The child-killing wolves sparking panic in India

[Still Waters]

Since mid-April, a wave of wolf attacks, external has terrorised around 30 villages in Bahraich district, near the border with Nepal. Nine children and an adult have been carried off and killed by the wolves. The youngest victim was a one-year-old boy, and the oldest was a 45-year-old woman. At least 34 others have been injured.

Fear and hysteria have gripped the affected villages. With many village homes lacking locks, children are being kept indoors, and men are patrolling the darkly lit streets at night. Authorities have deployed drones and cameras, set traps and used firecrackers to scare away the wolves. So far, three wolves have been captured and relocated to zoos.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx2n1z943zzo

[Ajay0]

The Indian wolf is an endangered species in India due to unregulated hunting, poaching and culling and habitat loss due to deforestation, and it is now accorded protection status since 1972 as it is close to extinction.

Only a few thousands remain, and this is why the authorities are not using lethal force against them, and employing scare tactics instead or putting them in zoos or sanctuaries.

Global warming has also resulted in excessive flooding issues in India, and in this instance forests that were part of their habitat was flooded . This could have led the wolves to stray into nearby villages for livestock and prey.

[openozy]

Some people would consider them monsters for killing a kid but they are just plentiful, easy prey to the wolves. No malice intended, just a meal.

[MrAnderson]

On 9/8/2024 at 5:30 AM, openozy said:

Some people would consider them monsters for killing a kid but they are just plentiful, easy prey to the wolves. No malice intended, just a meal.

There is nothing evil about what the wolves are doing. That's how they survive in the wild and they must kill to eat so they can make it. The issue with the authorities in India is that they fail their citizens because they don't care too much I suspect. There are always measures to deal with wild animals without killing them. You may have to kill a few of them in the end but that's how life is.

[Ajay0]

Operation Bhediya was launched in the Indian district of Uttar Pradesh's Bahraich district on July 17 to capture the wolves involved in the incidents.

Drones, thermal cameras, wolf pugmarks and eye-witness accounts were used as intelligence to understand the locations, habits and movement patterns of the wolves.

A couple of forest department teams were sent for both patrolling the villages as well as nabbing the wolves in the possible locations.

Six wolves have been identified as the culprits, five wolves have been captured and the sixth is the only one out in the wild.

https://indianexpress.com/article/india/up-forest-department-fifth-wolves-killed-bahraich-9559656/

https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/bahraich-wolf-attack-uttar-pradesh-captured-forest-department-operation-bhediya-2596867-2024-09-10

Quote

 

The forest department had formed several teams to patrol the areas in the night and was using elephant dung and urine to drive away the wolves

The Uttar Pradesh government has declared the wolf attacks as a 'wildlife disaster'.

The recent events of wolf attacks in Bahraich have baffled experts, as the animals are known to be gentle and docile by nature. General Manager of UP Forest Corporation Sanjay Pathak said that wolves have a tendency to seek revenge if their homes or young ones have been harmed.

The villagers' account of a wolf den in a nearby sugarcane field being destroyed in a flood, possibly killing cubs, underscores this argument.

 

 

Edited September 12 by Ajay0