Iberian Wolf

Fascinating facts about the Iberian Wolf

• The Iberian Peninsula hosts between 2,200 and 2,700 wolves, making it the largest wolf population in Western Europe. These animals are concentrated in the north-west of the peninsula, covering northwestern Spain and northern Portugal. They are organised into more than 350 packs that together occupy about 140,000 km² of rugged terrain, giving the region a uniquely dense wolf community.
• Between 2019 and 2021 Spain issued hunting permits for exactly 339 Iberian wolves, all restricted to the area north of the Douro River. This quota was the only legal avenue for wolf hunting in Western Europe until a national ban was introduced in February 2021. After the ban took effect, no further legal kills were permitted, ending a controversial period of regulated trophy hunting.
• In parts of its range the Iberian wolf reaches densities of up to seven individuals per 100 km², among the highest rates recorded for any European wolf population. Such concentrations occur in several Iberian regions where the wolves form tightly knit packs. Overall the subspecies numbers over 2,000 animals in more than 350 packs spread across 140,000 km², reinforcing its status as a densely populated wolf community.
• The isolated southern wolves of Sierra Morena have suffered severe genetic erosion, as a road-killed specimen showed that almost a third of its DNA came from domestic dogs. This high level of dog ancestry reflects intense inbreeding after the population became cut off for roughly fifty years. A breeding pair was still seen in 2013, but a thorough survey in 2016 failed to locate any remaining breeding individuals, suggesting the group may now be extinct.
• In Guadarrama National Park the Iberian wolf's diet is overwhelmingly wild, with 82% of food coming from native fauna and only 18% from livestock. Wild boar makes up the largest share at 44%, followed by roe deer at 35%, while ibex and red deer are taken only occasionally at 3% and 0.3% respectively. The exact mix shifts with prey availability, and the wolves will also supplement their meals with smaller animals such as rodents and birds when larger prey are scarce.

Sources

Every fact above was checked against these pages, and kept only where one of them states it.

• Wikipedia

At a glance

About the Iberian Wolf

In the granite mountains of the Iberian Peninsula, a wolf unlike any other prowls terrain that shaped it into something distinct from its European cousins. The Iberian wolf's spotted legs and striped tail are the marks of long isolation, a subspecies carved by centuries of persecution into secretive survivors on the margins of one of Europe's wildest landscapes. Their slow return from the brink is one of Europe's great rewilding stories.

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