The 2nd Ocelot confirmed to be living in Arizona since the mid 1960's has been spotted twice in the past two years and appears to robust and healthy...............Is there a mate for him/her out there in the Huachuca Mountains?

Wildlife officials say ocelot in Huachuca Mountains appears to be same one spotted in 2011

TUCSON, Ariz. — State wildlife officials say recent photographs taken by a hunter of an ocelot appear to show the endangered cat is the same one spotted in the Huachuca Mountains last year.

 

The Arizona Game and Fish Department says the latest photographs provided to the agency show the animal has grown, gained weight and appears healthy. The agency says the pictures will be reviewed by other experts to confirm its findings.

 

Wildlife officials say the sighting is promising given the limited number of ocelots in the wild.

 

The small spotted cats with a long tail have been listed as endangered since 1982 under the federal Endangered Species Act.

 

Only one other ocelot has been confirmed in Arizona since the mid-1960s and that animal was run over near Globe in April 2010.

 

Of the 100 Pumas that occupy southern Florida, about 25% get killed annually due to collisions with cars..............As we have constantly reported on, US Fish & Wildlife has to collaborate with the state of Florida and get additional critical habitat put in place to give the Cats further room to spread their wings...................Does anyone know if Florida transportation Officials are consdiering highway under/overpasses for the Pumas in addition to posting signs urging motorists to slow down----Us humans are not reading the sgins!!!!

Florida Urges Motorists to Drive Slowly in Panther Country- laht.com

MIAMI – Florida officials urged motorists to exercise caution to avoid colliding into panthers, whose population has risen sharply in recent decades.

Two Florida panthers, a protected subspecies of the cougar that inhabits wetland and dryland areas in the southern part of the state, were found dead on Monday alone, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, or FWC, said.

That brings the number of documented deaths this year to 23, 15 of which are believed to have been caused by vehicle collisions.

Florida Puma with kitten

A record total of 25 panthers were found dead in 2007 and 2009 and 24 in 2011, according to the FWC, which credits conservation programs for increasing the Florida panther population in the state to between 100-160 animals, far more than the 20-30 that existed in the 1980s.

In a statement, the FWC noted that these big cats are an endangered species and urged "motorists to be extra vigilant when traveling through panther country," especially "at dawn or dusk, when panthers are most likely to be on the move."

Isle Royale Wolf and Moose Researchers Rolf Peterson and John Vucetich have now declared their preferred solution to the dwindiling Wolf population on the island--REINTRODUCE MORE WOLVES IF THE CURRENT LOBOS GO EXTINCT!!!!!!!!

What Should Be Done About the Wolves at Isle Royale National Park, U.S.?

ScienceDaily — The number of wolves at Isle Royale National Park has dipped to nine -- the lowest seen since Michigan Technological University's wolf-moose predator-prey study began 54 years ago. What should be done if this furry icon of wilderness culture dies out altogether?

---

 

Michigan Tech researchers John Vucetich and Rolf Peterson and Michigan State University environmental ethicist Michael Nelson are willing to tackle this controversial subject.
The issue is a prickly one because there is conflict among environmentalists and ethicists about how we should -- or should not -- relate to nature and the environment. Some say, "let nature take its course." Others believe humans should work to maintain ecosystem health, and that may on some occasions require intervention.

"The appropriate approach is to acknowledge and understand all the values at stake, and then develop a perspective or position that would least infringe upon that set of values," say Vucetich, Peterson and Nelson.

There are three possible kinds of intervention that could save the wolves of Isle Royale:

* Wolf reintroduction -- reintroducing wolves if the present wolf population were to go extinct.
* Female reintroduction -- reintroducing female wolves when all present females have gone extinct.
* Genetic rescue -- introducing new wolves on Isle Royale while some of the present population remains, to broaden and strengthen the gene pool.

If the wolves are allowed to go extinct, the moose population on the remote island will grow unimpeded, until the moose strip the island of its vegetation and eventually, starve.

"The bottom line is, as long as there are moose there, keep the wolves there," says Vucetich.
"All things considered, if the wolves go to extinction, reintroduce them," Peterson concludes.

Researchers are seeking to learn about Wolverine migration patterns in and around Banff, Yoho and Kootenay National Parks in Canada this winter..........While pound for pound the strongest land mammal in North America, do Wolverines have the abililty to adapt their movements to the Trans-Canada Highway so as not to perish and become gene-bottlenecked?

Wolverine-tracking project puts out call for volunteers

Skiers to tote beaver carcasses long distances through deep snow

cbc.com

Scientists are working to determine how the Trans-Canada Highway is affecting migration patterns of wolverines. (Jeff Ford/Associated Press/Canadian Press)

 

A team of wildlife scientists is looking for people able to carry a beaver carcass long distances through the heavy snow to help track wolverines in Banff, Yoho and Kootenay national parks this winter.Volunteers will help researchers by nailing beaver carcasses and barbed wire to trees in order to attract wolverines and collect their fur.

Calvin Sime worked on a similar project in the Columbia Valley two years ago.
"[You get] fantastic views … in a mountainous terrain," he said. "Once you get up, there's some pretty nice views and some nice features to enjoy while you're volunteering."

Researchers are hoping to map wolverine migration patterns across 6,000 square kilometers.
"There is something about wolverines that just fascinate people. A lot of people are interested in helping out on a research project like this, getting out skiing in the winter time," said Tony Clevenger, who is spearheading the project.

Clevenger says the goal is to see how the Trans-Canada Highway is affecting the animals' movements."It's an exciting project," he said. "We had more than 40 people sign up two years ago and I'm expecting a similar amount this year."Volunteers need to be able to ski long distances through heavy snow in frigid temperatures.

The Center for Biological Diversity urging that additional Mexican Wolves be released into Arizona and New Mexico to diversify the gene pool of the 58 free roaming Mexican Wolves that exist in the wild..........To that end, there are now 3 Wolves being acclimated to desert living in a holding pen in New Mexico awaiting the necessary Federal and State permits allowing release

Wolf from Brookfield Zoo sent to New Mexico to be prepared for release

Only 58 Mexican gray wolves in the wild in the Southwest; wildlife officials hope Ernesta will add to the population

|By Joseph Ruzich, The Chicago Tribune

Ernesta, a wolf from the Brookfield Zoo, has been shipped to a refuge in New Mexico and may be released into the wild. There are only 58 Mexican gray wolves living in the wild in New Mexico and Arizona. (Jim Schulz, Chicago Zoological Society)
 

She may have not been born free, but Ernesta, a 4-year-old Mexican gray wolf from Brookfield Zoo, might be able to live out the rest of her life roaming the wilds of New Mexico.

