![Yellowstone-wolf-17120](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/00/Yellowstone-wolf-17120.jpg)
The history of wolves in Yellowstone includes the
extirpation
Local extinction, also known as extirpation, refers to a species (or other taxon) of plant or animal that ceases to exist in a chosen geographic area of study, though it still exists elsewhere. Local extinctions are contrasted with global extinct ...
, absence and
reintroduction of wild populations of the
gray wolf
The wolf (''Canis lupus''; : wolves), also known as the gray wolf or grey wolf, is a large canine native to Eurasia and North America. More than thirty subspecies of ''Canis lupus'' have been recognized, and gray wolves, as popularly ...
(''Canis lupus'') to
Yellowstone National Park
Yellowstone National Park is an American national park located in the western United States, largely in the northwest corner of Wyoming and extending into Montana and Idaho. It was established by the 42nd U.S. Congress with the Yellowston ...
and the
Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem
The Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem (GYE) is one of the last remaining large, nearly intact ecosystems in the northern temperate zone of the Earth. It is located within the northern Rocky Mountains, in areas of northwestern Wyoming, southwestern M ...
. When the park was created in 1872, wolf populations were already in decline in
Montana
Montana () is a state in the Mountain West division of the Western United States. It is bordered by Idaho to the west, North Dakota and South Dakota to the east, Wyoming to the south, and the Canadian provinces of Alberta, British Columbi ...
,
Wyoming
Wyoming () is a U.S. state, state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is bordered by Montana to the north and northwest, South Dakota and Nebraska to the east, Idaho to the west, Utah to the south ...
and
Idaho
Idaho ( ) is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. To the north, it shares a small portion of the Canada–United States border with the province of British Columbia. It borders the states of Montana and Wyom ...
. The creation of the national park did not provide protection for wolves or other predators, and government predator control programs in the first decades of the 1900s essentially helped eliminate the gray wolf from Yellowstone. The last wolves were killed in Yellowstone in 1926. After that, sporadic reports of wolves still occurred, but scientists confirmed that sustainable wolf populations had been extirpated and were absent from Yellowstone during the mid-1900s.
Beginning in the 1940s, park managers, biologists, conservationists, and environmentalists began what would ultimately turn into a campaign to
reintroduce the gray wolf into Yellowstone National Park. When the
Endangered Species Act of 1973
The Endangered Species Act of 1973 (ESA or "The Act"; 16 U.S.C. § 1531 et seq.) is the primary law in the United States for protecting imperiled species. Designed to protect critically imperiled species from extinction as a "consequence of ec ...
was passed, the road to legal reintroduction was made clear. In 1995, gray wolves were reintroduced into Yellowstone in the
Lamar Valley. The reintroduction of wolves in Yellowstone has long been controversial, as have wolf reintroductions worldwide.
Extirpation (1872–1926)
![Soldiers Soda Butte Creek-Wolf Pelt-YNP1905](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ef/Soldiers_Soda_Butte_Creek-Wolf_Pelt-YNP1905.jpg)
In 1872, when
Yellowstone National Park
Yellowstone National Park is an American national park located in the western United States, largely in the northwest corner of Wyoming and extending into Montana and Idaho. It was established by the 42nd U.S. Congress with the Yellowston ...
was created, there was not yet any legal protection for wildlife in the park. In the early years of the park, administrators, hunters, and tourists were essentially free to kill any game or
predator
Predation is a biological interaction where one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation (which usually do not kill th ...
they came across. The gray wolf was especially vulnerable to this wanton killing because it was generally considered an undesirable predator and was already being deliberately exterminated throughout its North American range, usually in the interest of protecting
livestock
Livestock are the domesticated animals raised in an agricultural setting to provide labor and produce diversified products for consumption such as meat, eggs, milk, fur, leather, and wool. The term is sometimes used to refer solely to animals ...
. In January 1883, United States Secretary of the Interior
Henry M. Teller issued regulations prohibiting the hunting of most park animals, but the regulations did not apply to wolves, coyotes, bears, mountain lions, and other small predators.
Shortly after the U.S. Army took over administration of the park on August 1, 1890, Captain Moose Harris, the first military superintendent, allowed public hunting of any wildlife and left all predator control to the park's administration. Official records show, however, that the U.S. Army did not begin to implement a policy of killing wolves until 1914.
