Only shortly after the existence of a third wolf pack was discovered in the Lausitz region in Saxony, Germany, a fourth pack of wolves was confirmed to exist in the Niederlausitz region (Brandenburg). The pack resides on an abandoned military training site in the Zschorno Heath region and has already reproduced successfully this year. The exact number of pups born is yet unknown, however.

Within one week, two dead wolves were found in the Lausitz region in Saxony and southern Brandenburg, respectively. The first wolf was found dead in the Neustadt Heath (Oberlausitz). The female yearling was discovered by a ranger in the morning hours on August 7 on the western part of the military training site where a pack of wolves resides since 2002/2003.

The carcass was sent to the Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research (IZW) in Berlin for a necropsy. According to the results, it is believed that the wolf was killed by a wild sow.

One week later, on August 15, a lumberjack found another dead female wolf near Luckau in southern Brandenburg. The carcass was located in the thicket near highway B87. Her left leg was broken and she was sent in for a necropsy to the IZW again.

A gunshot wound and remains of a bullet were found, which makes this the first proven case of an illegally shot wolf in the Lausitz region since the beginning of the recolonization in 1995. The German Hunting Association (DJV) condemned the act and offered a 1,000 EUR reward for any information which leads to the arrest of the offender.

According to officials, a third wolf pack seems to have established in the Lausitz region. Further information on the size of the pack and the location of its territory has not been released yet.

The Lausitz region (Saxony, eastern Germany, near the border to Poland) is home to wolves since they were first sighted around 1995 and formed the first reproducing pack in 2000. The second pack split off in 2002, when four siblings dispersed from the Muskau Heath pack to settle down in the Neustadt Heath area. However, in their first mating season, the only female amonst the four chose a German Shepherd dog over one of her brothers, giving birth to nine hybrids, four of which survived. Two were caught, the other two vanished. Later on, the Neustadt Heath female found a mate in a disperser from Poland in 2004 and gave birth to five pups the year after and to six more in 2006.

The federal government of Germany is making plans to capture six yearlings from the population in the Lausitz region (Saxony) and equip them with GPS collars. The trapping using fladry is scheduled for this winter. Throughout the last years, the Saxon State Ministry for the Environment and Agriculture (SMUL) had strictly opposed the idea of radio-collaring wolves or doing any other invasive research on the wolves in the region.

A five month old wolf pup from the Muskau Heath Pack was found dead on the military training area Oberlausitz approximately one week ago. An autopsy of the animal at the Institute for zoo and wildlife research in Berlin yielded no results in determining a specific cause of death. Further investigations are planned at the museum of natural history in Görlitz.

Also, one dead and two injured sheep were found at an enclosure in Nieder Seifersdorf (Oberlausitz, Saxony). Ilka Reinhardt from LUPUS wildlife consulting said that there is a 50% chance that the kill was made by a wolf. The reason for this uncertainty is that besides the typical bitemarks on the throat of the sheep, there are injuries inflicted by shaking, which is thought to be typical for dog attacks, according to Ilka Reinhardt. This was another case in which the loss could have been prevented, because one side of the 25 acre area was not completely fenced in.

In the night between October 18th and 19th, a flock of sheep was attacked in Köbeln, north of Bad Muskau, right on the border of Saxony to Brandenburg. It is presumed that the attacker might have been a wolf that has been sighted earlier this year in the Zschorno forest in Brandenburg.

Seven sheep were killed in this incident while two more were put down due to their injuries. Following the attack, the insufficiently protected pen holding 1200 blackhead sheep was equipped with an additional wire and fladry.

France has invited Carter Niemeyer, former coordinator of the Idaho Wolf Recovery Program for the US Fish and Wildlife Service to catch three wolves in Mercantour National Park and put GPS collars on them. The goal is to estimate the effect of wolves on ungulates.

»The many visitors of the park have made these wolves even more wary than those in american parks«, said Christophe Duchamp from the game department of the French alps. Therefore, they hoped that Niemeyer is able to get the work done with his tremendous experience. The ex trapper that retired on January 2nd, 2006 and has caught over 400 wolves during his career, but was always under attack of some US conservationists for his unpopular decisions in wolf control.