He calls the situation very special. “A lot of crazy things are happening in the Netherlands right now in one series. Like the wolf who fell asleep in a garden. I think this will happen again within the next two months.”
Van Maanen knows few comparable examples abroad. “In Germany, things like this are less the case. And in Romania, a case is known of a wolf that attacked someone who was cornered in a stable. The interaction between humans and animals is very strong in the Netherlands.”
The wolf expert was not consulted by the municipality of Westerveld about whether or not to shoot this wolf. He thinks it is not right that the wolf was shot. “I’m not in favor of shooting. The wolf was cornered,” he says. “People panic and resort to drastic measures. That also happened in the Middle Ages. You can see that in the drawings by Rien Poortvliet, where people are chasing the wolf with pitchforks.”
He says he will support the people in Wapse. “It’s very bad what happened here. But I try to be very real.”
It also hurts him personally. “It is grist to the mill of the wolf’s opponents. Under normal circumstances, a wolf will not attack a human. That is, if he is not sick or attacked.”