NEl 2025 The autonomous province of Trento will install 700 “bear -proof” bins in the municipalities of their competence. With the prospect of equipping the whole western Trentino by 2028, where the presence of these carnivores is higher, with containers designed to be inaccessible to their incursions.
And as early as March 7 the new level of wolf protection, In the 49 countries that adhere to the Bern Convention. It will go from “strictly protected” to “protected”with the possibility of eliminating some specimens to protect farms and cultivation. Two recent news, an example of how the relationship with wildlife evolves in an increasingly urbanized world. In which the awareness of many who protect biodiversity is a good conflicts with the not only economic threat deriving from coexistence with bears, wolves and other animals. The fatal aggression of an bear to Andrea Papi, who in 2023 jogging in the woods above Caldes, in Trentino, is a trauma that many have not forgotten.
What is often not news is the commitment behind the scenes of those who to find concrete solutions, Average between the blockade of those who invoke zero tolerance against the most intrusive species and those who consider each individual irreplaceable individual.
Evidence of coexistence between bears and communities
«We work to mitigate the conflicts between the inhabitants and The Marsican bear of which 50-60 units at risk of extinction remained»Says Serena Frau, a biologist of the conservation of save the bear, SalviaMabiarso.it, which operates in the area of the Abruzzo Natural Park. «To the farmers, to the breeders we offer to install the electrified fences for free that protect vegetable gardens, hives and chicken coops; We secure the tanks for the collection of water; We collect the ripe fruit from the trees, which attracts the most confident specimens; We vaccinate against diseases transmitted by wildlife guardian dogs (and also domestic ones) ».
The volunteers of Let’s save the bear they make many collective meetings in response to the requests of the COMMANthe. «Those who live inside the park area is more trained” to coexistence. And he knows, for example, that in the event of damage to beasts or cultivation, reimbursements arrive quickly, because the payroll body then awaits the bank transfer. To those who live outside, the “historical” perspective of coexistence a little is missing and above all the support to extricate themselves with the more deceived and long compensation practices is missing. The times of institutional responses also condition the intensity of the conflict “.
The experiment of Genzana
Two bears photographed in the Abruzzo National Park. (Photo by DeAgostini/Getty Images)
“It’s not all okay, There are poaching episodes, there are the poisoning of griffins and wolves“FRAU explains,” but we are building a bear -friendly community, committed to adopting the behaviors mentioned before, which favor peaceful coexistence with the animal.The first of these is Genzana, an important corridor for the movements of the wildlife between the parks of Abruzzo and the Majella».
Because there will be no “invasion” of the wolves
The danger of disappearing the wolf has it instead. In the 70s in Italy only 100 remained. Today, 3300 estimated in our country. There is no risk now, perhaps, the expansion of conflicts, for the multiplication of damage to farms and fields? We ask Filippo Zibordi, zoologist of Institute Oikos Onlus, Institute-Oikos.orgwhich realizes projects for environmental protection and for sustainable development in Italy and in the world.
«The Life Wolfs Alp project, lifewolfalps.euwhich monitors the presence of the wolf on the Alps and the coexistence with human activities ended at the end of 2024 “he explains. «I participated in a detection in the protected areas of Lombardy to estimate the number of animals and to experience prevention techniques. To make decisions starting from real data, and not from the emotional thrust of more or less alarming news. With a premise: wolves, foxes, Caprioli react to the ability of the environment. In order to survive in nature a pack of wolves are not expanding, it needs a territory of about 200 square km, in that same space it is not possible to overlap another pack of the same species ».
Because killing wolves is damage
The wolves present throughout Italy are about 3300 today. They are at the top of the food chain and have no direct predators, only the man. (Contrast)
Suppressing some specimens may seem like a direct way of reducing pressure, even the social one. “But that’s not how it works,” explains Zibordi. “If a 4-5 animal pack is killed a male or an alpha female (the only one who have the right to reproduce), The survivors are snorted and therefore the risk of incursions and damage to human properties increasesbecause the effectiveness of hunting techniques decreases. It would be different to eliminate the entire pack, but in any case the following year in that vacant territory another one would have settled. A single wolf (as well as a single bear) problematic must be suppressed, but In the long run he wins to encourage coexistence, supporting farms according to their needs. Electrified fences can work, guard dogs. Or as it has been experienced in Veneto, in the basis of a project coordinated by the University of Sassari, capture the wolves and equip them with collar so, if they approach too much cattle, an alarm that warns the shepherds is triggered ».
