looduskalender.ee

Track camera record. Private collection. Shoulder height of a jackal is about 50 cm and weight 11 – 16 kilos. The exterior reminds most of all of a wolf but it is significantly smaller. Its high-pitched howling is very characteristic.

 

 

 

Last week brought more information about the origins of the young female jackal that was killed in Läänemaa at the end of February. A group of Estonian zoology specialists together with species specialist Ovidiu Banea, who arrived here from Romania, ascertained that there are at least two, but probably even more, individuals of this smaller brother of our wolf, the jackal, in Läänemaa.

 

Evidence was found from tracks and howling, as well as images captured by track camera. Thus the perished individual is very likely a jackal born in Estonian nature. Local people maintain that a jackal has had litters already from 2010 onwards – but earlier what was heard and seen simply could not be explained. 

 

The presence and reproduction of jackals here is certain by now, but the question still remains as to how the first pair got here? Although direct human intervention in this seems clearly far more probable, natural migration cannot be ruled out. The nearest permanent populations are in the Ukraine and in Hungary; they were discovered there already in the 1990ies.

 

Wolves are said to be particularly hostile towards jackals. In addition to the global warming, a major reason for the spread of jackals northwards in recent decades is thought to be the low number of wolves.  

 

A report by O. Banea on the West Estonian jackal surveillance: http://goldenjackalaround.blogspot.com/