wolf facts :)

Wiping out Wolves - getting serious.

The change from a hunter/gatherer way of life to one based on farming and herding started about 12,000 years ago, and since then wolves and humans have been colliding in many parts of the world. In Europe, many forests were cut down during the Middle Ages to be replaced by forms and fields, and wolves lost their natural homes, driven to seek prey in human areas of habitation.

When European settlers came to North America in the 1500S and 1600s, they found wolves inhabiting the deep forests and wide plains of the continent. Here there might have been room for both human and animal predators to live their separate lives in peace, Instead, North America became the scene of the human race's most successful killing campaign against the wolf.

Inspired by the traditional European hatred of the wolf, the early settlers attacked the wolf using pits, traps, and poison. Bounties - cash rewards given by authorities to anyone who brought in the hide or some other part of a dead wolf helped things along. The American war against the wolf did not really get under way until the 1800s, when people began to move onto the great plains in the center of the country. Here there were enormous herds of buffalo, which served as a food supply for Indian tribes and for large numbers of wolves. All three of these - Indian, buffalo and the wolf were doomed to be brought almost to the point of extinction by 'civilization'.

At first wolves were hunted for their thick winter fur and a good price in European markets. Then as cattle and sheep grazing became common, wolves were killed because they preyed on the herds of domestic animals. (Their natural prey, the buffalo were wiped out during another concentrated massacre of wild life, but that's another story..)

The most common way to eradicate wolves by the American wolfers or wolf hunters, was to use Strychnine, it was placed in the carcasses of dead buffalo, cattle, or sheep. Wolves feeding on the animals would die, painfully. And so would any other creature - coyote, dog, bird, even human - that ate the poisoned flesh. It did not discriminate.

No one knows how many animals were killed during the last half of the 19th century, when the anti-wolf campaign was most active in the western part of the United States. Perhaps 1 or 2 million wolves died, and thousands of other creatures fell victim.

By 1900, there were not many wolves left in the western United States. The few remaining animals were still being pursued by wolfers rancher, and herders eager to eradicate the species completely from existence in America, In 1919, the government joined the antiwolf campaign, passing a law that called for the extermination of wolves on federally owned lands. By 1942, when the law was abolished 25,000 more wolves had been killed by the government plan.

This was the last phase of the organized campaign to eradicate the wolf. By this time, it had been virtually exterminated in most parts of the country.

The situation remains almost unchanged today...

Today the wolf is classified as an endangered species in most parts of the United States. This classification means that the killing of wolves is strictly controlled by federal law. For most wolves, such protection has come too late. The killing has already taken place, and the millions of animals slaughtered in the past cannot be brought back to life. Ironically, most people now agree that the world is a poorer place because of their loss.

The Wolf Pack

Wolves are an extremely social animal. They exist as a social unit called a pack.

Wolves travel and hunt in a group and perform almost all other activities in the company of fellow wolves.

The pack, the basic unit of wolf social life, is usually a family group. It is made up of animals related to each other by blood and family ties of affection and mutual aid.

The core of a pack is a mated pair of wolves - an adult male and female that have bred and produced young.

The other members of the pack are their offspring: young wolves ranging in age from pups to two and three-year-olds.

Pack sizes vary, most packs have 6 or 7 members, although some may include as many as 15 wolves. The size depends on many variables including the current numbers of the wolf population, the abundance of food, and social factors within the wolf pack.

Within each pack is an elaborate hierarchy. It may consist of a single breeding pair, the Alpha male and female, a lower group consisting of non-breeding adults, each with its own ranking, a group of outcasts, and a group of immature wolves on their way up. Some of the younger wolves of the pack may leave to find vacant territory and a mate.

Individual wolves in a pack play different roles in relation to the others in the group. The parent wolves are the leaders of the pack - the alpha male and alpha female. (Alpha is the first letter in the Greek alphabet.)

The alpha male and female are the oldest members of the pack and the ones with the most experience in hunting, defending territory, and other important activities.

The other pack members respect their positions and follow their leadership in almost all things, The alpha wolves are usually the ones to make decisions for the pack when the group should go out to hunt or move from one place to another.

The other Pack members all have positions in the hierarchy inferior to those of the alpha male and female. The young adult wolves, who are the grown-up offspring of the alpha pair, have their own special roles under the leadership or their parents. Some of them me able to "boss around," or dominate, their sisters and brothers because they have established themselves as superior in some way. This superiority might be physical-larger size or greater strength - but it can be based on personality Dominant wolves in the pack usually have more aggressive and forceful personalities than their relatives of the same age.

The juveniles and pups-wolves under two years old do not occupy permanent positions within the pack hierarchy. They all take orders from their parents and older brothers and sisters, but their relationships with each other change frequently. During their play and other activities, they are constantly testing one mother to find out who will eventually be "top wolf" in their age group.

