After the stork, the large hamster of Alsace? Like the famous wading bird some forty years ago, rodents are currently in danger of extinction. But good news, it’s a little better! In the region, the number of burrows of large hamsters has doubled between 2021 and 2022 according to the count carried out by the French Office for Biodiversity.
“In 2022, 960 burrows were identified in 24 municipalities of Bas-Rhin and Haut-Rhin”, announced Monday the prefecture of Grand-Est in a press release, which sees it as an illustration of “the positive dynamics of the populations observed since several years “. This number is the highest recorded in the last five years. Only 488 terriers were counted in 2021, 745 in 2019, 709 in 2018 and 505 in 2017. There was no count in 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic. Although these results remain “fragile”, they “encourage the continuation of actions for the sustainability of the species in France”, consider the authorities.
These figures are the result of a reintroduction policy during releases carried out each year in the spring, within the framework of a national action plan (PNA). A total of 404 individuals were released this year as part of the PNA, according to data provided by Dréal Grand-Est.
Several operators also organize releases as compensation. Vinci Autoroutes has thus reintroduced 180 large hamsters in 2022, to weigh the environmental impact of its new A355, a 24 km motorway inaugurated last year, also called Grand bypass west of Strasbourg (GCO), and built partly on the natural environment of the species. In total, this year, “270 hamsters were released by compensators, and 40 others” as part of a European collaborative project, says Dréal.
An “artificial rise”?
“These good figures come from these increasingly important releases”, tempers Stéphane Giraud, director of the Alsace Nature association, who denounces an “artificial increase in numbers”. “When you have to protect the release of large hamsters from predators with fences, or leave rotting wheat on the ground for them to eat, it is no longer really a wild species”, he still stings. .
Black belly, red back and white spots on the muzzle, the animal, also known as “European hamster”, has been classified as “critically endangered” since 2020 by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature ( IUCN). The IUCN fears that this “umbrella species” – its protection leads to that of several other species – will disappear within the next thirty years.