Ernesta was transferred from the west suburban zoo to the Sevilleta Wolf Management Facility near Socorro, N.M., on Oct. 27 and is now attending "wolf boot camp" with two other male wolves that arrived when she did. The goal is to prepare them for release into the wild as part of an effort to increase the wolf population in the area.

 

Yesterday, we focused on the historical Continent wide trek that British Seaman Samuel Hearne undertook during the three year period of 1769-1772,,,,,,, chronicling native life, fauna and flora from Hudson Bay(Canada) clear across to the Arctic Ocean........We continue today with his observation of the Bear and Fox species he encountered on this epic journey

A JOURNEY TO THE NORTHERN OCEAN; THE ADVENTURES OF SAMUEL HEARNE-1769-1772

Black Bears

-"Black Bears are not numerous to the north, west Churchill. Their habit of life is the same as the rest of the species, though the face of the country they inhabit differs widely from the more mild climates> The Bears that inhabit the southern parts of America are said to take up their winter abode in hollow trees; but I never saw any trees in my northern travels that could affod such shelter. As the winter approaches, they retire to their dens which are alway underground and generally, if not always, on the side of a small hillock"

-"The few Black Bears that inhabit these cold regions may be said to subsist for four months without food, till the latter of March, or the beginning of April. Thought the animals are but scarce, to the north of Churchill, yet they are so numerous between York Fort and Cumberland House, that in 1774 I saw 11 killed in the course of one day's journey, but their flesh was abominable. This was in the month of June, long before any fruit was ripe, for the want of which they then fed entirely on water insects, which in some of the lakes we crossed that day were in astonishing multitudes. The method by which bears catch those insects is by swimming with their mouths open. After the middle of July when the berries begin to ripen, the bears are excellent eating, and so continue till January or February following. The Southern Indians kill great numbers of those bears at all seasons of the year"

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Brown Bears

-"I believe these bears are never found in the Northern Indian territories; but I saw the skin of an enourmous grizzled bear at the tents of the Esquimaux at the Copper River ; and many of them are said to breed not very remote from that part"

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Polar Bears

-" The Polar or White Bear though common on the sea coast is seldomfound in its winter retreats by any of our northern Indians, except near Churchill River"

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Foxes

-"The Arctic Foxes are in some years remarkably plentiful, but generally most so on the barren ground near the sea coast. Not withstanding that, not less than from 200 to 400 have been caught each year within 30 miles of Fort Churchill. They always come from the north along the coast and generally make their appearance at about the middle of October. The great numbers of those animals that visit Churchill River do not all come in a body, but when they come by the Fort, the carcasses of dead whales lying along the shores afford them a plentiful repast"

"When Churchill River is frozen over near the mouth, the greatest part of the surviving white foxes cross the river and direct their course to the southward and in some years assemble in considerable numbers at York Fort and Severn River. They take to the trap so freely, they are otherwise so simple that I have seen them shot off-hand while feeding, the same as sparrows in a heap of chaff, sometimes two or three at a shot"

-'Th Naturalists seem still at a loss to know their breeding places which are doubtless in every part of the coast they frequent. Several of them breed near Churchill and I have seen them in considerable numbers all alon the west ocoast of hudson's Bay, particularly at Cape Esquimaux, Navel's Bay and Whale Cove, also on Marble Island; so that with some degree of confidence we may affirm that they breed on every part of the coast they inhabit during the summer season"

"They generally have 3 to 5 in a litter. When young, they are a sooty black colour but when winter sets in they are perfectly white. If taken young, they are easily domesticated in some degree; but I never saw one that was fond of being caressed; and they are always impatient of confinement"

In 1769, Samuel Hearne, an Englishman in the British Navy, began a three year overland journey of exploration from the Hudson Bay(Canada)to the Arctic Ocean...........Many consider his accoutning of the fauna and flora of Northern Canada to be as descriptive as Audubon's detailing of the American outdoors...........I detail below Hearne's reporting of the wildlife he encountered along his 3500 mile trek

A JOURNEY TO THE NORTHERN OCEAN

BY SAMUEL HEARNE


-"WOLVES ARE FREQUENTLY MET WITH IN THE COUNTRY'S WEST OF HUDSON BAY, BOTH ON THE BARREN GROUNDS AND AMONG THE WOODS"

-"THEY ARE NOT NUMEROUS; IT IS VERY UNCOMMON TO SEE MORE THAN 3 OR 4 OF THEM IN A HERD"

-"THOSE THAT KEEP TO THE WESTWARD, ALONG THE WOODS ARE OF THE USUAL COLOUR, BUT THE GREATEST PART THAT ARE KILLED BY THOSE OF THE ESQUIMAUX ARE PERFECTLY WHITE"

-"ALL THE WOLVES IN HUDSON BAY ARE SHY OF THE HUMAN RACE, YET WHEN SHARP SET, THEY FREQUENTLY FOLLOW THE INDIANS FOR SEVERAL DAYS, BUT ALWAYS KEEP AT A DISTANCE"

-"THEY ARE OF GREAT ENEMIES TO THE INDIAN DOGS, AND FREQUENTL KILL AND EAST THOSE THAT ARE HEAVILY LOADED AND CANNOT KEEP UP WITH THE MAIN BODY"

-"THE FEMALES ARE MUCH SWIFTER THAN THE MALES  AND THE INDIANS, BOTH NORTHERN AND SOUTHERN, 
 ARE OF THE OPINION THAT THEY KILL THE GREATEST PART OF THE GAME"

-"THEY ALWAYS BURROW UNDERGROUND TO BRING FORTH THEIR YOUNG; AND WHILE NATURAL TO SUPPOSE THEM VERY FIERCE AT THOSE TIMES, I HAVE FREQUENTLY SEEN THE INDIANS GO TO THEIR DENS AND TAKE OUT THE YOUNG ONES AND PLAY WITH THEM; I HAVE NEVER KNOWN A NORTHERN INDIAN TO HURT ONE OF THEM; ON THE CONTARY, THEY ALWAYS PUT THEM CAREFULLY INTO THE DEN AGAIN; AND I HAVE SOMETIMES SEEN THEM PAINT THE FACES OF THE YOUNG WOLVES WITH VERMILLION, OR RED OCHRE"
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-THE LYNX IS VERY SCARCE TO THE NORTH OF CHURCHILL, BUT IS EXACTLY THE SAME AS THOSE WHICH ARE FOUND IN GREAT PLENTY TO THE SOUTHWEST"

-"THEY NEVER APPROACH NEAR THE SETTLEMENTS IN HUDSON BAY"