In 1885, Congress created the Division of Economic Ornithology and Mammalogy with the express purpose of conducting scientific research for the protection of wildlife. The agency soon became the U.S. Biological Survey, which was in turn the forerunner of the
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
The United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS or FWS) is an agency within the United States Department of the Interior dedicated to the management of fish, wildlife, and natural habitats. The mission of the agency is "working with othe ...
. In 1907, under political pressure from western cattle and livestock industries, this agency began a concerted predator control program which was eventually called ''Animal Damage Control''. This program resulted in the deaths of an estimated 1,800 wolves and 23,000 coyotes in 39 U.S. National Forests in 1907 alone.
[ In 1916, when the ]National Park Service
The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government within the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages all national parks, most national monuments, and other natural, historical, and recreational propertie ...
was created, its enabling legislation included words that authorized the Secretary of the Interior to "provide in his discretion for the destruction of such animals and of such plant life as may be detrimental to the use of said parks, monuments and reservations".[
It is generally accepted that sustainable gray wolf packs had been ]extirpated
Local extinction, also known as extirpation, refers to a species (or other taxon) of plant or animal that ceases to exist in a chosen geographic area of study, though it still exists elsewhere. Local extinctions are contrasted with global extinct ...
from Yellowstone National Park by 1926,[ although the National Park Service maintained its policies of predator control in the park until 1933.][ However, a 1975–1977 National Park Service-sponsored study revealed that during the period from 1927 to 1977, there were several hundred ''probable'' sightings of wolves in the park.] Between 1977 and the reintroduction of wolves in 1995, there were additional reliable sightings of wolves in the park, most believed to be singles or pairs transiting the region rather than permanently inhabiting the park.
Official records of wolves killed
Prior to the National Park Service assuming control of the park in 1916, the U.S. Army killed 14 wolves during their tenure (1886–1916),[ most in the years 1914–15.][ In 1940, ]Adolph Murie
Adolph Murie (September 6, 1899 – August 16, 1974), the first scientist to study wolves in their natural habitat, was a naturalist, author, and wildlife biologist who pioneered field research on wolves, bears, and other mammals and birds in Arc ...
, a noted wildlife biologist published his ''Fauna Series No. 4— Fauna of the National Parks of the United States-Ecology of the Coyote in the Yellowstone National Park.'' In this report, Murie tallied the number of wolves killed as reported annually by park administrators between 1915 and 1935:
Updated research in the 1980s verified that the last official killing of wolves in the park took place in 1926 when two pups found near Soda Butte Creek
Soda Butte Creek is an approximately long major tributary of the Lamar River in Yellowstone National Park. It is named for a now-extinct geyser (Soda Butte) near its mouth. Soda Butte and the creek were named by A. Bart Henderson, a Cooke City m ...
were killed by park rangers. The last reported wolf killed in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem (prior to today's legal hunting or control measures) occurred in May 1943 when Leo Cottenoir, a Native American sheepherder on the Wind River Reservation
The Wind River Indian Reservation, in the west-central portion of the U.S. state of Wyoming, is shared by two Native American tribes, the Eastern Shoshone ( shh, Gweechoon Deka, ''meaning: "buffalo eaters"'') and the Northern Arapaho ( arp, ho ...
shot a wolf near the southern border of the park.
Absence (1926–1995)
Ecological impacts
Once the wolves were gone, elk
The elk (''Cervus canadensis''), also known as the wapiti, is one of the largest species within the deer family, Cervidae, and one of the largest terrestrial mammals in its native range of North America and Central and East Asia. The common ...
