The project to save the Italian deer: 20 specimens brought to Calabria
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With the arrival of spring it was released in a natural area of the Calabriathe Serre Regional Natural Park and the surrounding nature reserves, a first nucleus of 20 individuals of Italian deeroriginating from Mesola woodthe last remaining range of the autochthonous subspecies of our peninsula (Cervus elaphus italicus), decimated in the last centuries in the rest of the Italian territory. Therefore, the first phase of theOperation Cervo Italico realized thanks to the joint effort of several partners: Forest Police (formerly the State Forestry Corps) managers of the Bosco della Mesola Nature Reserve and who also guaranteed transport and surveillance at the release site thanks to the territorially competent department, the Serre Regional Natural ParkL’University of Sienascientific reference of the project, the Wwf Italy as operational coordinator, Dream Italyan institution for wildlife studies with extensive experience in the management of ungulates, theExperimental Zooprophylactic Institute of Lazio and Tuscany and the Department of Veterinary Medical Sciences of theAlma Mater Studiorum University from Bologna.
In March, after the delicate capture operations, the animals were safely transferred over a thousand kilometers away, in the Serre Regional Natural Park, which from today sees the value of its biodiversity increase, also for the benefit of local communities. Translocated individuals are subjected to intense monitoring through the use of satellite collars, which allow the verification of movements, survival and reproduction rates, and any causes of mortality. The operation involves the capture and release in the new identified area of at least 20 individuals per year, for three years (2023, 2024 and 2025). In order not to interfere with the most delicate phases of the biological cycle of the species, the release will take place every year within the time window included between the months of November and March.
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Public meetings will be held in the municipalities of the protected area of the Serre Regional Natural Park in the coming months, with the aim of providing citizens with information on ongoing operations and the value of the species for local and Italian biodiversity. Thanks to the collaboration between several bodies and institutions, the mission is to save a completely unique subspecies from extinction: all the deer present in the rest of the peninsula are, in fact, European deer (Cervus elaphus hippelaphus) introduced in Italy after the Second World War and today in progressive expansion. The Bosco della Mesola State Nature Reserve, in the province of Ferrara, has preserved the last ones to this day 300 specimens of Italian deer which, in conditions of genetic isolation, have an uncertain future due to the risk of consanguinity, possible modifications of the habitat or eventual epidemics.
The Mesola deer represents a priority to be protected and safeguarded at a national level. Long-term conservation of this population is today jeopardized by several factors: from the demographic ones, due to the smallness of the population and the high rate of consanguinity of the residual nucleus to the competition with the fallow deer, which, if present in large numbers, can limit the use of resources for deer; moreover, the lack of other populations does not guarantee a sufficient genetic exchange. To ensure a future for this unique population, it is therefore necessary on the one hand to improve the environmental conditions of the area of origin, both in the open areas and in the undergrowth, and to limit the diffusion and numerical consistency of fallow deer, and on the other to repopulate new suitable areas .
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Tallinn, green capital of animals: 1500 mammals have found a home
by Jeanne Perego
More than 30 years after the operation Sardinian deerlaunched by the WWF to save, also thanks to the purchase of Monte Arcosu Reservethe other subspecies of deer (Cervus elaphus corsicanus) typical of the island (and which today has gone from a few hundred to almost 10,000 individuals), it is hoped that the future of the Italian deer will be just as rosy.
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