Wolf attacks on cattle in Drenthe rise to 60 percent as predators learn to kill cows

Wolf attacks on cattle in the Dutch province of Drenthe have risen to 60 so far this year, up from 34 in 2025 and seven in 2022. The attacks are prompting calls for management of the wolf population, as wolves increasingly attack larger cattle rather than sheep, AD reports.

Dairy farmers and veterinarians say wolves have learned to kill cattle since preying on a herd of free-rangin Galloway cattle that has been nearly wiped out since 2022. Research by Leiden University has found that wolves in Drenthe target cattle more frequently than anywhere else in Europe. Attacks typically increase in fall and winter, Bernd Hietberg, a veterinarian at the Het Drentse Hart practice in Beilen, told AD.

“I am shocked by this," he said. “I thought a bull with horns like that would be safe from this predator. But the wolf keeps taking another step further than I expected.”

An adult Scottish Highland bull weighing about 800 kilograms was injured in a recent attack in the Geelbroek nature area, after which the animal fled to a farmyard. In another incident, a security camera recorded two wolves pulling down a young cow weighing around 300 kilograms next to a bar. "One wolf ripped the animal from behind and the other by the head," the farmer told the news outlet.

Hietberg said he now uses a bottle of the euthanasia drug Euthasol in a single morning. Previously, a bottle like this would last him a whole month. “The wolves start feeding immediately.”

A herd of about 100 adult Galloway cattle that grazed in the Elperstroom and De Tweelingen nature areas near Schoonloo since 1997 has been almost entirely wiped out by wolves. The pack has killed over 150 Galloway cows since 2022, including nearly every calf from 2023 onward and then the adult females.

“We knew there were wolves, but we thought, 'That won’t happen here,'" Henny Lensing, who managed the herd with her husband on land owned by the State Forestry Service, told AD. “People assumed the Galloways would learn to defend themselves against the wolf. That turned out to be a misconception: the only one that learned anything was the wolf.”

Farmers are responding by keeping young stock indoors around the clock and closing barn doors on adult dairy cows at night. Most sheep in Drenthe are already kept behind fences, but wolves reportedly dig under barriers. Fencing large pastures for cattle is prohibitively expensive, farmers report.

“Finally provide management,” said dairy farmer Sjaak van Essen, who has an open barn near Geeldbroek. “Soon we’ll have to build a fortress around the farmyard.”

Hietberg told AD that he sees that the conflict is growing. “Everyone in the Netherlands wants our cows to graze in the meadow. And for the Drenthe heathlands to stay beautiful through gazing. But how can that still be possible in a few years if we continue to give the wolf free rein? I see an enormous contradiction here.”