populations began to rise. Over the next few years, conditions of Yellowstone National Park declined drastically. A team of scientists visiting Yellowstone in 1929 and 1933 reported, "The range was in deplorable conditions when we first saw it, and its deterioration has been progressing steadily since then." By this time many biologists were worried about eroding land and plants dying off. The elk were multiplying inside the park and deciduous, woody species such as aspen and cottonwood suffered from overgrazing. The park service started trapping and moving the elk and, when that was not effective, killing them. Elk population control methods continued for more than 30 years. Elk control prevented further degradation of the range, but didn't improve its overall condition. At times, people would mention bringing wolves back to Yellowstone to help control the elk population. Yellowstone's managers were not eager to bring back wolves, especially after so successfully extirpating them from the park. Elk control continued into the 1960s. In the late 1960s, local hunters began to complain to their congressmen that there were too few elk, and the congressmen threatened to stop funding Yellowstone. Killing elk was given up as a control method which allowed elk populations to again rise. As elk populations rose, the quality of the range decreased affecting many other animals. Without wolves, coyote populations increased dramatically which adversely impacted the pronghorn antelope
The pronghorn (, ) (''Antilocapra americana'') is a species of artiodactyl (even-toed, hoofed) mammal indigenous to interior western and central North America. Though not an antelope, it is known colloquially in North America as the American ante ...
population. However, it was the overly large elk populations that caused the most profound changes to the ecosystem of Yellowstone with the absence of wolves.
Reintroduction initiatives
The campaign to restore the gray wolf in Yellowstone had its roots in a number of seminal studies related to the predator-prey ecology of the park. In 1940 Adolph Murie published ''Ecology of the Coyote in the Yellowstone National Park''. That study and his 1940–41 work ''The Wolves of Mount McKinley'' was instrumental in building a scientific foundation for wolf conservation. In 1944, noted wildlife biologist Aldo Leopold
Aldo Leopold (January 11, 1887 – April 21, 1948) was an American writer, philosopher, naturalist, scientist, ecologist, forester, conservationist, and environmentalist. He was a professor at the University of Wisconsin and is best known for his ...
, once an avid predator control advocate, made the following comments in his review of ''The Wolves of North America'', Young and Goldman, 1944:
By the 1960s, cultural and scientific understanding of ecosystems was changing attitudes toward the wolf and other large predators. In part, this included the emergence of Robert Paine's concept of the keystone species
A keystone species is a species which has a disproportionately large effect on its natural environment relative to its abundance, a concept introduced in 1969 by the zoologist Robert T. Paine. Keystone species play a critical role in maintaini ...
. In the early 1960s, Douglas Pimlott, a noted Canadian wildlife biologist was calling for the restorations of wolves in the northern rockies. In 1970 American wolf expert, David Mech
Lucyan David Mech (; born January 18, 1937), also known as Dave Mech, is an American biologist specializing in the study of wolves. He is a senior research scientist for the U.S. Geological Survey and an adjunct professor at the University of Minn ...
published ''The Wolf: The Ecology and Behavior of an Endangered Species'' (1970, 1981), an enlightening study of the wolf and its impact on its environment. In 1978, when wildlife biologist John Weaver published his seminal study ''Wolves of Yellowstone'', he concluded the report with the following recommendation:
The gray wolf was one of the first species to be listed as endangered (1967) under the Endangered Species Preservation Act of 1966
The Endangered Species Act of 1973 (ESA or "The Act"; 16 U.S.C. § 1531 et seq.) is the primary law in the United States for protecting imperiled species. Designed to protect critically imperiled species from extinction as a "consequence of ec ...
.[ However, until the passage of the ]Endangered Species Act of 1973
The Endangered Species Act of 1973 (ESA or "The Act"; 16 U.S.C. § 1531 et seq.) is the primary law in the United States for protecting imperiled species. Designed to protect critically imperiled species from extinction as a "consequence of ec ...
, there was no legal basis or process for re-introducing the gray wolf to Yellowstone National Park and the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.[ The Endangered Species Act obligated the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to develop restoration plans for each species designated as ''Endangered''. The first recovery plan was completed in 1980 but gained little traction. In 1987, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service published a revised ''Northern Rocky Mountain Wolf Recovery Plan'' which led the way to wolf reintroduction. The plan was a cooperative effort between the National Park Service, Fish and Wildlife Service, academia, state wildlife agencies and environmental groups. Its Executive Summary contains the following:
In 1991 Congress directed the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to develop an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the express purpose of reintroducing wolves into Yellowstone National Park and regions of Central Idaho. The final statement was published on April 14, 1994, and seriously examined five potential alternatives for reestablishing wolves in Yellowstone and central Idaho.]
