Return of wolves to Germany pits farmers against environmentalists

French TV channel Arte aired an interesting documentary in 2017 that looked at the cohabitation between wolfes returned from Italy and sheep farmers from south of France. The farmers presented in the documentary have small farms of 100s of sheep maximum, such that it is common that a farmer "know" most sheeps from its farm. These sheeps are outside except in winter or to sleep during the night.

In this documentary they say that the problems are that:

- sheeps that are attacked but not killed will run away and empty themselves of their blood and the farmer will have to finish them after seeing a lot of suffering

- farmers want to avoid this suffering and this is very stressful

- herds that have been attacked will remain terrified for days

- wolves are very smart and will wait for the right instant to attack

- wolves are "mean": they will kill more sheeps than they could eat

The documentary seems to suggest that the best solution is not drones nor more people around herds nor new ways to raise the sheeps nor locking herds inside buildings all day but to shot at any wolf that would get too close from the herd, because wolves are very intelligent and would soon realize that it is not in their interest to attack sheeps (they should be able to find food in the forest by hunting wild animals such as deers which would help control their population).

I could not find a link to the documentary (in French) but I watched it online recently.

So at least for small farms in south France, if I understood the documentary correctly, it is more a problem of legislation that ties the hand of farmers than it is a problem of money.

In at least some states, they are reimbursed (don't know for all). It's not just a economic topic, but also quite emotional. Interesting is the change in tone when the analysis of an attack comes back and reveals it was a dog instead.