The Norwegian wild – The lynx and the wolf

Norwegian wildlife conservation’s surveys bring good news this year for the much prosecuted wolf population of the country and not so good for the shy lynx population. This summer nine family groups of lynx have been registered in the wild predator regions of Norway, including Vestfold, Buskerud, Telemark and Aust-Agder. The Eurasian lynx is a wild cat native to Norway and Sweden as well as large swathes of Eastern Europe and Siberia. Its natural prey includes deer and foxes. This constitutes a reduction of 6.5 family groups compared to last year, NRK reports according to an article published by The Local.

However Norway’s wolf population has nearly doubled according to another article in the Local published in June. Over the past winter, there were about twice as many Norwegian wolves compared to the year before. “This winter, a total of seven litters were registered. Six of them were born in territory that is more than 50 percent within the administrative area for breeding wolves. The Norwegian population target of three annual wolf litters within the zone is therefore reached,” Jonas Kindberg of Rovdata said in a press release.

 

Image from wikipedia, author Bernard Landgraf