By Aron Lamm
Epoch Times Staff
AMOT, Sweden—In February 2011, two people illegally killed a wolf on a frozen lake in central Sweden by chasing it with a snowmobile, running it over repeatedly, and finally bludgeoning the seriously injured animal to death with a makeshift club. Then they hid the carcass in a crevice and covered it with snow. It is a powerful illustration of the kind of hatred some people have for wolves in Sweden.
The wolf is easily Sweden’s most controversial animal, despite there only being about 300 of them in a country of 9 million people, that’s roughly the size of California.
The debate is heated over whether or not to tolerate wolves in a country that has a long history of killing them off. It is often portrayed as being a battle between urban conservationists who only care for animals, and heartless country hicks who are ready to hunt down every last canine menace.
Swedish officials who handle predator issues are routinely threatened and harassed. When regulated wolf hunting was controversially introduced in 2010, activists took to the forest to sabotage it. TV debates on the topic end in shouting matches.
Leif Holst, who runs a nature tourism operation with sled dogs outside the small village of Katrineberg, some 200 miles north of Stockholm, first discovered the tracks of the grisly hunt along with his wife Gullan. Holst is also regional director of an association working to preserve Swedish predator-animals.
After the killing went public, Holst was told that killing the wolf in this manner was a service to the community; the person also suggested that Holst might be treated the same way.
“He was serious,” Holst said. “But that’s the only time I’ve had someone say something like that to my face. Mostly, they just talk behind your back.”
Extremists aside, however, the discussion in rural Sweden where the wolves roam is more nuanced. People there tend to take a more pragmatic approach, says Per Mellstrom, who lives about 10 miles from Holst in the village of Amot.
Mellstrom is an active member of the Swedish Hunter’s Association, and represents hunters’ interests in a regional government body for wildlife issues.
There once was a sizable wolf population in Sweden. In the 1830s, records show that Swedes hunted roughly 500 animals per year. Into the 1960s, rewards were still being offered for wolf kills. The program worked so well, that by the mid-’60s, wolves were declared officially extinct in Sweden.
A decade or two later, it is believed that five animals wandered into Sweden from Finland and began to proliferate.
Mellstrom says in his neck of the woods alone, three different wolf packs have established territories.
“Of course, everybody has an opinion,” he said. “But there is a pattern where there is usually a lot of controversy at first, when wolves spread to a new area, and after a while it blows over. Media only seek out the extremists, because that’s what makes good copy.”
Holst says he can’t quite understand the fuss over a few hundred animals.
“We have never had any issues with the wolves. The sled dogs sometimes answer them when they howl out in the forest,” he said.
The main problem, he says, is the hunting dogs. Sweden has a strong tradition of hunting moose with loose dogs, and hunting dogs that cross paths with wolves can find themselves at the losing end of an encounter. Hunters who are more careful with their dogs don’t run these risks, says Holst.
Mellstrom agrees this is the main issue for hunters and why it’s so emotional.
“The wolf is a magnificent animal, it’s a symbol of untamed nature,” he said. “Everyone wants to see or hear a wolf, or at least a track, but that feeling you get as a hunter, when you let your beloved dog go, and you suddenly see wolf tracks in the snow … that fear is very hard to explain to someone who hasn’t been there.”
People who have had their dogs or other animals killed by wolves, and seen the damage wolves can do, tend to be deeply affected by it, he said. Environmentally concerned city-dwellers, who never experience this, don’t really understand or care.
Wolves also kill a considerable number of moose, and thus compete with hunters for the meat.
Wolves also attack livestock, which requires building and maintaining fences. Mellstrom says that only in the last couple of years has the actual cost of Sweden having a wolf population become apparent, and that fencing alone will cost landowners a few hundred million dollars, with no comprehensive financing plan.
“There is always the question: How much do we want to pay for it? The wolf is not threatened globally, but it mostly lives in areas where there are little or no people,” he said. “There have always been problems between humans and wolves.”
In 2009, the Swedish Parliament decided to temporarily cap the wolf population at 210 animals. It allowed limited hunting in order to regulate the population.
Wildlife organizations objected to the hunt, however, and filed a complaint with the European Union, whose Habitats Directive ultimately governs these issues. The Swedish policy was found to violate the directive.
So, after two controversial wolf hunts, the Swedish government chose to stop the hunt, rather than risk going to the EU Court of Justice.
Mellstrom is critical of the way the Swedish government has handled the issue, but also of the wildlife organizations for disrupting the process. He says the foundation for Sweden’s current wolf woes lie in Sweden having to follow EU regulations that were never adapted to local conditions.
The Swedish government has in the meantime been revising its approach. A new proposal may be put before Parliament this fall, which would see a regulated hunt, which Mellstrom deems absolutely necessary.
Holst, for his part, is tirelessly trying to foster understanding between the two sides of the issue. He does volunteer work building fences and other forms of predator protection devices. Recently, he was at a hunting fair and he went over to the booth of an anti-wolf organization, paid the membership fee, and joined them, just so he could talk to them.
“The atmosphere was very relaxed after that,” he said. “Why shouldn’t we get along just because we have different opinions?”