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Wolf shot in southern Sweden after sheep attack

TT/The Local
TT/The Local - [email protected]
Wolf shot in southern Sweden after sheep attack
A wolf pair spotted in Linderöåsen near Kristianstad in Skåne. Photo: Länstyrelsen Skåne

A wolf was shot near the city of Lund in southern Sweden on Sunday, after it was discovered by a farmer while attacking a sheep.

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The animal, a female weighing 34kg, was shot according to a paragraph in Sweden’s hunting law which allows livestock owners to shoot predators if they find them attacking their animals.

“The farmer fired off a warning shot to discourage further attacks, but that did not help, and so a deadly shot was then fired,” Tom Espgård, the hunter appointed to oversee the hunting of predatory animals in Skåne, told the TT newswire. 

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On Wednesday a wolf was spotted in nearby Ljungbyhed, and on Saturday, six sheep were found dead in a suspected wolf attack in Röstånga, another village in Svalöv municipality. Skåne's county council will not confirm whether the wolf that was shot is the same wolf suspected of the attack in Röstånga.

Espgård said that the shooting had been done "very properly". "As a livestock owner, you have the right to protect your animals," he said. 

The vast majority of Sweden's wolves -- about 400 out of a total of 480 -- live in central Sweden, but wolves have been spotted with increasing frequency in Skåne, Sweden's most southerly county, in recent years. 

Sweden's government in May said it would allow hunters to kill as many as half of the country's wolves in the licensed wolf hunt this year, a decision which has been criticised by animal rights groups. 

READ ALSO: Why is Sweden planning to cull half its wolf population?

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