Norway clashes with environmentalists over wolf cull

Environmentalists and the government have been clashing in Norway over a controversial decision to cull two thirds of the country's endangered wolf population.

This would be the largest cull to take place since 1911.

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Currently there are only 68 wolves living in the country - so the cull would take the population down to just 21 or 22 wolves.

The government says it is are doing it to help out farmers who are losing their sheep to the predators.

However, limiting the country to only 22 wolves could be too little for the population to be able to sustain itself, say animal rights activists.

Nina Jensen, head of the Norwegian World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), said: "This is pure mass slaughter."

Adding: "We haven't seen anything like this in almost 100 years, when the policy at the time was to exterminate all the big predators," phys.org reports.