Arrival of male red wolf brings new hope to Durham museum’s mating program for endangered species

From WUNC 91.5:

A new red wolf has arrived at the Museum of Life and Science in Durham.

Museum staff said they hope the new male will help with population recovery efforts for the endangered species. Red wolves are considered the rarest wolf species in the world. The only wild population exists in North Carolina, with fewer than 20 red wolves.

Nine-year-old Adeyha joined the museum last week. Sherry Samuels, the museum’s senior director of animal care, said Adeyha’s name comes from the Cherokee language, meaning “in the oak woods.” Fittingly, he’ll be paired for breeding with Oak, the museum’s female red wolf.

 

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Never-Before-Seen Wolf Predation Finally Caught on Film

From Explorers Web:

Wolves will eat just about anything. And humans will film just about anything.

So it’s a surprise when we’ve never seen a wolf catch a particular prey species before. But you can now cross seals off the list.

Researchers in Alaska’s Katmai National Park caught a wolf dragging a harbor seal to shore, killing it, and eating pieces of it (after briefly leaving to grab a dinner date).

 

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Carnivore coexistence team working to help smooth wolf reintroduction in Colorado

From CBS Colorado:

Wolf reintroduction to Colorado is imminent, and while Colorado Parks and Wildlife put the finishing touches on the plan, a team over at Colorado State University is working to make sure things go as smoothly as humanly possible.

Kevin Crooks, a professor in the fish, wildlife and conservation biology department at CSU and director of the Center for Human Carnivore Coexistence, has been studying carnivores of all kinds for years. He’s been tapped to help make sure the reintroduction of wolves into Colorado’s high country and Western Slope is the least dangerous for the wolves, along with the humans and livestock in those areas.

 

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Watch The First Footage Of A Single Wolf Hunting And Killing A Seal

From IFLScience:

Wolves are famously pack animals, living and hunting together in family groups, they are famous for working together to take down prey items like caribou (Rangifer tarandus) and moose (Alces alces). Now, observations of wolves in Katmai National Park have shown they have developed a taste for a new kind of prey: marine mammals.

 

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Researchers observe wolves hunting and killing sea otters and harbor seals on Alaska’s Katmai coast

From Oregon State University:

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Firsthand observations of a wolf hunting and killing a harbor seal and a group of wolves hunting and consuming a sea otter on Alaska’s Katmai coast have led scientists to reconsider assumptions about wolf hunting behavior.

Wolves have previously been observed consuming sea otter carcasses, but how they obtain these and the frequency of scavenging versus hunting marine prey is largely unknown. Scientists at Oregon State University, the National Park Service and Alaska Department of Fish and Game are beginning to change that with a paper just published in Ecology.

 

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Will rule allowing for killing of wolves that attack livestock sink Colorado’s reintroduction efforts?

From The Aspen Times:

As the final steps fall into place before wolves are officially reintroduced to Colorado, policies governing both lethal take in response to livestock depredation and how to foster coexistence with the apex predator have been a flashpoint among livestock growers, conservationists and lawmakers.

It’s been a long, three-year haul from Colorado voter approval of gray wolf reintroduction to the creation of the Colorado Wolf Restoration and Management Plan in May to locating a viable population in a Western state that is willing to donate the wolves. (Oregon announced in early October that it would donate 10 wolves after other Western states with established populations declined to do so.)

 

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Conservationists fail in push to tighten Washington wolf killing rules

From Idaho Capital Sun:

Washington fish and wildlife officials have declined a request from conservation groups to tighten restrictions around when wolves that attack livestock can be killed.

A petition the groups filed in September with the state Fish and Wildlife Commission described Washington’s system for dealing with wolf-livestock conflicts as “ineffective.” It asked the panel to reopen rulemaking in order to put in place stricter protocols for when the state or ranchers are allowed to kill wolves.

 

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Carnivore coexistence team working to help smooth wolf reintroduction

From CBS Colorado:

Researchers with Colorado State University and Colorado Parks and Wildlife have brought ranchers from Montana who already have to contend with wolves to help educate Colorado high country and Western Slope ranchers.

 

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U of M study suggests humans have impacted how wolves hunt deer

From KARE 11:

ST PAUL, Minn. — Humans may be unwittingly impacting the health of the deer herd in northern Minnesota by allowing wolves to hunt more efficiently.

That is the early conclusion of new research carried out by the University of Minnesota’s College of Food, Agricultural and Natural Resource Sciences, in conjunction with partners including Northern Michigan University, the University of Manitoba, Voyageurs National Park and the Voyageurs Wolf Project.

 

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FWP Releases Draft of New Wolf Conservation and Management Plan

From Flathead Beacon:

Despite their generally shy and elusive nature, in recent years gray wolves have frequently found themselves at the center of controversy and litigation in Montana. As conflicts about species conservation and management fuel politicized debate, stakeholders have vastly different visions about what proper wolf population management should look like in the state.

Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks (FWP) released a draft of their 2023 Gray Wolf Conservation and Management Plan last week, the first update in 20 years, to guide future wolf management policy. The department is currently accepting comments to incorporate public perspectives as they finalize the document. They will not, however, be creating an advisory committee with representatives of stakeholder groups.

 

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