-THEY ARE VERY DESTRUCTIVE TO RABBITS AND SELDOM LEAVE A PLACE TILL THEY HAVE KILLED NEARLY ALL OF THEM"
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-"THE WOLVERINE IS COMMON IN THE NORTHERN REGIONS, AS FAR NORTH AS THE COPPER RIVER, PERHAPS FARTHER. THEY ARE EQUALLY THE INHABITANT OF THE WOODS AS WELL AS THE BARREN GROUND. THEY ARE VERY SLOW IN THEIR PACE BUT THEIR WONDERFUL SAGACITY, STRENGTH AND ACUTE SCENT MAKE AMPLE AMENDS FOR THAT DEFECT"

-"THE WOLVERINES HAVE ALSO BEEN SEEN TO TAKE A DEER FROM A WOLF. INDEED, THEIR AMAZING STRENGTH AND THE LENGTH AND SHARPNESS OF THEIR CLAWSRENDER THEM OF MAKING A STRONG RESISTANCE AGAINST ANY OTHER ANIMAL IN THESE PARTS, THE BEAR NOT EXCEPTED"

-"THESE ANIMALS ARE GREAT ENEMIES TO THE BEAVER, BUT THE MANNER OF LIFE OF THE LATTER PREVENTS THEM FROM FALLING INTO THEIR CLUTCHES SO FREQUENTLY AS OTHER ANIMALS"

-"THEY COMMIT VAST DEPREDATIONS ON THE FOXES DURING THE SUMMER"

Thomas Paine is smiling this morning as "COMMON SENSE" finally rules the day in North Carolina where the courts ruled to temporarilly stop nighttime "spotlight" kiling of Coyotes---effectively halting the killing of any more Red Wolves----4 of the endangered Wolves(mistaken for coyotes because of physical size similarities between the two species) have been killed during the spotlight hunting to date and unless a permanent ban on spotlighting is put into effect, the ongoing effort by biologists to keep the red wolf lineage alive will be severely crippled,,,,,,,,,,,,,and perhaps thwarted entirely!

Fourth red wolf killing prompts hunting change

Spotlight hunting for coyotes banned

By Brian North;wcti12.com

CHAPEL HILL -

After four endangered wolves were killed, a North Carolina court today granted conservation groups’ request to stop a temporary state rule that allows spotlight hunting of coyotes at night in the five county area of eastern North Carolina inhabited by the world’s only wild population of about 100 red wolves. The Southern Environmental Law Center filed the motion for preliminary injunction and a request for expedited hearing in Wake County Superior Court on behalf of the Red Wolf Coalition, Defenders of Wildlife, and the Animal Welfare Institute.

“Today, the court acted to prevent the killing of more endangered red wolves,” said Derb Carter, a senior attorney at the Southern Environmental Law Center who represents the groups. “Now the commission should make sure its permanent rule to allow spotlighting of coyotes will not further harm red wolves.”

An identical permanent rule that allows spotlight hunting of coyotes at night in North Carolina may still go into effect. The law center notified the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission that it is in violation of the federal Endangered Species Act by allowing spotlight hunting of coyotes and the groups will file a federal enforcement action unless the commission takes steps to protect the wolves.

At least four of the few remaining wild red wolves (Canis rufus) have been killed since the rule went into effect. Red wolves and coyotes are similar in size, coats, and coloring so red wolves are frequently mistaken for coyotes, even in daylight. Gunshot deaths are a significant threat to red wolf recovery and a leading cause of red wolf mortality.

 

 By allowing night hunting of coyotes, the commission is committing an unlawful take (i.e., harass, harm, hunt, or kill) of the red wolf. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service stated in its public comments that the Commission’s rule “amendments to allow night hunting have the potential to result in unauthorized take of red wolves.”

North Carolina is home to the world’s only wild population of red wolves. Red wolves bred in captivity were reintroduced on a North Carolina peninsula within their native range in the late 1980’s after red wolves were declared extinct in the wild. Once common throughout the Southeast, intensive predator control programs and loss of habitat eliminated wild red wolf populations.

Conservationists consider road kill such a threat to species survival that they have begun looking for solutions through an emerging discipline known as road ecology.......Roads present more than just the potential for dangerous interactions between vehicles and wildlife; they fragment habitat and restrict the movement of wildlife species............. Although, many wildlife management and transportation agencies have worked to mitigate vehicle-associated incidents with wildlife on our roadways, there is still much to learn about the ways in which wildlife interact with roads.......Joe Northrup and his colleagues at the University of Alberta, Edmonton and the University of Calgary documented the response of grizzlies to vehicular traffic noting that roads themselves are not so detrimental to wildlife, and grizzly bears in particular, but that the human use of roads is what needs to be examined............What they found was that bears avoided roads with high and medium traffic volumes and instead used low traffic volume roads and crossed these low volume roads with greater frequency............ They also found that bears utilized private agricultural land over multi-use public land............ The agricultural land was typically higher in road density, but lower in traffic volume.......In fact, traffic had a greater impact on bear behavior than road density........... .Typically management plans focus on limiting road density, but with increasing industrial development in bear habitat, this is becoming difficult.............. Incorporating measures aimed at reducing traffic, such as access management, into these plans will be an important step for bear conservation

Contributing Editor Dr. Jordan Schaul reports on the first study to examine grizzly bear behavior in response to spatial and temporal variations in traffic patterns using traffic models.

nationalgeopgraphic.com

In April, while filming a segment for the BBC series Dangerous Roads with actor Charley Boorman, I reported on the impact of roads on wildlife for Nat Geo News Watch.

Vehicle-wildlife collisions were of particular interest to the producers of the BBC television series. For the Alaskan version of Dangerous Roads, a camera crew was deployed to follow Charley on a road trip from Anchorage toward Prudhoe Bay along the Seward Highway—one of the most dangerous highways in North America.

Nat Geo Archives

The BBC stopped by the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center on their trip north to visit with our staff and animals. They asked if we had any “statistics” on the number of orphans that had been brought to the Center as result of collisions with vehicles on the Seward Highway. Indeed, we provided homes for moose calves, bear cubs and other wildlife, orphaned as a result of road incidents, but not all of the incidents occurred on that particular highway. Hence, we couldn’t provide a valid estimate.

Grizzly and black bear cubs of the year and older cubs were often brought to our facility, particularly during Spring when offspring were just emerging from hibernacula for the first time or otherwise still dependent on their mothers. Vehicle collisions either killed their mothers or left the sows in conditions that required they be immediately dispatched (euthanized).

Although a busy time for us, the implications stemming from such vehicle-wildlife incidents have great influence on the conservation of species worldwide, including here in North America where we are relatively adept at managing wildlife in the context of road interactions.

Data on vehicle-associated wildlife mortalities may or may not be astonishing, but wildlife conservationists consider road kill so much a threat to species survival that they have begun looking for solutions through an emerging discipline known as road ecology.

