Wolf contact in horses at permanent pasture in Germany

Abstract

Wolves returned to Germany in 2000, leading to fear in German horse owners that their horses could be in danger of wolf attacks or panic-like escapes from pastures when sighting wolves. However, reports from southern European countries indicate that wolf predation on horses diminishes with increasing presence of wildlife. Therefore, we conducted a long-term, filed observation between January 2015 and July 2022 on 13 non breeding riding horses, mares and geldings, kept permanently on two pastures within the range of wildlife and a stable wolf pack with annual offspring. Wildlife cameras at the fences of the pastures made 984 times recordings of wolves and 3151 times recordings of wildlife in and around the pastures. Between 1 January 2022 and 23 March 2022 we observed two stable horse groups. Pasture 1 was grazed by five horses of mixed breed, four mares and one gelding, with the median age of 8 years (min. = 6y, max. = 29y). Pasture 2 was grazed by eight heavy warmbloods and draught horses, three mares and five geldings, with the median age of 16 years (min. = 13y, max. = 22y). During this period no wolf was recorded at pasture 2, but wild boar several times, whereas at pasture 1, wolves were recorded 89 times, and for the wildlife mostly hare. Wolves may have avoided pasture 2 because of the presence of wild boar or because the large group of older, heavy breed horses may have formed a stable, protective group. The latter needs to be confirmed in a follow-up field observation, which records anti-predator behavior and welfare indicators in horses. In conclusion, wolves did not attack the mature horses on pastures with plenty of wildlife and the horses did not respond to the presence of wolves with visible signs of reduced welfare or panic. This indicates that wolves may prefer to prey on easily accessible wildlife around and at horse pastures and that Central European horses become accustom to the presence of non-hunting wolves.

Fig 1. Observation area.

a) shows a drawing of the observation area with the cameras TNO5, TNO7 and TNO9 at pasture 1, the camera TNO2 at pasture 2 and the cameras TNO1 and TNO3 at the pathway between the pastures. b) shows a wolf passing pasture 2 on the roadway, recorded by wildlife camera TNO2. Grazing horses are visible at the upper half of the picture (see more wolf and horse recordings at S1 File).

Fig 2. Wolves recorded between January 2015 and July 2022.

The dark grey column shows the total number of wolves observed at the observation area. The light grey columns show the number of wolves that were observed together in any one incidence (Table 1).

Fig 3. Wolf behaviour.

The light grey columns visualize when wolves were recorded standing (N = 117), trotting (N = 695) and running (N = 3) along, inside and between horse pastures. The dark grey columns show when wolves were observing horse pastures (N = 25) and when wolves were recorded inside horse pastures (N = 9).

Fig 4. Wolves recorded close to or at pasture 1, pasture 2 and the pathway at the comparative observation.

No wolf was recorded at pasture 2 between the 1^st January and the 23^rd March 2022, neither during the day, the night, or the dawn (Table 1).

Fig 5. Wildlife recorded at particular pastures and the pathway during the comparative observation.

Columns of dark color show the total number of wildlife, columns of light color the specific wildlife species recorded. While wildlife on pasture 1 was mostly hare (63%), wildlife on pasture 2 showed mostly wild boar (64%) (Table 1, Chi square test: both p < 0.001).