TALMASSON (PORDENONE) – «Ianco can’t be found. I saw him on Sunday he was playing out here and then it’s disappeared. Try to see if you can figure out where it ended up.” Ianco is a five-year-old mixed breed who, with his brother Max, made the days of Ermes Feltrin’s mother, who lives in a house in Talmasson di Fontanafredda, happier and less lonely and raised the alarm to her son. An inhabited area, where it is easy to see pets in courtyards or gardens. But what Feltrin discovered later, thanks to the images of the surveillance cameras, he didn’t expect it.
Wolves caught on camera
The video clearly shows two wolves adults who calmly approach the house around 2 am between Sunday and Monday and look around. They walk, not far from each other and look repeatedly. Then the attack on the dogs, one of which, Ianco, was torn to pieces by the wolves who fortunately failed to catch his brother Max who, terrified, ran away and hid near the entrance of the house. Valter Bergamo, head of the Fontanafredda wildlife recovery centre, confirmed that they are two wolves by looking at the images. It was he who immediately notified the Pordenone Forestry Guard, responsible for the area, and who delivered the film with footage of the attack.
The detail
«I usually arrive at night with the truck which I park near my mother’s house – explains Feltrin still in disbelief -. The two little dogs as soon as they hear me arrive run to greet me, they want to get into the cabin. That didn’t happen the other night». When he was alerted to Ianco’s disappearance, Feltrin walked towards the gate. «He never went on the road and I feared that he had been hit. Instead, after a hundred meters I found what was left of the dog.” And the cameras have removed the veil on the mystery, showing an unexpected and frightening reality. Yes, because Feltrin is scared now, «even though they told me that the wolf doesn’t attack humans. Max is terrified, I looked for him and found him hidden, motionless. Of course when I get home I will be more careful.”
Wolves near houses
The area where the wolves attacked and mauled the dog is inhabited, there is also a subdivision of terraced houses. But of wolves a Talmasson they had never been seen until the other night, even though for a few weeks there had been reports of the presence of these animals in Nave, Ranzano, Polcenigo. Alarms that many had not believed to be real, hypothesizing that dogs had been mistaken for wolves. The alarm, however, was real. And now the most important thing is to warn citizens to keep their dogs or cats indoors at night. And that they close chicken coops and other places where animals shelter. The wolves came down from the mountains and hills and arrived in the plains, following the route already opened by the roe deer which are often seen in the fields near the houses. “I don’t know if the Forestry Service will take action – states Feltrin -, but something needs to be done because the wolves have gotten close to the houses.” And it is not difficult to think that they will be able to return.
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