Some of our most iconic species succumb to road-associated incidents. In fact, some species like the woodland caribou are threatened more from road collisions than from habitat loss. And at one point when Florida panthers were truly on the brink of extinction, half of the extant population succumbed to vehicle collisions.

Roads present more than just the potential for dangerous interactions between vehicles and wildlife; they fragment habitat and restrict the movement of wildlife species. Although, many wildlife management and transportation agencies have worked to mitigate vehicle-associated incidents with wildlife on our roadways, there is still much to learn about the ways in which wildlife interact with roads.

We do know that behavioral responses to roads can be species specific, age specific and even gender specific. We also know that behavior may also shift based on the time of day and season.

What does this all mean for the grizzly bear, since most grizzly bear mortalities occur near roads and current management programs aimed at protecting grizzly bears focus on limiting road densities?
While bears may use roads and roadsides to travel and are sometimes attracted to roads because of the presence of ungulate road kill and other attractants, they also avoid roads because of vehicular activity levels.

To adequately develop effective bear management programs, which have focused primarily on limiting road densities, an understanding of how bears respond to traffic volumes on the roads is also needed, according to a new study.

Although previous studies have used indirect indicators of traffic levels to assess bear activity on and near roadways, it is only recently that investigators have used more precise model estimates of traffic volume to examine the behavior of grizzly bears in response to vehicular activity.

Joe Northrup and his colleagues at the University of Alberta, Edmonton and the University of Calgary documented the response of grizzlies to vehicular traffic in a recent issue of the Journal of Applied Ecology (British Ecological Society). In the paper entitled Vehicular Traffic Shapes Grizzly Bear Behaviour on a Multi-use Landscape the authors noted that roads themselves are not so detrimental to wildlife, and grizzly bears in particular, but that the human use of roads is what needs to be examined.

The authors created models of road use for an entire road network in southwestern Alberta, Canada and documented for the first time the response of grizzly bears to a wide range of spatial and temporal traffic patterns. They hypothesized that “traffic would significantly influence grizzly bear habitat selection and movement near roads, and that bears would avoid roads with higher traffic volumes.”

What they found was that bears avoided roads with high and medium traffic volumes and instead used low traffic volume roads and crossed these low volume roads with greater frequency. They also found that bears utilized private agricultural land over multi-use public land. The agricultural land was typically higher in road density, but lower in traffic volume.

Northrup said, “the finding that traffic had a greater impact on bear behavior than road density is an important for how we manage bears. Typically management plans focus on limiting road density, but with increasing industrial development in bear habitat, this is becoming difficult. Incorporating measures aimed at reducing traffic, such as access management, into these plans will be an important step for bear conservation.”

So as of 2008, did Wisconsin have 13,000, 26,000 or 40,000 Black Bears roaming its woodlands?..............If the scientific study that was conducted in 2008 by the U. of Wisconsin was accurate, 13,000 Bruins was the best estimate, not 26,000 or 40,000 as some wild ass hypotheses suggest...........With the 2012 Bear huting season just concluded with 4400 Bears killed, that means that 34% of the population was destroyed,,,,,,,,,a potential tipping point that could lead to a reduced population...........Note that the Dept. of Ntl. Resources states in their press release below that: "We are likely now to the point where we will need to consider backing off on permit levels in some areas this year."--------Like most State Game Commissions, Wisconsin DNR seems to be in the pockets of the hunters and farmers and not utilizing sound scientific management practices until population freefalls or inbalances force their hand

Hunters register 4,400 black bear in 2012 seasMADISON (Press Release) –wisconsin.gov

 

Hunters registered more than 4,400 black bears during the 2012 black bear season in Wisconsin, which state wildlife officials say is the second highest number on record. Hunters registered 5,133 bears in 2010 and 4,257 in 2011.

 

Wisconsin is known throughout the country as having both large bear as well as an abundant population that lives primarily in the northern third and central forest area of the state, according to Kevin Wallenfang, big game ecologist for the Department of Natural Resources.

 

"In recent years, bear have become more common throughout the state including many central and southern counties. We had a bear reported as far south as Green County this year, and we're hearing of more bear living year-round in many central counties," he says.

 

Bear hunters have until midnight on Dec. 10 to apply for a harvest permit for the 2013 hunting season, or preference point for future years. The number of permits available for the 2013 black bear hunt has not yet been determined. "We are currently looking at information from the 2011 and 2012 hunts, and will present our recommended harvest levels to the Natural Resources Board in January," Wallenfang says.

 

The DNR, with the help of volunteers from the Wisconsin Bear Hunters Association and other cooperators, has been conducting research to better estimate the number of bear in the state. A similar study done in 2006 showed significantly more than previously estimated, so harvest quotas and permits were increased.

"We are likely now to the point where we will need to consider backing off on permit levels in some areas this year."

 

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Cooperative study suggests Wisconsin's black bear population is larger than thought

wisconsin.gov

MADISON – Preliminary results of a two-year cooperative study of Wisconsin black bears suggest that the population may be two times or more larger than currently thought. Biologists stress that the new estimate comes from a half finished study and may change when data from the second year of the study are analyzed. Early results are encouraging, however, and indicate Wisconsin continues to provide quality habitat for large mammals like bears.
"This is good news," said Keith Warnke, Department of Natural Resources deer and bear ecologist. "It means we have a healthy bear population, and we may be able to expand bear hunting opportunity. The other good news is that more people will have opportunities to see these great animals in the wild."

The two-year, DNR-funded study was conducted by University of Wisconsin-Madison Wildlife Ecology graduate student Dave MacFarland under the guidance of Dr. Timothy Van Deelen.
"The preliminary results are comparable to bear densities in Minnesota and Michigan's Upper Peninsula," said Van Deelen. "Dave and I spent a good deal of time rechecking our calculations and we're eager to see if the results hold when the second year of data are incorporated."

In the bear study, some 3,500 baits marked with tetracycline were set out across the state's bear range in 2006. Tetracycline, when ingested, is harmless to bears but leaves a telltale line in a bear's bones. Successful bear hunters in 2006 and 2007 were asked to provide a section of a rib bone from bears they harvested for analysis. From those samples, the biologists were able to use a formula to calculate the estimated bear population.

Using tetracycline is a variation on a wildlife population estimating technique known as mark and recapture. Other examples of mark and recapture are banding of waterfowl and songbirds and radio collars or radio implants on other species. When hunters report harvesting a banded game bird or biologists recapture a banded songbird, that information is used in a model to estimate total populations.

