W O L V E S

Howls in the Wild

Wolves howl for a number of reasons:

To maintain communication

To establish the roll of the pack

To declare their presence in a territory

Each wolf has a disinctive voice that other pack members recognize immediately. Most howling is done at night.

The Diminishing Gray Wolf

Over two hundred years ago Canis Lupus (the gray, tundra, or timber wolf) was the most widely distributed mammal on earth. In North America wolves have been completely eradicated from the entire United States, except for Alaska and small populations in northern Minnesota, Michigan's Isle National Park and western Montana. Gray wolves are gone from the heavily developed territories across Southern Canada, but packs still roam freely across northern Canada all the way from Labrador to the Yukon Territory. The gray wolf is not an easy animal to discribe. Its basic colors are white, gray, and black, but usually there is great variation in shading even within a family or pack. Arctic wolves tend to be white or nearly white, but a pack might include individuals that are buff, brownish, or even almost black. The color of some wolves even changes slightly with age, and when an adult wolf molts in spring, losing its long hairs, it is much lighter in appearance. In truth, the gray wolf is not necessarily "gray" at all.

Size Matters

As with all animals that are actively disliked, feared, or hunted as trophies, the wolf's size is often exaggerated. Average size varies as much as fur color, but everywhere males are larger than females. Northern wolves tend to be larger than those farther south. A fully grown norther male will stand almost three feet at the shoulder and measure six feet or so from nose to tip of extended tail. Males weigh from 125 to 150 pounds. Small females from southern populations may reach only 65 or 70 pounds by the time they are old enough to breed. Although no other wild animal looks like a gray wolf, an inexperienced observer might mistake a very small wolf for a very large coyote. But a wolf's muzzle is always larger and it runs with its tail stretched out straight behind. However the only way to distinguih a wolf from a coyote is by its skull size and dimensions. The jaws are larger and the brain case smaller in a wolf skull than in a coyote skull. Wolves also have more massive teeth than coyotes, as seen in the image of a wolf skull on the left.

Survival of the Fittest

One reason we do not see wolves very often, is that most of their activity is at night or at twilight. The cooler the weather, the likelier wolves are to hunt and move about during daylight. Wolves are credited with being far more capable, efficent killers than they really are. A pack of wolves does not just select its prey, run it down, kill it, then begin to eat it before it is dead. Plenty of physical effort is expended, and thousands of footprints are left behind for every meal obtained. Life is hard in a wolf pack.

Two weeks may pass betweens kills and substantial meals. A hungry pack of fifteen has been known to completely consume a four hundred pound moose, or twenty pounds of meat each, in just twenty four hours. Over open terrain, running wolves have been clocked at up to twenty eight miles per hour in short runs (up to two humdred yards), and at about twenty two miles per hour during runs of a mile or two. But that is not really fast compared to their hooved animal prey. What wolves can do is lope smoothly for hours on end, almost without effort or changing pace.

Their boundaries are established by scent marking, urine, and by howling. To prosper, even to survive anywhere, wolves require not only large tracts of wilderness, but wilderness that supports adequate prey. Their prey dictates the wolves' social structure and the way they must live in well organized packs. There is always danger when hunting powerful, formidable prey, and pack members are often injured by flying hooves or flailing anters with the older and inexperienced wolves most likely to be hurt, sometimes fatally.

Bringing Pups into the World

Depending on latitude, females come into esturs once a year between January and April, which is when mating occurs. The southern most wolves breed earliest. Amost always only the alpha pair mate,or dominant male and female mate. As with all canids, mating consists of a copulatory session that lasts as long as thirty minutes. Females are sexually marture at two and males a year later. Young are born nine weeks later. Litter sizes range from only one to a dozen. Puppies are born in borrows or natural caves, beneath deadfalls, or in other concealed spots. Mothers remain at the den nursing the helpless slate clock pups for about two months, all the while being fed by pack members. After two mothes the pups are moved to might be called a rendezvous,where they are fed until they are strong enough to travel with the pack. Living at the rendezvous the pupies are vulnerable to predation by bears,wolverines,or members of rival wolf packs. At six mothes the average pup weighs fifty to sixty pounds.

Misconceiving Myths

Many misconceptions persist about wolves as predators. For example, they do not always use the same hunting strategies. Another myth is that wolves slaughter large numbers of helpless prey at one time out of blood lust. Not only would that be exhausting, it would also decimate thier food supply, which must be sustained. Whenever wolves capture an animal large enough to last more then one meal, they gorge to replenish. Usually, they move away some distance to rest and digest before cosuming the remains. For to long no predator has been more hated, feared, and hunted by men than the wolf.

The feeling originated in the dread and superstitions of our forbearers and later heightened by the wolf's role as a cattle killers. In North America there has not been a single recorded wolf attack on a human. Fortunately, viewpoints are changing.

More and more North Amercans now regard the wolves as fellow residents on our planet in trouble.