‘Shameful loss’: wolves declared extinct in Andalucía

For centuries, wolves have roamed the mountain ranges of Andalucía in southern Spain, but after years of decline the creature has been officially declared extinct in the region.

Since 2003, the regional government has carried out a census of the wolf (Canis lupus signatus) population in an effort to monitor the species and reduce conflict with the local population, farmers in particular.

However, in a report, the Andalucian government’s environment department says that “since 2020 there has been no sign of the wolf being present in Andalucía”, in spite of it being a protected species.

Up until at least 2010 it was estimated there were six to eight wolfpacks in the region, mostly in the Sierra Morena, comprising up to 56 individuals.

Despite the wolf being declared extinct only now, experts say there has not been any evidence of wolves in Andalucía since 2013, and probably no reproductive group since 2003.

“This is bad news and it confirms the negative trend for the few existing wolfpacks in southern Spain, which are threatened through being physically and genetically isolated from wolves in the rest of Spain, by loss of habitat, poaching and illegal hunting,” said Luis Suárez, the conservation coordinator for the World Wildlife Fund in Spain.

“The shameful loss of wolves in Andalucía is directly related to the lack of political will on the part of the regional government to adopt conservation measures,” Suárez added.

“It’s incomprehensible that, despite a situation that goes back decades, the wolf has not been listed as a species in danger of extinction and there’s been no recovery plan,” he said.

Had it been categorised as in danger of extinction, the Andalucian government would have been legally obliged to take measures to protect the local wolf population.

Suárez said that for years the government had been paralysed by fear of a confrontation with the hunting lobby and livestock farmers and had limited itself to monitoring the wolf population.

“Now it has a responsibility to get to work to guarantee the return of this species to the southern mountains as soon as possible,” he said. “There is no time for excuses.”

Spain has Europe’s largest wolf population. In the mid-19th century there were about 9,000 wolves distributed throughout the country. A policy of eradication meant that by the 1970s only a few hundred remained.

When poisoning was outlawed in the 1970s, the species began to recover. In the most recent census, in 2021, there were between 2,000-2,500 wolves in 297 packs, 90% of which were in the north-west, principally in Castilla y León, Galicia and Asturias, where they enjoyed protected species status that has banned wolf hunting since 2021.

The Spanish government’s wolf recovery plan announced in 2021 aimed for an 18% increase in the population, from 297 to 350 packs. However, a study published last year by the natural history museum in Madrid suggests that official estimates of Spain’s wolf population are overly optimistic and that numbers are much lower than claimed.

“Populations are typically assessed over a period of two years which is insufficient to determine within a significant margin of error whether a population is increasing, in decline or stable,” said Victoria González, a researcher on the project.