening scene to a cautionary tale by the Grimm Brothers but wild encounters like this are no longer lodged in the past: wolves are weaving their way back into Europe, which is now home to 20,000, with numbers growing each year.
In fairy tales the wolf is depicted as an undomesticated brute. We read about them swallowing grandmothers and blowing down houses owned by innocent little pigs. A wolf in sheep’s clothing describes someone who doesn’t show their true self.
The Big Bad Wolf was once the most wide-ranging mammal on the planet – except for humans – and since becoming a protected species they have quickly recolonised their ancient hunting grounds. In Europe numbers have quadrupled since 1969. From deserts to forests to moorland, wolves can live almost anywhere and increasingly there are controversial calls to reintroduce this apex predator back in the UK.
To find out what this fairytale truant was really like I went to the central Apennine mountains in Italy on a trip organised by the European Safari Company. The Apennines are known as Italy’s “other” mountains and almost run the length of the country from Liguria in the north to Calabria in the south. We visited the Abruzzo National Park, which is just a few hours north of Rome, the city appropriately founded by two men who suckled from a wolf.
These bald, snowy peaks and deep valleys are believed to be home to the highest density of wolves in Europe. Estimates suggest that between 50 and 100 wolves live in this 50,000 hectare park. The mountains are so isolated the wolves have become a new subspecies called the Apennine wolf (as opposed to the standard European grey wolf). Before wolves became a protected species in 1976 there were as few as 12 individuals left in the park. Their recovery has been remarkable.
It turns out wolves are terrified of humans. This means that even in Abruzzo sightings are quite rare.
Contrary to what we’re told in childhood tales, wolves rarely attack people. In Europe no one is believed to have been killed by a wolf in the past 20 years – despite their surprising proximity to human populations. They are less dangerous than collapsing deckchairs. However, human fear of wolves is deeply engrained. “Wolves change human activity,” says Bruno D’Amicis, photographer and author of Time for Wolves, who showed us around the park. “You wouldn’t want to go wandering in the woods alone with wolves around.”
This mutual fear doesn’t make them a natural tourist attraction. I was on a three-day trip tracking these elusive creatures by looking at their prints, poo and watching their movements on motion sensor cameras fixed on trees. We were led by Valeria Roselli, 37, an experienced mountain guide for Wildlife Adventures, a company based in the small town of Pescasseroli on the boundary of the park.
We saw wolf prints criss-crossed between ancient beech forests and open snowy mountain tops. On the motion sensor cameras we could see they had passed just the night before. Unlike on African safaris where animals are largely oblivious to people, wolves do not wait around. Neither do the roe deer, red deer, wild boar and chamois which they prey on: this is a landscape shaped by fear.
A huge amount of understanding about wolves comes from looking at their poo – or “scat” – there is tremendous excitement whenever we find one. Bones and hair protrude from these precious dark faeces, which show the wolf’s last meal and how long ago it was there. Sending scat off to be tested in a lab can reveal an individual’s age, sex, family and even sexual habits. These clues are crucial to creating a picture of the diet and lifestyle of these illusive animals. “I will never look at s*** in the same way again,” my Belgian friend remarks at the end of the trip.
Wolves also use smells from other animal prints to understand the landscape. They can smell different people from their footprints and avoid an area after a new motion sensor camera has been put up because it stinks of human. They can also identify sick animals and newborns within a herd of deer, chamois or wild boar. This informs them whether a herd is worth hunting down.
Far from being dense reprobates, wolves are very intelligent creatures. Their hunting techniques show a great deal of coordination and problem-solving ability. They plan attacks to scatter the herd and use their sense of smell to identify weak individuals. These techniques are passed down generations. One of the region’s oldest wolf packs has learnt how to fatally injure their prey by herding them off cliffs. We see a horse’s skeleton up the hill from the sleepy village of Barrea. “The wolves herded it off that wall before killing it,” Valeria nonchalantly says.
They are as supportive to their own kin as they are ferocious to outsiders. In each pack only one pair breeds each year. The whole family are devoted to looking after the young.
The feeling of being in a forest with wolves is stronger than seeing dog-like shapes on the other side of a mountain. Feeling their presence is more exciting
It’s exciting – and a little unsettling – to know a wolf could be hiding tens of metres away, silently watching. “The feeling of being in a forest with wolves is stronger than seeing dog-like shapes on the other side of a mountain. Feeling their presence is more exciting,” says D’Amicis, who has spent years wandering around these forests.