* Reintroduction of Experimental Populations (incorporating most of the state implemented nonessential reintroduction alternative with parts of the 1987 Recovery Plan).
* Natural Recovery (with limited land-use restrictions in anticipation of some illegal killing of wolves).
* No wolf (as proposed in alternative scoping).
* Wolf Management Committee (as proposed by Congress).
* Reintroduction of Non-experimental Wolves (incorporating the accelerated wolf recovery alternative but with fewer land-use restrictions)
Alternative 1 was the recommended and ultimately adopted alternative:
The final EIS opened the way for re-introduction, but not without opposition. The Sierra Club
The Sierra Club is an environmental organization with chapters in all 50 United States, Washington D.C., and Puerto Rico. The club was founded on May 28, 1892, in San Francisco, California, by Scottish-American preservationist John Muir, who be ...
and National Audubon Society
The National Audubon Society (Audubon; ) is an American non-profit environmental organization dedicated to conservation of birds and their habitats. Located in the United States and incorporated in 1905, Audubon is one of the oldest of such organ ...
opposed the re-introduction plan on the grounds that ''Experimental populations'' were not protected enough once the wolves were outside the park. The Farm Bureau
The American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF), also known as Farm Bureau Insurance and Farm Bureau Inc. but more commonly just the Farm Bureau (FB), is a United States-based insurance company and lobbying group that represents the American agri ...
's of Idaho, Wyoming and Montana opposed the plan on the basis that the wrong subspecies of wolf—''Canis lupus occidentalis'' (northwestern wolf
The northwestern wolf (''Canis lupus occidentalis''), also known as the Mackenzie Valley wolf, Alaskan timber wolf, or Canadian timber wolf, is a subspecies of gray wolf in western North America. Arguably the largest grey wolf subspecies in the ...
(Canada)) instead of ''Canis lupus irremotus'' (Northern Rocky Mountains wolf
The northern Rocky Mountain wolf (''Canis lupus irremotus''), also known as the northern Rocky Mountain timber wolf, is a Subspecies of Canis lupus, subspecies of gray wolf native to the northern Rocky Mountains. It is a light-colored, medium to ...
) was selected for reintroduction. These objections were overcome and in January 1995, the process of physically reintroducing wolves into Yellowstone began.
Reintroduction (1995–present)
Initial releases 1995–96
In January 1995, U.S. and Canadian wildlife officials captured 14 wolves from multiple packs east of Jasper National Park, near Hinton, Alberta, Canada. These wolves arrived in Yellowstone in two shipments—January 12, 1995 (8 wolves) and January 20, 1995 (6 wolves). They were released into three acclimation pens—Crystal Creek, Rose Creek and Soda Butte Creek
Soda Butte Creek is an approximately long major tributary of the Lamar River in Yellowstone National Park. It is named for a now-extinct geyser (Soda Butte) near its mouth. Soda Butte and the creek were named by A. Bart Henderson, a Cooke City m ...
in the Lamar Valley in Northeast East Yellowstone National Park. In March 1995, the pens were opened and between March 21 and March 31, 1995, all 14 wolves were loose in Yellowstone.
Seventeen additional wolves captured in Canada arrived in Yellowstone in January 1996 and were released into the park in April 1996 from the Chief Joseph, Lone Star, Druid Peak
Druid Peak (elevation ) is a moderate domed peak on the southern flank of the Absaroka Range in Yellowstone National Park. The peak lies just north of the Lamar River and Soda Butte Creek confluence at the head of the Lamar Valley. Prior to 188 ...
and Nez Perce
The Nez Percé (; autonym in Nez Perce language: , meaning "we, the people") are an Indigenous people of the Plateau who are presumed to have lived on the Columbia River Plateau in the Pacific Northwest region for at least 11,500 years.Ames, K ...
pens. The reintroductions were planned on taking 3-5 years but these were the last wolves released into the park as officials believed that the natural reproduction and survival were sufficient.
Annual wolf status since reintroduction
Wolf population declines, when they occur, result from "intraspecific
Biological specificity is the tendency of a characteristic such as a behavior or a biochemical variation to occur in a particular species.
