In the early XNUMXs they were on the verge of extinction, so much so that the WWF launched a national awareness campaign. Fifty years later it can be said that the countryside has been lucky: today a presence of over 3.300 wolves, of which two thirds in the Apennine ridge and one third in the Alps, where their population grew faster. The estimate is from Ispra, the National Institute for Environmental Prevention, which carried out the first national monitoring of the species. A team effort that involved a vast network of experts in collecting the signs of the presence of the wolf from North to South, explains Ispra, which carried out the monitoring between the 2020 and the 2021, on a mandate from the Ministry of Ecological Transition.
"If we calculate the extent of the wolf presence areas (41.600 square kilometers in the Alpine regions and 108.500 square kilometers in the peninsular regions), it can be said that the species occupies almost all of the suitable environments in peninsular Italy. Everywhere the wolf population has grown, in the Alps the most significant increase ». Since these are estimates, a fork of error must be considered for each of the numbers relating to the presence: between 822 and 1.099 for the Alpine regions, between 2.020 and 2.645 for the peninsular areas, says Ispra (Higher Institute for Environmental Protection and Research). The monitoring was conducted by dividing the national territory into cells of 10 × 10 kilometers and carrying out two separate analyzes for the Autonomous Regions-Provinces of the Alps area and the regions of peninsular Italy.
The presence of the wolf, says Ispra, "has been documented by 6.520 photographic sightings with camera traps, 491 prey to hoofed carcasses, 1.310 tracks, 171 dead wolves, as well as from 16.000 excrements found on the ground. 1.500 genetic analyzes were conducted which made it possible to identify the species. Overall 85.000 kilometers were traveled on foot to collect the data necessary for the investigation ». The monitoring involved a network of over 3.000 people, including trained volunteer operators and staff from national and regional parks, regions and autonomous provinces, universities, museums, 5 national associations (Aigae, Cai, Legambiente, Lipu, Wwf Italy), 37 local associations, 504 departments of the Environmental Forestry Unit Command and Agri-food (Cufaa) of the Carabinieri.
The network of operators was coordinated in the Alpine region by the Life WolfAlps Eu project and in the Italian peninsula region by 20 technicians appointed by Federparchi Europarc Italy (the Italian Federation of Parks and Natural Reserves). "An innovative monitoring project on a national scale and under the coordination of Ispra, which has made it possible to overcome the inhomogeneity of the monitoring carried out so far, defining standardized protocols that will make it possible in the future to analyze population dynamics - the note of the Institute reads - The data collected and the network created can provide support to local authorities and national parks for the correct conservation of the wolf and to mitigate the conflicts of this predator with human activities "(Sun 24 Hours).