Run over in the Czech Republic: wolf released for shooting is dead

Created: 02/10/2022, 06:01

By: Dominik Göttler, Heidi Geyer

The run over animal on the side of the road near the Czech town of Prostejov.

© AOPK/Vladislav Holec

A legal tug-of-war had developed around the shooting down of the wolf with the designation GW2425m in Upper Bavaria.

Now it is clear: the animal has long been dead. It was probably run over by a car in the Czech Republic.

Munich/Prostejov – The male wolf with the designation GW2425m, which was released for shooting after several cracks in Upper Bavaria and a foray through the town of Bergen, is dead. As the State Office for the Environment announced yesterday, the animal was already in the Czech Republic on January 17th found run over.

Genetic tests have now shown that the wolf that was run over is the same animal for which the government of Upper Bavaria had issued a shooting license on the day it was found in the Czech Republic.

A legal dispute arose over this approval.

While alpine farmers, Bavaria's Minister of Agriculture and the Minister of the Environment welcomed the decision, the Bund Naturschutz and the Society for the Protection of Wolves complained about a possible shooting.

Unlike the government, they saw no danger to humans.

The conservationists were right in the first instance, the general decree was suspended.

The decision of the Bavarian Administrative Court was still pending.

"From our point of view, the urgent procedure is over," said a government spokesman yesterday.

The site is about 360 kilometers as the crow flies from Bavaria

The site where the dead wolf was found in Prostejov in the Czech Republic is around 360 kilometers as the crow flies from the last record in Bavaria - a crack on December 19 near Marktschellenberg.

So within just under four weeks, the wolf migrated almost across Austria to the east of the Czech Republic.

The federal government for nature conservation and the Greens in the state parliament called for nationwide state support for herd protection for Bavaria's animal owners yesterday.

The current case shows the distance a wolf can cover in a short time.

The farmers in the Chiemgau were relieved.

Matthäus Michlbauer from the farmers' association in Traunstein said he was glad the wolf hadn't caused any further cracks.

But it is only a matter of time before the next conspicuous wolf comes along.