Biochemist Linus Pauling stated that "Biological specificity is the set of characteristics of living organ ...
strife," food stress, mange
Mange is a type of skin disease caused by parasitic mites. Because various species of mites also infect plants, birds and reptiles, the term "mange", or colloquially "the mange", suggesting poor condition of the skin and fur due to the infection ...
, canine distemper
Canine distemper virus (CDV) (sometimes termed footpad disease) is a viral disease that affects a wide variety of mammal families, including domestic and wild species of dogs, coyotes, foxes, pandas, wolves, ferrets, skunks, raccoons, and felin ...
, legal hunting of wolves in areas outside the park (for sport or for livestock protection) and in one case in 2009, lethal removal by park officials of a human-habituated wolf.
''*1995-99 Data reflects status of the wolf in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem
The Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem (GYE) is one of the last remaining large, nearly intact ecosystems in the northern temperate zone of the Earth. It is located within the northern Rocky Mountains, in areas of northwestern Wyoming, southwestern M ...
. Since 2000 monitoring has focused on packs operating within park boundaries. Wolves continue to spread to surrounding areas, and the last official report by the park for the Greater Yellowstone Area counted 272 wolves in 2002.''
Ecological impacts after re-introduction
Scientists have been researching and studying the impacts on the Yellowstone ecosystem since re-introduction in 1995.
As the wolf population in the park has grown, the elk population, their favored prey, has declined. Prior to reintroduction, the EIS predicted that wolves would kill an average 12 elk per wolf annually. This estimate proved too low as wolves are now killing an average of 22 elk per wolf annually. This decline in elk has resulted in changes in flora, most specifically willows, cottonwoods and aspens along the fringes of heavily timbered areas. Although wolf kills are directly attributable to declines in elk numbers, some research has shown that elk behavior has been significantly altered by wolf predation. The constant presence of wolves have pushed elk into less favorable habitats, raised their stress level, lowered their nutrition and their overall birth rate.
The wolves became significant predators of coyotes after their reintroduction. Since then, in 1995 and 1996, the local coyote
The coyote (''Canis latrans'') is a species of canis, canine native to North America. It is smaller than its close relative, the wolf, and slightly smaller than the closely related eastern wolf and red wolf. It fills much of the same ecologica ...
population went through a dramatic restructuring. Until the wolves returned, Yellowstone National Park had one of the densest and most stable coyote populations in America due to a lack of human impacts. Two years after the wolf reintroductions, the pre-wolf population of coyotes had been reduced to 50% through both competitive exclusion and intraguild predation
Intraguild predation, or IGP, is the killing and sometimes eating of a potential competitor of a different species. This interaction represents a combination of predation and competition, because both species rely on the same prey resources and a ...
. Coyote numbers were 39% lower in the areas of Yellowstone where wolves were reintroduced. In one study, about 16% of radio-collared coyotes were preyed upon by wolves. Yellowstone coyotes have had to shift their territories
A territory is an area of land, sea, or space, particularly belonging or connected to a country, person, or animal.
In international politics, a territory is usually either the total area from which a state may extract power resources or a ...
as a result, moving from open meadows to steep terrain. Carcasses in the open no longer attract coyotes; when a coyote is chased on flat terrain, it is often killed. They feel more secure on steep terrain where they will often lead a pursuing wolf downhill. As the wolf comes after it, the coyote will turn around and run uphill. Wolves, being heavier, cannot stop and the coyote gains a large lead. Though physical confrontations between the two species are usually dominated by the larger wolves, coyotes have been known to attack wolves if they outnumber them. Both species will kill each other's pups given the opportunity.
Coyotes, in their turn, naturally suppress foxes, so the diminished coyote population has led to a rise in foxes, and "That in turn shifts the odds of survival for coyote prey such as hare
Hares and jackrabbits are mammals belonging to the genus ''Lepus''. They are herbivores, and live solitarily or in pairs. They nest in slight depressions called forms, and their young are able to fend for themselves shortly after birth. The ge ...
s and young deer, as well as for the small rodent
Rodents (from Latin , 'to gnaw') are mammals of the order Rodentia (), which are characterized by a single pair of continuously growing incisors in each of the upper and lower jaws. About 40% of all mammal species are rodents. They are na ...
s and ground-nesting birds the foxes stalk. These changes affect how often certain roots, buds, seeds and insects get eaten, which alters the balance of local plant communities, and so on down the food chain all the way to fungi and microbes."
