Several attacks on flocks of sheep were observed between the end of December 2021 and mid-January in Féniers.
The Creuse prefecture authorized Friday, for the second time in ten days, scaring shots against the wolf after a new attack by herds this week on a farm where “the responsibility of the wolf has not been dismissed“.
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In a decree published on Friday, the prefecture authorized “carry out scaring shots in the vicinity of threatened herds in the municipalities of Féniers and Gentioux-Pigerolles and the neighboring municipalities“. A measure already decided for the only municipality of Féniers, on January 19.
Several attacks on flocks of sheep were observed between the end of December 2021 and mid-January in Féniers, and new “predationswere counted about ten kilometers away, on January 26 and 28 on a farm in Gentioux-Pigerolles where “the responsibility of the wolf has not been dismissed by the OFB“, the French Office for Biodiversity, said the prefecture in a press release.
The prefecture indicates that it has triggered, “from the first attacks», the provisions set out in the «National Wolf Action Plan“, providing in particular for the compensation of breeders affected by predation attributed to the wolf, a protected species in France, and each observation of which must be reported to the OFB.
Its presence in the department arouses tensions in the agricultural world. Last Saturday, a farmer president of the Rural Coordination of Creuse, Florian Tournadre, had declared during a report broadcast on France 3 Limousin, that his union invited “farmers to take their shotgun“, for “kill and make the wolves disappearin order to protect their herds.
His remarks triggered a quick reaction on Twitter from journalist Hugo Clément, an avowed defender and activist of the environment, on social networks, who called on the government to “react to this offender“. “Killing or calling for the killing of a protected species is illegal and a crime“Reacted in turn on Twitter Barbara Pompili, Minister of Ecological Transition, announcing the opening of an investigation.
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At the beginning of December, the president of the Rural Coordination of Haute-Vienne Pierrick Gouteron, had signed a press release affirming that “a wolf in its territory is one wolf too many“. The question of the presence of wolveswill be tackled within the framework of the French presidency of the EU“, said Monday the Minister of Agriculture Julien Denormandie during the trip of President Emmanuel Macron to Creuse.