Currently, biologists track black bear populations by placing a series of baits on routes in each county throughout the black bear's range and record which are consumed by bears over a week long observation period. Biologists use these observations to help build a population model that also takes into account hunter harvest, hunter success rates, bear population data and historical harvest rates to generate a population estimate.

 This model estimates the current black bear population in Wisconsin to be at about 13,000.

"It is important to keep in mind that these models both provide information for us to consider when managing the bear population, and both are important to scientific bear management," Warnke said. "We are always working to improve the science we have to manage wildlife populations. The department funded the research to improve our bear population estimate and expand the science base we have on this species. The Wisconsin Bear Hunters Association was a key collaborator on this study and many members participated in gathering data and contributing research supplies. I'd also like to thank Dave MacFarland for organizing and conducting this research and his help in enlisting cooperation from the bear hunters."

In the tetracycline study, a much larger number of bait stations were used and the bait stations were constructed in a way that only bears could reach the bait. The new study also carefully adjusted the amount of bait so that a single bear would likely consume all of it in one visit, greatly reducing the possibility that one bait might mark two bears. By comparing the number of baits consumed in a season to the number of harvested bears showing the tetracycline marker in their bones, scientists were able to calculate the new population estimate.

Officials stress that these are preliminary findings and it is too early to draw conclusions or implement changes. The earliest possible changes that would impact bear hunting permit availability would be for the 2009 hunting season. Adjusting black bear population goals will necessitate changes to administrative rules and involve public meetings, and Natural Resources Board and legislative approval.

"When the final results are in we'll be able to use this information to assess bear population goals and adapt our bear management program," says Warnke. "Any changes to bear management policies will be done carefully, with public input and only after thorough analysis of potential impacts. The first priority is and always will be conservation of the resource."

"Our bear population is expanding and one benefit of that is that people can expect to see bears in areas outside what is thought of as traditional range," Warnke said. "Despite bears' general shyness toward humans, people in the central and southwest areas of the state likely can expect to see more evidence of bears as they disperse, looking for new territories."

Adult black bears typically weigh 250 to 500 pounds for males (boars) and 200 to 450 pounds for females (sows). Infant bears, called cubs, are born quite tiny but by the time they are 2 months old, they weigh about 6 pounds. Females give birth to two or three cubs in January or February when they are still in their winter sleep. When standing on all four paws, adult bears measure 2 to 3 feet tall at their shoulders.

 

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Black bear population status and distribution

Wisconsin's occupied bear range is expanding, which means residents can expect to see black bears in areas outside of the bear's traditional range. An abundant population and suitable bear habitat have facilitated the southerly movement of occupied bear range in Wisconsin. Wisconsin's black bear population is considerably higher than it was 20 years ago. Wisconsin's bear population was estimated to be about 9,000 bears in 1989.

 A 2008 study indicated the bear population is currently between 26,000 and 40,000 bears--based on what??????????--The 2008 U. of Wisconsin Bear population study using recognized scientific measurement protocol estimated 13,000 bears in Wisconsin(Blogger Rick).

 DNR manages bears population size through regulated hunting. The number of hunting permits has been increased following studies showing higher numbers of bears. Over the next year, opportunities will be provided to the public to comment on desired numbers of bears in each of the state's bear management regions as the DNR prepares a new bear management plan.
 

Wisconsin is not alone in their expanding bear range. The results from a 2008 survey of eastern United States and Canadian Provinces that actively manage black bear populations indicated that 75% of these jurisdictions report an increase in bear range. Only Vermont reported a contracting bear range.

U. of Wisconsin Wildlife Professor Tim Van Deelen says the Wisconsin deer population is doing quite nicely, even as wolf numbers have grown.............. "The impact of 900 wolves in a state with 30,000 square miles of wolf range and several hundred thousand deer is likely to be minimal".............."I'm a population ecologist, and it's a difficult question whether wolves are real competition for hunters"................. "There is the potential for competition, but everything about the evolution and life history of the white tail deer is designed to offset losses to predation"........"As near as I can tell from DNR harvest and monitoring data, wolves are not causing a dramatic decrease in the growth rate of the deer population, and whatever level of competition is occurring must be trivial"............. "There are hunters who are unlucky to have a bad experience at the local level, but at the statewide level, I am not seeing significant wolf impacts"......"It's always the same arguments"........... "People argue that there are not as many deer as there should be, or as many as the DNR says, yet since Aldo Leopold's time, the deer population has increased"

Deer, wolf and hunting: Professor shines spotlight of data on a durable debate

  

by David Tenenbaum;wisc.com

As the Wisconsin gun deer season started on Saturday, Nov. 17, some hunters are wondering about the impacts of the growing wolf population, and the first wolf hunting season in more than 60 years.

A primary justification for the season, which began Oct. 15, was to reduce wolf depredation on state's herd of white-tail deer.

Although wolves certainly prey on deer, Timothy Van Deelen, an associate professor of wildlife management at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, says that does not automatically mean that hunting more wolves will bring more deer.The situation is just too complicated for that. Numbers are hard — and expensive — to come by, and raising the already high deer population may not be a good thing.

Looking at the available data, Van Deelen says the Wisconsin deer population is doing quite nicely, even as wolf numbers have grown. The impact of 900 wolves in a state with 30,000 square miles of wolf range and several hundred thousand deer is likely to be minimal."I'm a population ecologist, and it's a difficult question whether wolves are real competition for hunters," says Van Deelen. "There is the potential for competition, but everything about the evolution and life history of the white tail deer is designed to offset losses to predation."

Wolves hunt by chasing instead of ambush and may train deer to become much more wary, Van Deelen says, "so they may be much less visible to a hunter who is out for a week or so."
Van Deelen, who grew up hunting in the Lower Peninsula of Michigan, and continues to hunt deer, notes that wolves also kill coyotes, another deer predator, thereby reducing coyote impacts on deer.
In general, he says, scientists estimate that the average wolf kills 17 to 20 deer per year, which comes to about 20,000 kills in the northern two-thirds of Wisconsin.

"We don't know how many of them would have died from something else," he says. "Wolf predation on coyote is part of a compensatory mechanism that we don't fully understand."

To get reliable numbers on changes in the deer population and predation by wolves and others, Van Deelen is supervising two intensive, radio-collaring projects in collaboration with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources. Now in their third year, these projects are located near Winter in the Northwest forest, and Shawano, in the eastern farmland.

"As near as I can tell from DNR harvest and monitoring data, wolves are not causing a dramatic decrease in the growth rate of the deer population, and whatever level of competition is occurring must be trivial," says Van Deelen. "There are hunters who are unlucky to have a bad experience at the local level, but at the statewide level, I am not seeing significant wolf impacts."