Wolf Communication

Wolves use body language and facial expressions to communicate with each other. Dominant wolves will freely look other animals directly in the eye, this declares and reinforces their superior rank. A subordinate wolf will cringe towards the leader with tail low and bent legs, ears back and down, in a submissive nature. At other times, active submission involves a group of subordinate wolves surrounding the dominant wolf with their noses up against it. Sometimes the pack will howl. Various facial muscles, eyes, ears and the nose are extremely important when wolves are expressing their feelings. Bared teeth, an open mouth, ears erect and pointed forward indicate a threat by a dominant wolf. Wolves are also very territorial animals and do not readily share it with wolves who are not members of their pack. Wolves communicate and mark their territories by scent. They often do this by urinating near the edges of their territory, and on stumps, rocks and logs that are within their territory. Most of this is done by the dominant wolves, usually the alpha male. classification :) Kingdom - Animalia (all animals) Phylum - chordata (animals with notochords) Subphylum - Vertebrata (animals with a skeleton of bone or cartilage) Class - Mammalia (Mammals) subclass - Eutheria (placental mammals) Order - Carnivora (carnivores. Eg: cats, dogs,bears.) Family - Canidae (dog family) Genus - Canis (dogs) Grey Wolf - Canis Lupis Red Wolf - Canis Rufus Domestic Dog - Canis Familiaris. (Some believe the domestic dog is the same as the Grey Wolf (Canis lupus)) Dingo - Canis familiaris dingoCoyote - Canis latrans wolf diet :) What do wolves eat? Wolves are carnivores (meat eaters) but they will eat other foods as well. Their diet ranges from big game, such as elk and moose, to earthworms, berries and grasshoppers. To avoid using too much energy catching their food, wolves prey on weaker members of a herd, such as old, young or sick animals. In summer, when the herds migrate, wolves eat mice, birds and even fish. They may also eat carrion. Wolves eat their food very quickly, probably to protect it from being stolen, and to decrease the chance of attack from other predators. They eat the best parts first, and come back later for the remainder, as they can't afford to be wasteful. They will hide food in the snow, or icy soil, which helps to preserve it, and protect it from scavengers. Wolves can eat every 5-6 hours when there is plenty of food available, or they can fast and live on scraps for 2 weeks when there is less food around. Their digestion is very efficient, with all but 5 percent of large meat feeds able to be digested. Any splinters of bone that are not broken down somehow become wrapped in undigested hair, which protects the intestines from injury. Pups are fed by the adults who disgorge fresh meat from their stomachs, or carry back fresh pieces of meat to the den. Biologists learn much about the diet of wolves by studying their waste products, which are called 'scats'. Wiping out Wolves - a history. By means of hunting with horses and dogs or trapping in pits, traps and cages, wolves were completely wiped out in England by the early 1500s. Scotland killed its last wolf in the mid-1700s. Most European countries eventually finished off their wolf populations soon after. A few still live in eastern Europe, India, Germany, Italy, Spain and the Middle East. No one knows how many survive in Russia and China. Most wolves in North America are found in Alaska and Canada and hunters, from whom most of our knowledge of this shy creature comes from, say they are now almost impossible to find... This extreme attitude toward wiping out wolves can be seen to the fables and legends about the animals that originated in the Middle Ages and still survive today. In the Middle Ages, wolves were also thought to be in league with the forces of evil, many legends connected the wolf with Satan and the dark powers of the supernatural world. See the tales area for some more information on Wolf Tales. In America, Wolves served as models for hunting and played a significant role in the religious lives of the plains tribes and other groups of North American Indians. The powerful and courageous wolves were seen as representatives of important natural forces or spirits. Images of wolves often appeared in religious ceremonies and Indian healers included wolf skins in their medicine bundles, the collections of sacred materials that they used used for curing illness. Other native American hunters who have known the wolfintimately are the Eskimos. Today as in the past, groups of Eskimos share their homeland on the cold northern tundra with wolf packs, hunting the same prey and leading the same kind of nomadic life. Indians of earlier times and the Eskimos of today, respect the wolf for its skill as a predator. They also admire the wolf's dedication to the welfare of its companions, a model of social behaviour for humans as well as animals. Eskimos like Indians, sometimes kill wolves for their skins or for other specific reasons, but they believe that they are taking the life of an equal, not slaughtering an enemy.  Such coexistence between wolves and humans is possible only when there is no conflict between their ways of life. Conflict quickly arises when humans begin to produce their own food instead of hunting wild animals and gathering plants. Wolves have no choice but to continue their way of life, but now they may find their prey limited except for the herds of sheep and cattle. When this happens, their image in human eyes changes they are up longer considered admirable and courageous hunters but dangerous predators to be controlled or exterminated...