A livestock breeder in the mountains of Drama, near the Greek-Bulgarian border, used his mobile phone to call for help as a pack of 19 wolves circled the tree in which he had taken refuge, the Athens News Agency reported yesterday.

Theofilos Amarantidis, 23, was riding a mule through the abandoned village of Melissohori when he noticed a wolf following him. He climbed up a walnut tree just before several more wolves arrived on the scene.

Friends whom he notified walked about a mile through thick fog with a pack of sheepdogs and chased away the wolves. The agency did not say when the incident occurred.

One of the rescuers, Lazaros Karropoulos, said that wolves entering Greece from Bulgaria had become a serious problem for livestock breeders in the area, as they were a protected species and shooting them is prohibited.