Dense deer populations cause thousands of auto collisions, and damage tree plantings and native vegetation."Ecologically, the impact is across the board," Van Deelen says. "If you are a commercial forester, you worry about regeneration of trees with commercial value. If you are concerned about the biodiversity of forest floor plants, deer impact that. [UW-Madison botany professor] Don Waller has done lots of really rigorous research demonstrating that we are losing plant diversity at the same time that the deer population is increasing."

The problem, Van Deelen says, likely lies in expectations."There are hunters who are unlucky to have a bad experience at the local level, but at the statewide level, I am not seeing significant wolf impacts." "In Wisconsin, we have a generation of hunters who grew up in 1980s, when the deer population was at a historic high level. Even though the deer population is only down a bit, they begin complaining that it's not as high as they think it should be, but their frame of reference may be unrealistic or incompatible with the conservation of other resources," he says.

"Numbers from outside sources are clear," Van Deelen adds. "Per square mile, in antlered deer, antlerless deer and trophy bucks, Wisconsin is at the top, compared to Michigan, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, Illinois and Iowa.


A Classic Wolf and White Tail encounter at waters edge-7 out of 10 times the deer escapes the wolf

The Quality Deer Management Association, which is independent of the DNR, puts us third in the nation in terms of harvested bucks per square mile, and fourth in the nation in terms of antlered bucks in 2010. The Boone and Crockett club suggests that Wisconsin hunters have reported three times as many trophy class bucks per 1,000 square miles as hunters in Michigan and Minnesota.""Taken together these statistics suggest that Wisconsin is a good place to be a deer hunter, whether your interest is in the opportunity to harvest any deer or the opportunity to harvest a trophy buck," says Van Deelen.

Controversy is stock-in-trade for wildlife managers, adds Van Deelen, who was critical of the preliminary report on deer management ordered by Gov. Scott Walker, but gave better grades to the final report, issued in June. "It's always the same arguments," Van Deelen says. "People argue that there are not as many deer as there should be, or as many as the DNR says, yet since Aldo Leopold's time, the deer population has increased."

 

Pine Martens are starting their march back to inhabiting larger swaths of Newfoundland, moving from the western end of the island as far east as the Avalon Peninsula........

Bay St. George a hotspot for pine marten on west coast

A pine marten is seen in a tree in a Newfoundland forest.

 

Paul Hutchings; westernstar.com                                                                    

DEER LAKE — Pine marten researcher Glenda Bateman was not exactly surprised by the results from last year's pine marten tracking program, but it is great to finally have her suspicions confirmed.Bateman said not all of the numbers are available from last year as of yet, but she said they received 97 hair samples from 56 volunteer groups. From the samples collected, 47 turned out to be marten hair, showing that the species is spreading across the island.

The exciting thing for researchers, she said, was where the small, otter-like animals have been confirmed. They managed to determine that martens are most likely in the Bay St. George area.
"We had no confirmed samples from that area before, so we were very pleased with that," she said. "We suspected (pine martens) would move out there, we didn't know that for sure, but now we do."
Researchers also received results from the Humber Valley area and as far east as the Avalon Peninsula. From the Northern Peninsula they received no samples last year, but Bateman hopes that will change, as so far this year they have one volunteer for the area.

Last year, Bateman, co-ordinator with Codroy Valley's Intervale, spoke to groups like the Newfoundland and Labrador Snowmobile Federation, along with hunters, hikers or anyone who goes into the woods, trying to recruit volunteers. She was asking for people to help set up baited wooden shelters in wooded areas to collect hair samples from animals to gain information about the province's pine marten population.

This year she is hoping to get more eager volunteers.The project is being conducted jointly between Intervale and the provincial wildlife division, and partly funded by the Environment Canada Stewardship Program. Bateman said there is a lot to gain."The problem is our information is outdated, and this allows us to gather new information that we don't have on population and distribution," she said.

Anyone wishing to volunteer for the program can call 709-640-4696  or send an email to martenvolunteer@gmail.com.

"Widespread development in the booming oil-and-gas area(British Columbia) has opened up the forest habitat, boosting moose and deer populations by providing rich browsing range"............ "In the past, wolf numbers rose and fell in synchronicity with the caribou population"............ "But with more moose and deer around, wolf numbers have stayed high, disrupting the natural predator-prey symbiosis"........ "Put simply, the caribou are literally taking it in the neck, with wolves causing 40 per cent of all mortalities"--Elena Jones, B.C. Biologist..........So what should be done to save the Caribou???............"That really is quite a political decision," Ms. Jones said. "My job is basically to say these are the ways that will increase caribou populations, and then the public really decides how they want to do it"........... Do they want to kill wolves and maintain development?"............ "Or do they want to decrease development?" ........"Those are really the public's choices"..........And of course the B.C. Provincial Government has come right out favoring development,,,,,,,,, putting forth a draconian year round, no bag limits Wolf hunting proposal---Can it be stopped from being implemented?---See Sadie Paar's plea on this subject in the 2nd blog entry today, below

Caribou, Wolves or Development

Mark Hume;globeandmail.com


Caribou populations are declining so quickly along the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline route that British Columbians are now faced with a stark choice: kill wolves to save the caribou or halt development.

Probably nobody knows that better than Elena Jones, a biologist who has been studying five caribou herds in northeast B.C. for the past decade.

 

At the rate the caribou populations are dropping, she says, they will soon vanish from the landscape – unless something is done to save them.

"The populations are declining quite dramatically and if those trends continue I would expect those herds . . . to be locally extirpated within five to 10 years," she said, admitting to a feeling of "helplessness" as she watches the unrelenting decline of caribou.
"I feel really that my job at present is almost documenting the decline of caribou as opposed to being able to actually study caribou or make any difference," Ms. Jones said.

Widespread development in the booming oil-and-gas area has opened up the forest habitat, boosting moose and deer populations by providing rich browsing range. In the past, wolf numbers rose and fell in synchronicity with the caribou population. But with more moose and deer around, wolf numbers have stayed high, disrupting the natural predator-prey symbiosis. Put simply, the caribou are literally taking it in the neck, with wolves causing 40 per cent of all mortalities.

And now Enbridge is proposing to put the Gateway pipeline right through the middle of that caribou range, which would open up the woodlands even more, exacerbating an already severe wolf-predation problem.

The numbers show how desperate the situation is. In recent years, the Moberly herd has gone from 191 caribou to 35. The Bearhole-Redwillow herd has dwindled to 21 animals from 80. And when biologists went looking for the Burnt-Pine herd of 17 caribou this year, they could only find one animal left alive – standing alone in a tract of forest where there hasn't been a new calf born in four years.

Wolves hunting Caribou

Any doubt that the pipeline route passes through caribou habitat was removed by a recent study in which Ms. Jones and Dale Seip tracked animals using radio collars. They found that over the course of a year several herds (and particularly the Bearhole-Redwillow population) criss-cross the pipeline right of way many times, moving between feeding and calving grounds.