The presence of wolves has also coincided with a dramatic rise in the park's beaver
Beavers are large, semiaquatic rodents in the genus ''Castor'' native to the temperate Northern Hemisphere. There are two extant species: the North American beaver (''Castor canadensis'') and the Eurasian beaver (''C. fiber''). Beavers ar ...
population; where there was just one beaver colony in Yellowstone in 2001, there were nine beaver colonies in the park by 2011. The presence of wolves seems to have encouraged elk to browse more widely, diminishing their pressure on stands of willow
Willows, also called sallows and osiers, from the genus ''Salix'', comprise around 400 speciesMabberley, D.J. 1997. The Plant Book, Cambridge University Press #2: Cambridge. of typically deciduous trees and shrubs, found primarily on moist s ...
, a plant that beavers need to survive the winter. The renewed presence of beavers in the ecosystem has substantial effects on the local watershed because the existence of beaver dams "even out the seasonal pulses of runoff; store water for recharging the water table; and provide cold, shaded water for fish."[YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK WOLF REINTRODUCTION IS CHANGING THE FACE OF THE GREATER YELLOWSTONE ECOSYSTEM, YellowstonePark.com, BY STAFF, JUNE 21, 2011, visited 10/28/2011](_blank)
Beaver dams also counter erosion and create "new pond and marsh habitats for moose
The moose (in North America) or elk (in Eurasia) (''Alces alces'') is a member of the New World deer subfamily and is the only species in the genus ''Alces''. It is the largest and heaviest extant species in the deer family. Most adult mal ...
, otter
Otters are carnivorous mammals in the subfamily Lutrinae. The 13 extant otter species are all semiaquatic, aquatic, or marine, with diets based on fish and invertebrates. Lutrinae is a branch of the Mustelidae family, which also includes wea ...
s, mink
Mink are dark-colored, semiaquatic, carnivorous mammals of the genera ''Neogale'' and '' Mustela'' and part of the family Mustelidae, which also includes weasels, otters, and ferrets. There are two extant species referred to as "mink": the A ...
, wading birds, waterfowl, fish, amphibians and more."
Similarly, after the wolves' reintroduction, their increased predation of elk benefited Yellowstone's grizzly bear population, as it led to a significant increase in the growth of berries in the national park, an important food source for the grizzly bears.
Wolf kills are scavenged by and thus feed a wide array of animals, including, but not limited to, ravens, wolverine
The wolverine (), (''Gulo gulo''; ''Gulo'' is Latin for "gluttony, glutton"), also referred to as the glutton, carcajou, or quickhatch (from East Cree, ''kwiihkwahaacheew''), is the largest land-dwelling species of the family Mustelidae. It is ...
s, bald eagle
The bald eagle (''Haliaeetus leucocephalus'') is a bird of prey found in North America. A sea eagle, it has two known subspecies and forms a species pair with the white-tailed eagle (''Haliaeetus albicilla''), which occupies the same niche as ...
s, golden eagle
The golden eagle (''Aquila chrysaetos'') is a bird of prey living in the Northern Hemisphere. It is the most widely distributed species of eagle. Like all eagles, it belongs to the family Accipitridae. They are one of the best-known bird of p ...
s, grizzly bear
The grizzly bear (''Ursus arctos horribilis''), also known as the North American brown bear or simply grizzly, is a population or subspecies of the brown bear inhabiting North America.
In addition to the mainland grizzly (''Ursus arctos horri ...
s, black bear
Black bear or Blackbear may refer to:
Animals
* American black bear (''Ursus americanus''), a North American bear species
* Asian black bear (''Ursus thibetanus''), an Asian bear species
Music
* Black Bear (band), a Canadian First Nations group ...
s, jay
A jay is a member of a number of species of medium-sized, usually colorful and noisy, passerine birds in the Crow family, Corvidae. The evolutionary relationships between the jays and the magpies are rather complex. For example, the Eurasian m ...
s, magpie
Magpies are birds of the Corvidae family. Like other members of their family, they are widely considered to be intelligent creatures. The Eurasian magpie, for instance, is thought to rank among the world's most intelligent creatures, and is one ...
s, martens and coyotes.