The wolf is a benefit for the whole ecosystemin fact, whose damage must not be paid by shepherds and breeders, Zibordi reiterates. But why do we have to want the wolf to recovered the Alps? “Because it is at the top of the predatory pyramid if it comes relocated in its place, the entire food chain is rebalanced». It happened in the Yellowstone park in the United States. Reintroduce the wolf has reduced local deer and also had a positive impact on vegetation, because these ungulates for fear of the predator have no longer burned in areas they had made deserted. The shrubs that arose, then used by the beavers to create dams, have changed the course of the rivers with a positive impact on amphibians, reptiles … “a more varied and therefore stronger ecosystem derived from reacting to changes” concludes the zoologist.
The wild boar, the king of the forest
“Just the impoverishment of the landscape, with the abandonment of the fields, has doubled the surface of the woods in our country from the 1950s to 2015from 5.6 to 11 million hectares (110 thousand square kilometers, one third of the surface of Italy). A large slice of this ground, especially in the most impervious and depopulated areas, is not maintained. Nobody cuts the wood, nor does the paths cleaned or collects berries, acorns and berries. The wild boar is the king »explains Barbara Franzetti, researcher of Ispra Ambiente, the Higher Institute for Environmental Protection and Research, isprambiente.gov.itconsultant of all public administrations.
Franzetti, who deals with mammals and conflicts with wildlife, says: «The abundant availability of food was the first dentor to the growth of wild boars, because he allowed the seven-month young females to have already had 4-6 litters individuals. In addition, in the 70s they were reintroduced together with Caprioli, deer and other animals, to repopulate the areas from which they had disappeared, without considering the short and long term impact of the operation. Also to satisfy the coeval boom of hunting, which has become popular and “democratic” activity in the post -war activity ».
With urbanization, the woods have closer and more closer to the houses And here are the wild boars walking through Rome and Genoa, which is “A block of reinforced concrete between the forest and the sea“. “Wild boars are intelligent animals, learn to break through the fences of the flower beds and sleep under shrubs, to cross the stripes, especially in periods of drought are attracted by the water and the irrigation systems of the gardens”.
Are they also needed educational interventions to the population in this case? For Franzetti it can have a deterioration power to avoid leaving leftovers of food and even more avoiding to intentionally feed the little ones who trotter for the city, but the only way to reduce the spread of wild boars is the demolition. “The wolf could do its part. But he is a generalist predator, who ranges between sheep, nutrie, deer and the help he can give is limited “concludes the expert of Ispra Environment.
As Elizabeth Kolbert wrote in his Under a white sky (Neri Pozza): “Accepting the crisis of biodiversity could be a first step to understand it.”
The conflicts between men and fauna in Africa
He knows it very well Silvia Ceppi, who for 26 years has been working for Oikos Institute in Africaand which is located today in the north of Tanzania, precisely in the Arusha region. «4000 square km of forest per year disappear in Tanzania. There were 90 thousand elephants, in 15 years with poaching they fell to 40 thousandtoday we have returned to 50/60 thousand. We work for protect the transit corridors Animals outside the protected areas – between the Serengeti park, the porous border with the south of Kenya and the area of Lake Manyara. The goal is to guarantee biodiversity, because if the protected areas are isolated and There are no exchange between animal populations, they are more fragile” explains.
The damage that zebras and elephants does
Difficult to live with elephants and zebras. Also because there is impetuous demographic growth: the population went from 44 million to 60 million inhabitants in a decade, 2012-2022. And for this It is pushed to occupy the transit corridors of the fauna with sustenance activities. “The resident communities, in particular those dedicated to pastoralism, are very aware and tolerant of the needs of animals” explains Ceppi. «But immigrants who work in income crops, such as tomatoes intended for the international market, they have incompatible needs with those of transit. To judge the intensity of the conflict with wild animals, it should be borne in mind that people often live under the poverty threshold, do not have resources to meet the damage, they receive refunds. And when The incursions of the elephants make human victims, the indiscriminate retaliation is immediate “.
Save animals from extinction
Unfortunately, Many states have chosen to fence the national parks of almost the whole area subsaharan and therefore prevent animal incursions. However, this reduces the vitality of wildlife, because prevents you from moving in search of food, and mate with animals with different genetic heritageor. “To reduce conflicts in the thirty villages in which we operate”, concludes Ceppi “we also identify areas of drinking out of the most strategic animals compared to the needs of wildlife e We try to bring drinking water to the villages. We have Also constituted the protection teams of the crops that control the traffic of large herbivoresand with very strong torches and firecrackers keep them away from the crops. But the economic suffering of the population makes the conflict more harsh ».
I woman © RESERVED REPRODUCTION