The large cull of wild boar ordered to combat the spread of African swine fever (ASF) will, Estonian Hunters' Society adviser Marko Vinni said, negatively impact on Estonia's wolf population as ungulate (including wild boar and elk) numbers are are already low while predator numbers (including wolves) are high – and this situation is set to get worse.

The number of ungulates should be hiked instead, he added, as to fail to do so will lead to a rise of predator attacks on livestock

"As hunters we give our best, but whether this will also bring solutions to the problems, I cannot answer at the moment," he added.

The last large-scale wolf attack on liestock happened in Vasula, near Tartu, in early May, where close to 50 lambs were slaughtered by wolves.

Another factor is culling quotas being set by the Environment Agency (Keskonnaamet) regularly being contested in court by the Eesti Suurkiskjad NGO which, even if the cull is upheld, often shortens the hunting season to a couple of months, even as "Outside the hunting season, to our knowledge, one wolf has been hunted on the basis of special permits," Vinni went on.

Tanel Türna, head of the hunting and aquatic life bureau at the Environment Agency, said what exactly will happen with the cull for the upcoming season, which runs November 1 to February 28, is not yet known.

119 animals were hunted during the last season plus some special permits issued for hunting nuisance individuals while, the agency, reported, there were 150–180 individuals wolves present in Estonia.

The red deer population – also a prey of the eurasian wolf – is healthy and growing, Türna noted, while "here possible, wolves also kill other mammals, such as beavers, hares, foxes, raccoon dogs, smaller rodents and birds," and only kills livestock opportunistically if presented with easy prey – hence the need for farmers to put in adequate preventive measures, even including electric fences.

Between 2015 and 2019 the wild boar stock in Estonia, meanwhile, fell to about a seventh of its original number, yet this was not followed by a surge in livestock attacks, Türna said, with the number of sheep killed annually by wolves ranging between 700 and 1,100 a year.

The wild boar cull quota has been set at 18,000 in the aftermath of the ASF epidemic which began in June, in an effort to stop the disease spreading to areas with pig farms via wild boar as a vector. The cull was more than a quarter fulfilled by late August.

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