Meanwhile, wolf packs often claim kills made by cougar
The cougar (''Puma concolor'') is a large Felidae, cat native to the Americas. Its Species distribution, range spans from the Canadian Yukon to the southern Andes in South America and is the most widespread of any large wild terrestrial mamm ...
s, which has driven that species back out of valley hunting grounds to their more traditional mountainside territory.
The top-down effect of the reintroduction of an apex predator
An apex predator, also known as a top predator, is a predator at the top of a food chain, without natural predators of its own.
Apex predators are usually defined in terms of trophic dynamics, meaning that they occupy the highest trophic lev ...
like the wolf on other flora and fauna in an ecosystem is an example of a trophic cascade Trophic cascades are powerful indirect interactions that can control entire ecosystems, occurring when a trophic level in a food web is suppressed. For example, a top-down cascade will occur if predators are effective enough in predation to reduce t ...
.
2009 removal from Endangered Species List
Because gray wolf populations in Montana, Wyoming and Idaho had recovered sufficiently to meet the goals of the Wolf Recovery Plan, on May 4, 2008, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
The United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS or FWS) is an agency within the United States Department of the Interior dedicated to the management of fish, wildlife, and natural habitats. The mission of the agency is "working with othe ...
changed the status of the gray wolf population known as the Northern Rocky Mountain Distinct Population Segment from ''Endangered'' to ''Experimental Population-Non Essential''.
The wolves in Yellowstone and the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem fall within this population. In response to the change in status, state wildlife authorities in Idaho and Montana enacted quota-based hunting seasons on wolves as part of their approved state Wolf Management Plans. Environmental groups objected to the delisting and the hunting seasons, but despite legal attempts to stop them (''Defenders of Wildlife
Defenders of Wildlife is a 501(c)(3) non-profit conservation organization based in the United States. It works to protect all native animals and plants throughout North America in their natural communities.
Background
Defenders of Wildlife is a n ...
et al. v Ken Salazar et al.''), the wolf hunts, which commenced in Montana in September 2009 were allowed to proceed.
Although wolves within the park boundaries were still fully protected, wolves that ventured outside the boundaries of the park in Idaho or Montana could now be legally hunted. During these hunts, Montana hunters legally killed a number of wolves in the Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness known to frequent the northeast corner of the park.
Reactions
Hunting opportunities
From 2000–2004, the Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks reduced antlerless permits by 51% from 2,882 to 1,400. They proposed only 100 permits for 2006 which was a 96% decrease from the 2,660 permits issued in 1995. Initially, the effects of wolf predation on elk during the first five years of the recovery were not detected, as elk numbers were identical to those of 1980–1994. From the winter of 1995 to the winter of 2004 however, the elk greatly decreased in number, dropping from 16,791 to 8,335 as the number of wolves on the northern range increased from 21 to 106, though predation from bears, increased human harvests, more severe winter and droughts were also factors. Since 2000, 45% of known deaths and 75% of predation-caused deaths of radio collared cow-elk have been confirmed to be attributable to wolves. Human caused deaths in the same period accounted for 8–30% of known deaths. Yellowstone elk comprise up to 92% of the winter diet of wolves, the overall kill rates of Yellowstone wolves on elk in winter being estimated at 22 ungulates per wolf annually. This is higher than the 12 ungulates per wolf rate predicted in the ESA
, owners =
, headquarters = Paris, Île-de-France, France
, coordinates =
, spaceport = Guiana Space Centre
, seal = File:ESA emblem seal.png
, seal_size = 130px
, image = Views in the Main Control Room (120 ...
.
