The regional platforms on large carnivores, regularly described in these newsletters, are financed under two EU-funded contracts managed by IAE and partners. The first of these contracts came to an end with the end of the year. The three local-based stakeholder platforms, followed a similar process of around 6 closely-spaced meetings to exchange viewpoints and come to agree a mission and come a better understanding of each others’ positions. They then listed and prioritised concrete actions to be financed by the project. The actions in each platform are described briefly here and in more detail on the website.

Ávila, Spain

The actions focused on providing greater support to cattle breeders suffering depredation from wolves.

An economic analysis of damages financed by the project and carried out by the Avilena Breed association, a farmer and two scientists, confirms that Avila is one of the provinces with highest incidence of wolf depredations in Spain. Damage prevention measures, when implemented, can decrease the amount of damages, however these measures are associated with costs for the management of livestock and maintenance of prevention measures.

A pilot study together with WWF and the LIFE Eurolargecarnivores project, focused on individual assessments of damage risk and implementation of prevention measures. Innovative prevention measures for cattle were tested in one pilot farm, and obtained extremely promising results. Although difficult to generalise from, it can provide a good practice example to be replicated by /adapted for other farms.

Based on the above, the Avilena breed association has proposed a specific measure under the Rural Development Programmes. The proposal was discussed at the final platform meeting 9 December and presented to a wider group at the regional workshop, 10 December 2021.

A formal request for support to the platform’s continuation in the form of a participatory committee on wolf in Avila was put forward to the Junta de Castilla y Leon. The Junta would also need to be involved directly in the meetings for the members to find them worthwhile.

Grosseto, Italy

The selected actions focused on wolf damages to sheep and the use of livestock guarding dogs.

The project developed a field manual to support to the correct use and checking of damage prevention measures on the ground, particularly adapted to the local situation. The association DifesAttiva played a major role in this action.

The platform provided input to a session on the management of livestock guarding dogs, to a training webinar within the project “Precision Sheep” funded by the RDP. Further collaborations under this project are planned for a longer training course in the future.

An ongoing collaboration with agricultural associations aims to establish an evaluation system for damage prevention measures and valorisation of their implementation.

In order to establish participatory wolf monitoring, the project held three training sessions with different groups which resulted in five platform members taking part to the first National Wolf Survey coordinated by ISPRA. A contribution was also given for the development of a mobile App for the collection of field data.

The project collected all reports, published papers and theses known to them and made them available on the platform website in an online library on the wolf in Italy. A total of 75 documents were retrieved and made available in full or as an abstract where copyright restrictions applied.

With the support of a communication agency, a Facebook page was opened and used as a channel to promote the events we attended or organised, as well as to promote the proposed interventions elaborated by the platform. For less formal communication between platform members, a whats app group was set up.

The project contributed to a range of public events and organised a series of information webinars aimed at providing sound information on various initiatives implemented.

Harghita, Romania

Two training sessions were held illustrating the application of standardized bear monitoring methods developed within the LIFE URSUS project.

An interactive online platform for local communities was set up, where information on large carnivore topics was shared, and questions and interventions were answered by the specialists. A facebook page was used for additional public outreach and was promoted through series of meetings.    

Together with agricultural partners (Székely Gazdaszervezetek Egyesülete, Gyimesvolgyi Biogazdak Egyesulete), about 40 specialists from rural areas, mostly leading local farmers were chosen as participants of the webinars and face to face meetings on the topic of bear conflict management and damage compensation. A “Short guideline on bear damage prevention and compensation” on best practices for farmers and damage prevention methods, was produced and shared with the groups participating.

A total of three electric fences were installed for protecting different livestock and bees. The selection of farms/goods to be protected was made by local associations according to need and their value as demonstrating different types of protection measures which are valid across the region.

A study on the effects of artificial feeding on bears was undertaken by AVPS Szilos, and conclusions highlight that under current circumstances (hunting ban combined with continuation of artificial feeding), a much higher bear density is maintained artificially than what the natural habitat could sustain. The conclusions suggest that feeding is likely to lead to conflict and should be discontinued under current circumstances.

Regional platform in Vercors, France ToR for communication support

in order to avoid tensions between the stakeholders concerned, the Vercors Regional Nature Park in the French region Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, in collaboration with the European project supported by adelphi, has set up a multi-actor working group on "Protection measures against the wolf (including guard dogs) and other uses of the territory". In December 2021, this group launched a terms of reference to support communication in developing and publicising their joint narrative (in French only). The aim is to develop a common narrative on the guard dog and sharing spaces, and to propose a catalogue of communication tools to use this narrative in the Vercors Regional Nature Park.