When wolves were completely exterminated in almost every other European country, the Apennine population held on. D’Amicis explains that people in the Apennines had an “older relationship with large carnivores”.
“It’s generally a wilder place. This different attitude has allowed wolves to survive until today. They were hunted and poisoned, of course, but not in the same unrelenting way as much of Europe,” he says.
However, the ancient tensions between humans and wolves are surfacing once again. In 1992 the first wolf crossed from Italy into France. Since then, they’ve been making their way back across continental Europe with other packs coming from eastern Europe. People in densely populated countries like Belgium, Luxembourg and Denmark are re-learning how to live with their long-lost neighbours. The Netherlands now has a resident wolf pack after an absence of 140 years. The UK is one of the last European countries to still be free from wolves.
Settled wolves generally prefer hunting wild game but when they’re on the move or unsettled they kill livestock. No one is sure why they prefer the flesh of wild animals, but it could be explained by a deep fear of proximity to human populations. However, the impact on farmers is still significant. Since wolves returned to France in 1992 there have been 12,000 reports of attacks on livestock. Compensation is available but many farmers are still angry about losing good animals. In Germany there were 500 attacks on livestock recorded in 2017 alone.
Farmer Claudio di Domenio, 42, who farms in the park, had six out of 100 sheep killed by wolves last year. For each sheep he gets €270 (£230) in compensation, which he considers a good price. However, last year he only received compensation for two deaths because the rangers said he could not prove it was a wolf attack.
Many farming lobbies and politicians in Europe are strongly against wolves. Permits are handed out to keep numbers down – for example Finland keeps its wolf population at 150 and in France hunters are allowed to kill 10 per cent of the wolf population annually.
The National Farmers Union in the UK is against reintroducing wolves. NFU senior countryside adviser Claire Robinson says reintroducing wolves could have a “massive impact on the many benefits that the countryside delivers”, including to local wildlife and biodiversity. “Additionally, the introduction of predatory species such as wolves poses a threat to livestock farming.”
However, on the other side of the debate, environmentalists say that wolves have an incredible ability to regenerate tattered, overgrazed landscapes and improve biodiversity. Proponents of rewilding are particularly keen to reintroduce the wolf in Scotland.
20,000
Wolves in Europe
The benefits of having wolves is based on a theory called the “ecology of fear”. This phenomenon is often cited when talking about Yellowstone National Park, where wolves were reintroduced in 1995 after being hunted to extinction by humans 70 years earlier. Between the 1920s and 1990s no aspen saplings survived the heavy browsing of elk. However, since the reintroduction of wolves, aspen shoots now grow into adulthood near streams and gullies where elk are too afraid to graze for fear of being crept up on by a hungry wolf.
The number of elk remains the same but the way these herbivores graze the land has changed.
This is an example of a trophic cascade when animals at the top of the food chain change the activity of several other species. This is how land would have been grazed before humans hunted apex predators to extinction. Ecologists believe reintroducing wolves would create more of a “natural” landscape dotted with different types of habitats.
The revival of Yellowstone is considered one of the most remarkable modern ecological restorations and is the only time wolves have been reintroduced somewhere. It’s difficult to measure the impact of wolves on Abruzzo – which is also home to a number of other blockbuster predators like golden eagles, lynx and marsican bears – as they’ve always been there.
Scotland is currently home to more deer than at any time since the last ice age. With no natural predator the UK deer population has doubled in the past 50 years. They overgraze plants and young saplings, leaving little room for other species. Many ecologists argue that reintroducing the fear factor in Scotland would significantly improve biodiversity.
Last year a study led by the universities of Sussex and Kent found that wolves would effectively reduce deer numbers and allow nature to recover. Dr Christopher Sandom, lecturer in biology at Sussex, says: “This research shows that they could actually have an extremely beneficial impact in terms of making the rewilding process more effective.”
Other experts agree. Distinguished professor of ecology William Ripple, from Oregon State University, says: “It is possible that the type of trophic cascades that have occurred in Yellowstone after the return of wolves could be seen in other areas of the world if conditions are right … The experimental reintroduction of wolves to the Scottish Highlands would provide useful data on the potential ecological effects of wolves there.” Rewilding Britain says there’s “no ecological reason why wolves can’t live in Britain”.
According to folklore, the last wolf was killed in Britain in 1680, but they’ve haunted us for centuries since. If wolves were reintroduced we’d have to address our ancient fear of these much maligned and misunderstood creatures. The Big Bad Wolf just doesn’t exist.
Phoebe was a guest of the European Safari Company. For more information email info@europeansafaricompany.com
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