Sweden culls 27 wolves – Brings conservation credentials into question

04/01/2010 18:16:23 Despite low density, Swedish government permits culling of 27 wolves
January 2010. Sweden, long thought of being at the forefront of conservation, has sanctioned the killing of highly endangered wolves. Sweden has some a somewhat arbitrary limit of 210 wolves that are allowed to live in the wild in Sweden. As wolf numbers have increased above this number, the government has allowed a hunt for 27 wolves.
Sweden's wolf population is red-listed as the wolf is critically endangered in Sweden. It is thought that 20 other European countries have higher densities of wolves than Sweden, despite the fact that they all have a human higher population density.

"If Sweden permits more than ten percent of a critically endangered mammal to be killed, how can Sweden claim environmental credibility on a EU or global scale, whether the questions concern whale hunting or climate change?" asked Dr. Mikael Karlsson, President of the Swedish Society for Nature Conservation.

12,000 hunters
The hunting started on January 2nd with around 12,000 hunters registered for hunting down the 27 wolves, but with no coordination from public agencies other than telephone answering machines. Consequently, the regionally responsible agencies are still trying to reveal whether or not the hunting has been within the regional share of the national quotas, and it still remains to be seen if the total national quota will be exceeded or not.

"The road that the government has embarked on is dangerous, uncontrolled and signals a systematic shift in Swedish nature conservation tradition. This is a sad day for all who cares about nature;" says Dr. Mikael Karlsson, President of the Swedish Society for Nature Conservation.