France’s Roquefort farmers say their age-old tradition of sheep-rearing to produce mouldy blue cheese is under threat from the return of the wolf.
By Henry Samuel, Paris
Seen this summer for the first time since the 1920s in the southern appellation, the elusive and protected predator has fanned out from the Italian and southeastern French Alps and is now carrying out attacks in the Cevennes mountains of Lozère in the southern Auvergne, the home of Roquefort cheese.
Roquefort farmers warn the future of the cheese could now be in jeopardy as they will no longer be able to respect the appellation’s strict rules on allowing their sheep to graze freely. These stipulate that it is “compulsory” for sheep to roam on the hilly pastures “every day” provided there is sufficient grass, “weather conditions permitting”.
There have been 30 recent attacks, with 62 ruminants killed and 73 injured.
Only a few have been officially attributed to the wolf, but farmers say coexistence in the area is impossible.
Christian Robert, 48, has a flock of 550 Lacaune sheep, whose ewes’ milk is used exclusively for Roquefort. According to a 1,000-year tradition, their milk is left to ripen in the caves of Mont Combalou beneath the village of Roquefort-sur-Soulzon.