Steel walls and barbed wire fences: How the rise of tough EU borders is hurting wildlife

There has been a border-building spree across Europe in recent years. 

Fencing at the EU’s external and internal borders grew nearly sevenfold between 2014 and 2022, from 315 to 2,048 kilometres, according to the European Parliament. 

Aimed at keeping people out, experts warn these steel walls and barbed wire fences are having a significant - yet often overlooked - impact on animals too. 

Eugene Simonov, an activist and researcher at the Ukraine War Environmental Consequences Work Group, tells Euronews Green that borders increase the risk of death as large mammals and birds can easily injure themselves or become tangled in sharp or electrified fencing. 

On the “especially wicked” Russian-Mongolian or Russian-Chinese borders, he says herds of hoofed animals can die in great numbers in crushes during their migrations if they are pressed up against the barrier. 

Still, nature can adapt. 

According to Matthew Hayward, Professor of Conservation at the UK’s University of Newcastle, predators are learning to incorporate fences into their hunting strategies, meaning they can kill bigger and better prey. 

Though this may benefit those doing the killing, he says it is an “atypical behaviour” within an ecosystem which could create new pressure on prey populations. 

Man-made borders create impermeable barriers that animals cannot cross.

The accompanying increase in human activity - with guards patrolling the areas - deters them further, Hayward says. 

The professor has studied populations of European bison, wolves, deer and lynx in Europe’s last ancient forest on the Polish-Belarusian border, where Poland’s last government built a high fence more than 180km long and 5.5-metreshigh to keep out illegal migrants. 

A key issue is that borders