He's pretty bold

Wolf released for shooting in residential area

The wolf from St. Oswald near Freistadt stumbled into the wildlife camera - it has obviously made prey(Bild: zVg)

This wolf, which has been on the loose in the Rohrbach and Haslach area for some time now, is pretty bold. Twice it has been chased away with difficulty and regularly roams unabashedly through residential areas. Now it has been classified as a high-risk wolf and released for shooting.

The Isegrim has been seen and "snapped" by wildlife cameras on several occasions. But on February 19, it came really close to humans for the first time. At a farm in Rohrbach-Berg, it walked uninhibitedly towards the farmer, who was doing woodwork, and was apparently also interested in the chicken coop. "The wolf was almost impossible to chase away," the farmer later reported to the Upper Austrian wolf commissioners.

The next incident occurred on March 4. The predator, which had already been spotted or photographed a dozen times, roamed through the settlement area in broad daylight and was not impressed by cars honking their horns. "We have therefore classified the animal as a high-risk wolf and released it for shooting. The wolf can be removed from St. Oswald within a period of four weeks. The deadline ends on April 2, 2025," says Michaela Langer-Weninger, Provincial Councillor for Agriculture and Hunting. The district master hunter and the hunting rights holders in the affected hunting areas of Rohrbach have been informed.

Protection lowered
The shooting permit was issued on the very day that the Bern Convention comes into force, in which the protection status of the wolf is lowered from "strictly protected" to "protected". "Once again, the importance of wolf management in Upper Austria is evident. There are now four wolf packs in Upper Austria, which are growing rapidly due to their high reproduction rate. Effective wildlife management measures are therefore essential," says Langer-Weninger.

Four times more sightings reported
Wolf sightings have quadrupled since 2019, particularly in the pack areas in the Mühlviertel region. This shows that monitoring and targeted management are of great importance. Upper Austria is a pioneer here, but now there is also movement internationally in the discussion about wolf management.