This Terrifying Robot Wolf Is Protecting the Crops of Japanese Farmers

or the last eight months, farms near Kisarazu City in Japan have been home to a horrifying robot wolf. But don’t worry, it wasn’t created to terrorize local residents (although, from the looks of the thing, it probably did). Its official name is “Super Monster Wolf,” and engineers designed it to stop animals from eating farmers’ crops.

In truth, the story of the robowolf is more than a little sad. As Motherboard reports, wolves went extinct in Japan in the early 1800s. The cause? A state-sponsored eradication campaign. Now, parts of Japan are overrun with deer and wild boar. They love to feast on farmers’ rice and chestnut crops. Obviously, farmers do not love this. Fast forward 200 years, and humans create a robotic wolf to replace the species they killed off.