So what should be done to save the caribou?

"That really is quite a political decision," Ms. Jones said. "My job is basically to say these are the ways that will increase caribou populations, and then the public really decides how they want to do it. Do they want to kill wolves and maintain development? Or do they want to decrease development? Those are really the public's choices."

It was against this backdrop that the provincial government last week released its draft wolf-management plan for public discussion. The paper lays out a wide range of management options, from basically doing nothing, to hunting down and shooting entire packs of wolves from helicopters.
The environmental group, Pacific Wild, has condemned the report, saying it projects "a barbaric and grim future for B.C. wolves."

That may be true, but if nothing is done to change things, northeast caribou simply have no future.
In another development last week, Chris Tollefson, a lawyer representing BC Nature and Nature Canada at the Gateway hearings, sought to have a recently completed caribou report by Ms. Jones and Mr. Seip entered as evidence. A decision on that application is pending, but it is hard to see how the joint review panel can ignore a document that raises such urgent questions about the entwined fate of caribou, wolves and the Gateway pipeline.

Sadie Paar is a relentless warrior on behalf of Wolves in Canada...............She forwarded the letter below that rebuts the inane rationale that the Province of British Columbia is putting forth for the institution of a nearly year long Wolf hunting season that is open ended without bag limits......The way this draft plan is structured, unless significant public opposition is mobilized in the coming weeks, the B.C. government will further relax and liberalize wolf hunting, trapping and other kill programs for years to come.......... Several concerned groups will be following this issue and speaking out for wolves as what is clearly shaping up to be a renewed government-sanctioned assault on B.C.'s wolves............These groups include: Pacific Wild, Valhalla Wilderness Society, Furbearers Defenders, the LifeForce Foundation, the Northern Lights Wolf Centre, World Temperate Rainforest Network, Peter A. Dettling Wilderness Education Centre, and likely more to come.

Please contact Honourable Terry Lake, BC MInister of the Environment to oppose this plan; env.minister@gov.bc.ca

Groups Pack Together to Voice Opposition to BC's Continued War on WolvesFOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Two days ago, the B.C. government unveiled its Draft Wolf Management Plan. This draft wolf plan goes on to outline a barbaric and grim future for B.C. wolves that amounts to a government sponsored kill program.

The plan is full of discussion on the "harvesting" of wolves, as if they are some kind of crop like wheat or barley. It further states the lofty objective to "…ensure self-sustaining populations throughout the species range." A self-sustaining population is a good start, but nothing to be too proud of when the report states that would allow for harvest rates of up to 34%. Recent research in Ontario's Algonquin Provincial Park by Dr. Linda Rutledge has shown that unexploited wolf populations behave differently than family-based packs which are natural. Rutledge, her team and many wolf advocates urge that conservation policies need to look beyond numbers and take social dynamics into account. 

 
The draft makes no mention of unique genetic populations that exist across the province, nor that BC is one of the last places on Earth where wolves can live as nature intended. This province has an opportunity to do something that very few other places on the planet have; to deliberately preserve wolves in their most natural form as part of a functioning ecosystem. The current draft does not support such a goal.

Hunting seasons would continue to range from 9 months to year round, with many areas having no bag limits, no mandatory reporting, and no harvest quotas. The draft plan states that hunting will continue to be based on ethics such as humane treatment, although the plan includes trapping with neck snares and leg hold traps which have been banned in other countries for their cruelty. 
 
Landowners with livestock concerns would continue to be permitted to hunt and trap wolves on their own property, although there is no evidence to show that indiscriminately killing wolves works as a long-term solution to reducing livestock losses; depredations occur in areas that have been practicing lethal control for decades. In fact, in certain parts of BC and North America, killing wolves indiscriminately may have lead to increased depredation rates on livestock the next year. 
 
One of the objectives listed in the plan is to "Control specific populations where wolves are preventing caribou recovery". This is really a continuation of the slaughter that began in 2001, sterilizing and killing wolves while development continues. To date the wolves that have been killed have provided no evidence of more caribou, but the government wants the killing and sterilization to continue. In the meantime, so will mineral exploration, snowmobiling, heli-skiing, and other activities that compromise sensitive caribou and many other species.

When wolves are being killed through hunting, trapping, livestock concerns, failing caribou herds, and on transportation routes across the majority of the province, many concerned groups consider this a destitute ecosystem as extended family members are butchered in a human-dominated landscape. It is the wolf pack that is the top predator, not the individual wolf. 
 
The number of wolves killed in BC has been increasing over the years. It is little wonder these numbers are rising as incentives are offered to people to kill wolves where bag limits have increased and "harvest" seasons lengthened.

There is no discussion of quality of life for wolves and of what it actually means to disrupt the social bond of a pack or extended family with trapping, hunting, poisoning, aerial killing and other means legally employed to kill wolves in B.C. The evolutionary impact of reduced genetic diversity in wolf populations that are forced to suffer such high levels of human caused mortality is also not discussed in this plan.

Wolves may remain as a species in BC for a long time due to their resilient nature, but most ecologists and conservationists would judge this as an impoverished ecosystem if wolves are not able to live out their lives in their most natural form; with family members. Management plans for wolves must consider more than mere numbers if there is any intention of true conservation.

The way this draft plan is structured, unless significant public opposition is mobilized in the coming weeks, the B.C. government will further relax and liberalize wolf hunting, trapping and other kill programs for years to come. Several concerned groups will be following this issue and speaking out for wolves as what is clearly shaping up to be a renewed government-sanctioned assault on B.C.'s wolves. These groups include: Pacific Wild, Valhalla Wilderness Society, Furbearers Defenders, the LifeForce Foundation, the Northern Lights Wolf Centre, World Temperate Rainforest Network, Peter A. Dettling Wilderness Education Centre, and likely more to come.

Our friend, Coyote Biologist Jon Way our of Massachusetts, recently penned an article for INTERNATIONAL WOLF magazine that seeks to explain why Coyotes do not seem to engender the same type of empathy by the general public that Wolves do

Love wolves, hate coyotes

 

Click below to read a new publication I wrote that just came out!
Way, J. G. 2012. Love wolves and hate coyotes? A conundrum for canid enthusiasts. International Wolf 22(4, winter): 8-11.

 This is a popular (not peer reviewed) article summarizing my (and others) feelings on why society treats wolves so much differently than coyotes.

