France authorises first wolf cull since 1930s

0 Comments | AFP, July, 2004

PARIS (AFP) — France authorized its first wolf cull since the 1930s in order to reduce a colony of some 50 animals which sheep farmers say are wreaking havoc in the southern Alps.

Ecology Minister Serge Lepeltier told a news conference in Paris that up to four wolves can be shot by the end of the year if attacks on sheep flocks continue.

The minister was unveiling details of a wolf "action plan" which was drawn up in recent months to resolve the competing demands of the farming and environmentalist lobbies.

Exterminated in France before World War II, the wolf was reintroduced in 1992 in the Mercantour national park on the Italian border, and its population has since increased by 20 percent a year.

Sheep farmers who bring their flocks to graze on the...