Subspecies
Historically, the wolf populations originally native to Yellowstone were classed under the subspecies ''C. l. irremotus''. When the issue of what subspecies to use for the introduction was raised, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service representatives stated that the taxonomy of gray wolves had been revised numerous times, and that ''C. l. irremotus'' was not a distinct subspecies, but a geographical variant. Three publications were made on the appropriateness of using a founding population of Canadian wolves: Brewster and Fritz supported the motion, while Nowak determined that the original Yellowstone wolves were more similar to '' C. l. nubilus'', a subspecies already present in Minnesota, and that the Canadian animals proposed by Brewster and Fritz were of the subspecies '' C. l. occidentalis'', a significantly larger animal. The rationale behind Brewster and Fritz's favor was that wolves show little genetic diversity, and that the original population was extinct anyway. This was contradicted by Nowak, who contested that Minnesotan wolves were much more similar in size and shape to the original population than the proposed Canadian wolves, though he conceded that ''C. l. occidentalis'' was probably already migrating southward even before human intervention. Doug Smith states that the size difference between the introduced wolves and the original wolves was actually only a 6-7 percent difference and Minnesotan wolves had no experience with elk and bison and were not adapted to mountainous terrain. Smith and Yellowstone National Park deny the claim that the "wrong wolf" was introduced.
In popular culture
* The podcast ''Criminal
In ordinary language, a crime is an unlawful act punishable by a state or other authority. The term ''crime'' does not, in modern criminal law, have any simple and universally accepted definition,Farmer, Lindsay: "Crime, definitions of", in Can ...
'' covered the killing of Wolf 10 (a male) in their episode, "Wolf 10." Their sister podcast, '' This is Love'', produced an episode about the reintroduction of wolves to Yellowstone, and focused on the stories of Wolves 8 (male), 21 (male), and 42 (female).
See also
* O-Six O-Six (2006–2012), also known as 832F or "The 06 Female", was a female gray wolf, whose death by hunting just outside the protected area of Yellowstone National Park stirred debate about the hunting and protection of wolves in Wyoming, Montana and ...
, dominant breeding female ("alpha female") of the Lamar Canyon pack, whose death by hunting just outside Yellowstone received extensive media coverage and was the subject of a bestselling book by Nate Blakelee.
* OR-7
OR-7, also known as Journey, was a male gray wolf that was electronically tracked as he migrated from the Wallowa Mountains in the northeastern corner of the U.S. state of Oregon to the southern Cascade Range. After the wolf dispersed from his ...
, first confirmed wild wolf in western Oregon since 1947 and the first in California since 1924
* Repopulation of wolves in California
The repopulation of wolves in California was recognized in late December 2011, when OR-7, a male gray wolf from Oregon, became the first confirmed wild wolf in California since 1924, when wolves were considered extirpated from the state. The fi ...
began in 2011
* Repopulation of wolves in Colorado
The repopulation of wolves in Colorado began with the natural expansion of the gray wolf into habitats in Colorado they occupied prior to the wolf's near extirpated from the conterminous United States. In the 1940s, the species was nearly eradic ...
includes the natural expansion and proposed reintroduction
* Repopulation of wolves in the Midwestern states of Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin occurred naturally
* List of gray wolf populations by country
As of 2018, the global grey wolf population is estimated to be 200,000–250,000. Once abundant over much of North America and Eurasia, the grey wolf inhabits a smaller portion of its former range because of widespread human encroachment and des ...
* Wolf distribution
Wolf distribution is the species distribution of the wolf (''Canis lupus''). Originally, wolves occurred in Eurasia above the 12th parallel north and in North America above the 15th parallel north. However, deliberate human persecution has reduc ...
(species distribution)
* Yellowstone (British TV series)
''Yellowstone'' is a BBC nature documentary series broadcast from 15 March 2009. Narrated by Peter Firth, the series takes a look at a year in the life of Yellowstone National Park, examining how its wildlife adapts to living in one of the hars ...
References
Further reading
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{{DEFAULTSORT:History Of Wolves In Yellowstone
Wolves
The wolf (''Canis lupus''; plural, : wolves), also known as the gray wolf or grey wolf, is a large Canis, canine native to Eurasia and North America. More than thirty subspecies of Canis lupus, subspecies of ''Canis lupus'' have been reco ...
Yellowstone National Park
Yellowstone
Yellowstone National Park is an American national park located in the western United States, largely in the northwest corner of Wyoming and extending into Montana and Idaho. It was established by the 42nd U.S. Congress with the Yellowston ...
Wolves
The wolf (''Canis lupus''; plural, : wolves), also known as the gray wolf or grey wolf, is a large Canis, canine native to Eurasia and North America. More than thirty subspecies of Canis lupus, subspecies of ''Canis lupus'' have been reco ...