Two sheep were killed and three sheep were injured in an attack in Amen by a suspected wolf. The sheep were behind a five-wire wolf-proof fence. It was the fifth wolf attack on sheep by Bert Zinger from Hijken; it was the first time they were wolf-proof.
Zinger found the dead and injured animals around noon yesterday. “Two died instantly and three were injured, two of which I doubt survive,” he said in a video posted on Facebook.
He is very upset about the attack. “I have placed a wolf-resistant grid in the way BIJ12 wants it. It has cost an enormous amount of work and money. According to the province and the wolf consultant, this should be the solution. We sheep farmers are skeptical about this and it now appears that this rightly so,” said Zinger.
In the video he says that he has already had several conversations with the province, but that he cannot get any further. “He continues to say that wolf-resistant fences are the solution. It now appears that this is not the case. There is only one solution for wolves that get through these types of fences, and that is management. And management means shooting.”
The appraiser who took the DNA is also a wolf consultant in Gelderland. He called the fence ‘wolf-resistant’. This means that it met the standards of BIJ12, the body that handles claims for the provinces. Some of the standards are that the height must be 1.20 meters, that it must be at least 4.5 thousand volts and that the bottom wire does not hang higher than 20 centimeters above the ground.
Earlier, the Drenthe wolf consultant also came to view the state of the fence after such a report. But it is not welcome at Zinger. “Someone who doesn’t have a wolf-resistant grid doesn’t have to tell me how to do it. He has to set a good example,” says Zinger.
An exmoor pony owned by wolf consultant Jaap Mekel was found last Sunday with a eaten carcass in a plot that Mekel grazes for Natuurmonumenten. The animal was behind two electric wires. Mekel and Natuurmonumenten believe that the chance of a wolf attack was small because the animals show herd behavior and are therefore more resistant to the wolf than farm animals.
The province confirms the valuer’s reading. “One of the posts has snapped off at the bottom. According to the appraiser, the wolf got through there,” says a spokesperson.
Earlier, the Drenthe and Gelderland wolf consultants differed in opinion about the wolf resistance of a fence. The Gelderland wolf consultant had labeled a fence at sheep farmer Stefan Worst in Vledder as ‘wolf-resistant’ in February, but the Drenthe wolf consultant found that the fence did not meet the standards of BIJ12 on several points.
The attack in Amen took place within the triangle where a pair of wolves has settled. The DNA of she-wolf GW3011f and wolf GW2864 was found on dead sheep in the area between Grolloo, Borger and Zwiggelte. The male’s DNA has been found regularly since June last year and the female’s has been since September last year. DNA research must show whether this wolf pair is indeed responsible for the attack in Amen.
This is what Bert Zinger himself put on Facebook: