Wolves of France

*This article starts at the renaming of France in 1190. For articles about wolves in the area in more ancient times, please look for the country's name in the time period. For wolves in prehistoric times, please look at Wolves in Prehistoric Europe.*

Despite wolves having been eradicated for a time, wolf numbers were high in France in 2017, with around 360 wolves and 42 different packs. However with the recent culling, those numbers are likely less now.

## Subspecies

Most modern French wolves are descended from the Italian wolf subspecies crossing over the border naturally. However, at least one source calls them by their Eurasian subspecies.  But it's clearly evident by their short mane that at least some of them belong to the are the Italian subspecies. Most likely the type of wolf found in France before their eradication belonged to a different genetic phenotype.

## Attacks

**Livestock**

Since the days of the Holy Roman Empire, and possibly before, wolves in France have a strong violent streak towards sheep. They willingly hunt sheep in packs, as opposed to it being just loners, as may occur in other areas. There is no doubt that the fear of wolves that pervade modern media and haunt Westerner's hunters and farmers fears come from the stories based upon French Wolves. While wolves of other areas, especially in Europe and northern Asia, are still likely to hunt sheep every now and again, the sheer preference towards them is a feature of French Wolves.

Currently in France alone about thousands of livestock are killed a year by the reintroduced and ranging wolves. A demonstration was brought to Aveyron in 2017, where they brought over 3,000 sheep, a hundred cattle, and a few horses to represent all the livestock that had been murdered by wolves by that time in that year.    The last couple of previous years had brought nearly 10,000 each year. In 2021, the number reached around 12,000.

Due to their ravenousness in rural towns like Lozère,  culling has continued again, despite the country's government's previous attempts to serve the farmers in getting more sheep, providing guard animals, and electric fences. The farmers say that electric fences, guard dogs, and other ideas have not worked at stopping the wolves from attacking their sheep. However, it seems without dogs, they could easily kill more. One farmer reports that they without dogs they can kill 2,000 in a week, and 30 in a single attack. The dogs also have to be equal in number to the wolf pack's number in order to keep up the safety. Having to raise dogs has changed both their practice and their individual lives as people, and even how people treat them (treating them as dog owners, I suppose).

This sort of massacring sheep was previously attributed to dogs and wolfdogs, as they are considered unnatural. But it is apparent now that wolves can do this.

The sheep attacks of wolves in France is lower than those of coyotes in North America. They are the leading predator of sheep predation there, and consisted of 3% of sheep deaths in 2009. Coyotes can kill as many as 135,600 sheep a year and 116,000 cattle (likely calves) a year , and live in a much wider area than France. North American wolves attack sheep and cattle at much less rates, maybe at 135 to 500 cows a year and about 115 in a tri-state area (that number having been merged with ravens and vultures).

**Human**

Between June 1764 and the same month of 1767, hundreds of attacks on country folk, mostly women and children, were occurring in and around the Gévaudan province. Many of the victims were decapitated with their throats partially eaten, and their bodies not fully consumed. The animal/s in question were noted by witness reports to not be wolves, but rather wolf-like beasts of an unknown sort. Wolves were still commonplace in this area and era. The country folk knew what wolves looked like. This creature is said to have had a long tassled tail, pig-like snout, rust colored fur, a black stripe down its back, and much larger than a wolf. It should be noted that while wolves can have dorsal stripes and have reddish fur, it is clear that local wolves, and most likely all French wolves at this time, did not have this sort of coloration. The Italian wolves that live in modern France are rust colored on their legs and lower sides and sometimes have black markings on their back.

The killings came to the attention of Louis XV, who commanded several different groups time after time to hunt down the beast. Wolves were suspected, and several wolves were hunted down by his teams, as well as at least one peasant. A wolf mother and her larger-than-her Beauceron hybrid pup was also taken. It is said after Jean Chapel shot down the beast on June 19th 1767, its body and stomach contents reportedly contained human remains and were documented in the Marin report. However, it is also said that a great many commoners zealously dissected the beast themselves before the mortician could even examine its remains. Nevertheless, his shooting of the animal is the last documented report of a death by the Beast of Gévaudan. Sources say that it was a larger wolf or wolfdog with rust colored fur, but its hard to tell if I can't find the Marin Report, which may not even be real. A lot of sources seem to dodge it as a wolf. They say he killed a "creature", which was then noted in later text to be a wolf or implied by the earlier text. Thanks, internet.

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 https://www.economist.com/the-economist-explains/2017/09/11/why-wolves-are-back-in-france
2. ↑ https://wolf.org/wow/europe/France/
3. ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKmchJhfihg
4. ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vs6QMlPZZYA
5. ↑ https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/aug/06/french-farmers-demand-action-against-wolves-killing-livestock
6. ↑ https://phys.org/news/2017-07-wolves-slaughter-france-cull-sheep.html
7. ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvIoTPp99SE
8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKmchJhfihg
9. ↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domestic\_sheep\_predation#North\_America
10. ↑ https://wildearthguardians.org/historical-archive/livestock-losses/
11. ↑ https://www.livingwithwolves.org/portfolio/are-wolves-killing-lots-of-cattle-and-sheep/
12. ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20081209090711/http://www.nina.no/archive/nina/PppBasePdf/oppdragsmelding/2002/731.pdf
13. ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NDOs8i9IzQ
14. ↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Beast\_of\_G%C3%A9vaudan&oldid=1144701577
15. ↑ https://skeptoid.com/episodes/4732
16. ↑ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/beast-gevaudan-terrorized-france-countryside-180963820/
17. ↑ https://mysteriesrunsolved.com/2020/06/beast-of-gevaudan.html