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Petition · Halt the Inhumane Wolf Hunt in Sweden in January 2024 [1]
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Date: 2025-01
Say NO to wolf hunting in 2024
The county boards in Värmland, Västra Götaland, Västermanland, Södermanland and in Örebro have decided on license hunting for a total of 36 wolves in January 2024. Something Revolution Rov strongly opposes, hence this petition to demonstrate to our decision makers that there are many of us who do not want see any licensed wolf hunting in 2024.
To clear up any question marks in the matter, let us therefore ask ourselves the questions: How are our Swedish wolves really doing? What does another license hunt mean in practice for our Swedish wolf tribe?
The Swedish wolf is protected and classified as highly threatened with extinction on the The species database red list. The wolf also has strict protection in the EU's nature conservation directive, there is also a Parliament decision that we must have viable predator tribes in Sweden.
In autumn 2023, there are around 400 wolves in Sweden, but it is a sensitive and vulnerable wolf tribe. Its genetic status needs to be significantly improved to make the population viable even in the long term. Many wolves that form pairs at the moment are closely related to each other, genetically equivalent to sibling pairs.
The survival of the Swedish wolf tribe actually depends on new wolves migrating in from Finland and Russia and replenishing it with new genes, so-called genetically important wolves. During the last 10 years, approximately 1 new Finno-Russian wolf has migrated every winter in the northern part of Sweden and Norway, but only a very few of these have been able to reach potential partners. Instead, they were shot during protection hunts for the benefit of the reindeer herding country.
Illegal hunting, "poaching" also poses a serious threat to our wolf population. Illegal hunting is of course difficult to monitor and document, it hides large numbers of missing wolves every year. Through DNA, researchers have nevertheless demonstrated that up to 80 wolves are shot illegally each year. In many license hunting decisions on wolves in recent years, it has been argued that if legal hunting is allowed, illegal hunting will disappear, but that has not happened at all... Instead, even more wolves have had to die.
The political situation surrounding the wolf issue in Sweden has also significantly increased the threat to the Swedish wolf tribe after the change of government in autumn 2022. Among other things, the government has decided to review whether the reference value for wolves can be lowered to 170, instead of the current 300 individuals. They also want to simplify the guidelines for protective hunting decisions on wolves so that it will be easier to shoot wolves. When the wolf issue in Sweden is discussed, it often ends up in numbers, how many wolves can there be and where?
The survival of the wolf tribe in our country is obviously not only based on quantity but also quality. Genetic quality. So Sweden's wolf tribe cannot therefore afford to be shot down and thus become even more genetically impoverished than it is today.
The wolf has an important role as a top predator in our ecosystems. It is a skilled hunter that regulates the number of ungulates and influences their behavior by creating fear and caution. Leftovers from the wolf's prey also become food for other predators, the fact is that the wolf provides carrion species with carcasses that can be of great importance in warmer climates and benefit, for example, the protected wolverine (classified as vulnerable to extinction).
Neither the wolf nor any other animals exist in nature as ornaments. They are integrated into highly complex ecological networks with other organisms, the bedrock and climate, in other words the network that forms the basis of man's own existence and well-being.
So stop the license hunt for wolves in 2024 before it is to late !
https://revolutionrov.org/2023/11/29/namninsamling-sag-nej-till-vargjakt-2024/
Wolves are an integral part of our earths ecosystem.
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[1] Url:
https://www.change.org/p/halt-the-inhumane-wolf-hunt-in-sweden-in-january-2024
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