Photo (c) PSolfest, 1999

Wolf Society

PACKS AND TERRITORIES
Scientists believe that all domestic dogs are the descendants of wolves. They share many of the physical characteristics of wolves. But socially, dogs and wolves have some differences. Dogs are known as "man's best friend" because they are so easy to tame and get along well with their human owners. They accept that humans are dominant and so they will agree to follow orders if they are trained properly. Wolves, like dogs, form attachments and are very social. Their loyalty, however, is seldom to humans. Instead, wolves form their allegiance to a pack. Most wolves live together in packs which are similar to a family.  Packs are important for every aspect of wolf life ranging from hunting for food to caring for the young. Packs range in size from two to twenty wolves, but the average is six to ten members. Each pack establishes its own territory, or area in which it lives. The pack will fight to maintain its territory, but it uses signals such as scent markers and howling to keep other animals out. Scent marks are placed at the borders of the pack's territory by the alpha male to warn other wolves or predators to stay out. Wolves will place their scent (urine or scat) on rocks, stumps, logs, ice chunks, or sticks pointing from the ground.

In the arctic, these territories can be as large as 1,000 square miles. These wolves must travel large distances to find enough prey to feed the pack. In Wisconsin and Minnesota, the range is much smaller, around 50 to 150 square miles. Neighboring wolf packs may even share a common border, however, their territories seldom overlap by more than a mile and this area will often be treated as a "buffer" between the two.

PACK ORGANIZATION
Wolf packs are organized according to ranking, or hierarchy. This ranking keeps the wolves from fighting each other and provides social order for the pack. There are two hierarchies, one for the males and one for females. Every pack has a pair of animals which head the pack - one male and one female. These are the "Alpha" wolves. (Alpha is the first letter of the Greek alphabet and means "first".) These two mate and produce the young which the rest of the pack will support. One of the two alpha wolves will be the leader of the pack. People assume that the male is always the leader, but this isn't always true. Some packs are led by females. The "beta" wolf is the second ranking individual within the pack.

As the litter grows up, the pups may take their place in the pack or disperse, or leave. A young aggressive wolf will stay in the hopes of later challenging the pack's alpha wolf and become the leader.  It is called a "bider", since it bides its time. If successful, this wolf may become the new pack leader. An unsuccessful challenger may leave the pack to become either a lone wolf or a "disperser", a wolf which begins a new pack in as new territory. Disperser wolves may be as young as eight months or as old as four and a half years. Most often wolves leave the pack when they are about a year and a half old.

Packs also have "scapegoats". Scapegoats are the "omega" or lowest ranking wolves in a pack. These wolves live on the fringe of the pack. They do not sleep with the pack and are the last to eat. This maybe a leader which had lost position in a pack or a young member who is submissive to all other pack members.
 

RAISING YOUNG
Usually, only the alpha pair will produce a litter. This protects the pack from having more members that it is able to feed. The alpha pair will mate in February and March and then, sixty three days later, will give birth to a litter, usually four to seven dark gray pups. Delivery is made in a den, usually about 6-12 feet long and one and  a half to two feet in diameter. Over half of the litter may die within the first year.

Used with permission from "The
Searching Wolf"

When the pups are first born, they are blind, deaf and helpless, weighing only about a pound. The mother must stay in the den with them, nursing. After about six weeks, they are weaned and the adults will begin to bring them meat. The adults will eat the meat at the kill site, then return and regurgitate the partially digested food for the pups when they nip the muzzles of the adults. While the rest of the adults hunt, the pack may have one member which serves as a "baby-sitter" for the young. This is often the lowest ranking wolf of the pack.

At about six to eight weeks of age, the pups are moved from their den area by the mother  who carries them in her mouth to the first of a series of rendezvous sites or nursery areas. These become the center of pack activity for the summer months. By August, the pups can roam two or three miles from these rendezvous sites and by September, the sites are abandoned as the pups follow the adults.

Even among the pups, there is a hierarchy. Often the most aggressive pup will become the alpha pup. This is determined through  a series of play fights with the brothers and sisters. This play is valuable in determining the position of  the pups to each other and later within the pack.

HUNTING

The wolf is the ultimate predator at the top of the food chain. Predators are not hunting for fun. Hunting is the act of obtaining food for survival. When packs hunt, the members work together as a team. Hunting requires the strength of several wolves in order to take down large animals. In fact, wolves seem to prefer hunting large animals, although they will avoid animals that are too dangerous. They will look for animals that are easiest to catch.

Wolves are carnivores, feeding on other animals. In Wisconsin, over half of the wolf's diet are white tailed deer, sixteen percent are beaver, ten percent hares and nineteen percent are small animals such as mice, squirrels, and muskrats.

Beavers are an important food source when larger prey are not available. They spend a lot of time on shore in the fall and spring cutting wood for their food supply. Since beavers are easy to catch on land, wolves eat more of them in the fall and spring than the rest of the year. In the winter, beavers stay in their lodges or travel safely under the ice, making difficult for the wolves to feed on them. Wolves therefore rely on deer and hares in winter.

It is estimated that one wolf will eat approximately one deer every eighteen days or fifteen deer per year. Thus 300 wolves in Wisconsin account for less than 5,000 deer per year killed, far below the 30,000 deer hit by cars or more than 250,000 deer killed by hunters each year.

Wolves are not considered a threat to humans. According to wolf expect David Mech, there has never been a confirmed report of a non rabid wolf killing a human in the United States. Dogs, on the other hand, account for nearly eleven human deaths a year.

Wolves will sometimes eat farm livestock if given easy enough access to it. In Minnesota, between 1978 and 1984, an average of 24 farms suffered losses from wolves. This is out of a total of 12,000 farms. Most of the farms hit by wolves lacked adequate fencing or guard dogs. Both Wisconsin and Minnesota have programs to reimburse farmers for livestock losses from wolves.

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