Drama in the Sierra de la Culebra, the paradise of the Iberian wolf that was scorched by lightning

Any resident of the towns that dot the serpentine profile of the Sierra de la Culebra can quote in a row, as if reciting a prayer in Latin, the scientific names of a bunch of boletus, amanitas, níscalos. A brief question about mushrooms in the area can have a complete mycology treatise as an answer, because in the soil that extends at the foot of the pines, oaks, Pyrenean oaks and chestnut trees in this Sierra of Zamora grow these valued gastronomic treasures that they can only be collected with a special license. Deer, roe deer, wild boar, foxes, otters, badgers, wild cats and one of the largest redoubts of Iberian wolves in Spain coexist in the same ecosystem, the latter safe from hunters due to the latest protection measures approved by the central government. The scene of what is already the greatest environmental catastrophe in the history of Castilla y León, according to the Ministry of the Environment, was the natural jewel of Zamora. The fire, caused by lightning, has charred some 30,000 hectares since Wednesday. And with them, the main economic support, through the sale of wood, the management of hunting quotas and tourism, of a fortnight of municipalities in this part of depopulated Spain.

At dawn on Sunday, and when it seemed that the worst could yet come, the first rains came from the west like a blessing that helped to calm the fury of the fire and cool the earth. With seaplanes and helicopters working one more morning overhead, the 1,800 residents who had been evicted were able to return to check the material damage around their villages. And the mayors began to make a provisional balance while waiting for the definitive figure of devastated surface and economic losses given by the Junta de Castilla y León. Lorenzo Jiménez, popular councilor of Villardeciervos, calculates that the devastating forest fire has affected “at least half” of the 70,000 hectares of the Sierra de la Culebra. “We can hang the closed sign for liquidation, because we have been annihilated,” he laments. Its municipality of 420 souls triples its population on vacation due to returning families and tourists, especially from Madrid, but also Basques, Catalans and British and Germans, who reserve entire weeks and make “waits to observe the wolves” or “attend to the spectacle of the bellowing” of the deer in September and October.

Wolverines surrounded by flames

The wolf has its second largest presence in Spain in these places, after the Cantabrian mountain range. Javier Talegón, from the Llobu association for the observation of this animal, asks for time to analyze the impact of the fire on the species, but fears that of the 10 herds settled in the area, at least six have lost their territories. The main concern is the “breeding areas”, where these animals go from groups of three or four to add four or five young: if they have been devastated, there will be a displacement of individuals. Jorge Echegaray, from the Association for the Conservation and Study of the Iberian Wolf (Ascel), maintains that there has been a “brutal destruction of the habitat with consequences such as the degradation of wild prey.” Many roe deer or wild boar have died or have moved, something that the Iberian wolf does not always do due to the territoriality of its congeners, which makes it difficult for other wolves to settle in their spaces. The density of these specimens, Echegaray fears, is compromised because this misfortune has happened in the reproductive season, with puppies barely two months old and that cannot always be transported by their mothers when the flames break out. Therefore, the expert suspects that some will not have survived, like thousands of amphibians or reptiles burned by fire. “The Sierra de la Culebra has never been valued by the Board as a protected natural space or a sanctuary for the protection of the wolf. The model of mass coniferous forestry exploitation has generated a tinderbox”, censures the Zamorano, who believes that “in the long term it will be extremely serious because the habitat and the prey condition the density” of this predator.

“There is no doubt: this fire, already very serious, has occurred at the worst time of the year, a fatal time for the wolf,” Lorenzo Jiménez insists along the same lines. “It is a more intelligent animal than the human being,” says the mayor, “and I hope I am wrong, but mothers can give their lives to defend their litters.” Thanks, above all, to the Iberian wolf, the Sierra de la Culebra “is known throughout the world,” he says. “Great experts come here to study them, like the American David Mech”, founder of the International Wolf Center and researcher at the University of Minnesota. The mayors of the area suspect that many animals will now begin to appear charred among the embers of this regional hunting reserve that winds gently between the counties of Aliste, Sanabria, Carballeda and the Portuguese Tras os Montes. “We know that there are deer alive, because it has been possible to photograph some that returned to the place where they lived, but they have found it completely destroyed by fire,” says Jiménez.

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Misfortune strikes again an area historically punished by depopulation: Zamora has lost 40% of its census since 1950 and 30,000 people so far this century. The average age of its 170,000 inhabitants is 51 years, eight more than the national average, and the forecast for 2033 according to Eurostat makes one tremble: it will be the oldest province on the continent, with an average age of 62.7 years. By then the black demographic situation will be at least adorned by green leaves in the Sierra de la Culebra. If it does not burn again on what was burned in a landscape where even the flocks of sheep, guarantors of the cleanliness of the mountains, have plummeted.

A fatal blow to the economy

In this Biosphere Reserve, much of the income of the towns comes from the sale of pine wood. Of the municipal budget of 550,000 euros in Villardeciervos, 100,000 correspond to the annual income they receive from the wood auction, which is organized under the management of the association of town halls with the control of the regional government. The hunting quotas leave in the regions that make up the sierra more than 200,000 euros; and the pull of mycology and the sale of licenses to collect, 0.9 million direct. It is undeniable for all that the natural catastrophe is accompanied by effects on the finances of Zamoranos, who have an important economic injection in rural tourism in these parts, together with livestock (with many cattle now lost in the mountains), agriculture or beekeeping.

Desolation snatches even the ability to express the pain caused by the blackened landscape: Lidia Mateos, a worker at the El Salao hostel (Villardeciervos), is unable to define what happened: “It’s terrible, a drama, there are no words.” The phone is interrupted by the damaged repeater towers while she denounces the “tremendous abandonment” they have felt and assimilates a “dungy present” that prevents even looking to the future.