Jonathan Way, Ph.D., has a B.S. (UMass Amherst), M.S. (UConn Storrs), and doctorate (Boston College) related to the study of eastern coyotes/coywolves. He is the author of Suburban Howls, an account of his experiences studying eastern coyotes in Massachusetts. Jon is seeking an institution that will support him and his goals for long-term ecological research. He runs an organization Eastern Coyote Research, works seasonally for Cape Cod National Seashore, is a part time post-doctoral researcher with the Yellowstone Ecological Research Center, frequently travels to the Yellowstone area, and is looking for a publisher for two completed book projects: My Yellowstone Experience and Coywolf.

        

Our very good friends at COUGAR REWILDING, Chris Spatz and John Laundre have penned an outstanding treatise on why a National Cougar Recovery Plan should be implemented by the US Fish & Wildlife Agency-----Read their most excellent and comprehensive rationale for why the Puma merits restroration back into our midwest and eastern woodlands(click on link below)

From: Christopher Spatz spatzcat61@gmail.com;

Date: Fri, 16 Nov 2012 07:57:29 -0500

To: Rick Meril<rick.meril@gmail.com

Subject: National Cougar Recovery Plan

 

Good morning, Rick. Should you choose to post our article, please use this link .

Thanks, Rick. Always thinking of your blog.

Thank you,

Chris

Writing in his 1859 book On the Origin of Species, which laid down the foundations of evolution as a science, Darwin reported, "There are two varieties of the wolf inhabiting the Catskill Mountains, in the United States, one with a light greyhound-like form, which pursues deer, and the other more bulky, with shorter legs, which more frequently attacks the shepherd's flocks."..........The debate continues as to whether the Eastern Wolf is a distinct species(same as the Red Wolf now relegated to the barrier islands in North Carolina) or is a subspecies of the Gray Wolf(a wolf/coyote hybrid)..............Very smart scientists come out on both sides of this equation with the US Fish & Wildlife folks beginning to side with the "distinct species" classification,,,,,,,This could lead to gray wolves being delisted in the Eastern USA,,,,,,,,,,,, In my opinion, this would be a bad thing unless this same Agency gave Endangered Species Protection to the Eastern Wolf .............I say this because under the endangered species classification, the USFW folks have a mandate to restore the endangered animal to regions of its former habitat deemed still suitable to support their existance...........There have been peer reviewed studies done that state that suitable gray wolf habitat exists in New England and NY State to support several thousand gray wolves..................If the USFW delists the gray wolf in the East, there is no chance for wolves being restored to this geographic region unless this same Agency designates Eastern Wolves as endangered..............A complex and urgent issue this is and near and dear to my heart as it is one of the initial reasons why I began this blog two years ago--We will continue to monitor this issue closely and provide you with updates as to what-happens-next for Wolves east of the Mississippi

Eastern wolves howl for recognition

Dan Vergano, USA TODAY

 

Eastern wolves, once thought a gray wolf subspecies, qualify as a distinct wolf species, say federal researchers reviewing two decades of genetic analyses.

Wolves in the upper Midwest may be mixtures of Gray wolves and Eastern wolves.(Photo: Scott Flaherty)

 

- Along with towering oaks, glittering rivers and tribes of Native Americans, the Europeans who first colonized North America met wolves. Wolves were an "apex" predator in colonial days, top of the ecological eat-or-be-eaten heap. They were also a little different from the wolves in Europe, noted naturalists, among them evolution's founder, Charles Darwin.

 

Writing in his 1859 book On the Origin of Species, which laid down the foundations of evolution as a science, Darwin reported, "There are two varieties of the wolf inhabiting the Catskill Mountains, in the United States, one with a light greyhound-like form, which pursues deer, and the other more bulky, with shorter legs, which more frequently attacks the shepherd's flocks."

 

Later that looked like one of Darwin's mistakes. In the decades afterward, while wolves were busily being exterminated almost entirely from the country by the descendants of those explorers, naturalists came to a different view: North America's wolves were just Europe's gray wolves all over, and the different types were just subspecies, instead of full-blown different species of wolves.

 

But thanks to genetics, Darwin's take on things is enjoying a revival, summed up in a recent survey of studies in the journal North American Fauna, a publication of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The implications may matter both for the future of wolves nationwide and for biologists looking at how species get their start, the subject Darwin first wrote about centuries ago.

 

While wolf experts agree that there is a gray wolf, or Canis lupus, and the red wolf, Canis rufus, now found in North Carolina, disagreements range over whether there are anywhere from eight to 27 subspecies of these wolves. "The lack of consensus among researchers on so many important issues related to the taxonomy (grouping) of North American wolves prompted the present review," begins the recent wolf report led by Fish and Wildlife Service biologist Steven Chambers.

 

Chambers and colleagues report the "most contentious" debate among researchers centers on the Eastern wolf, a slimmer, streamlined wolf that ranges in size from about 77 to 62 pounds, now found only in Canada. Is the Eastern wolf, Canis lupus lycaon (LY-can), a subspecies of the gray wolf, or is it simply Canis lycaon, a species of its own?

 

Weighing two decades of genetics studies, the review concludes that Eastern wolves are, indeed, a separate species. Most likely, the genetics indicate they sprang from a coyote-like ancestor several hundred thousand years ago, rather than directly from gray wolves.

 

"One thing that can be hard to understand is that different genetics researchers can disagree about what the genes mean," says DeLene Beeland, author of the upcoming book The Secret World of Red Wolves: The Fight to Save North America's Other Wolf. "With wolves, different researchers have looked at the same genes and disagreed about what they mean."

Ranges of gray wolves (a) historical range; (b) range at time of listing under the U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA 1973); (c) current range.(Photo: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.)

What makes assessing the status of Eastern wolves most difficult is that they mate with both gray wolves and with coyotes, Canis latrans. So, many of the wolves in the studies contain a mixture of genes from all three groups. Wolves in the Great Lakes, for example, look like a mixture of gray wolves and Eastern wolves, says the report.

 

"It is a debate, a real debate with real implications," says wolf researcher Paul Wilson of Canada's Trent University, who views Eastern wolves as a separate species. The fight isn't just about how many genes it takes to make a species distinct, but about what it means for separate new species of wolf to be declared. The issue comes amid a long-running political fight about "delisting" gray wolves as endangered in the American West and discussions of introducing wolves to Northeastern states.

 

Efforts to re-establish populations of red wolves in North Carolina and Mexican gray wolves in Arizona have led to contentious political fights. The authors of the review are careful to say their conclusions are not the official position of their agency, which delisted gray wolves in the Great Lakes as endangered in 2011.

 

People in Eastern states may have already gotten a taste of the reintroduction of Eastern wolves. Eastern wolves preferentially prey on white-tailed deer, unlike gray wolves, which are more wide-ranging in their tastes, and have one other notable difference with them: They mate with coyotes instead of preying on them. That may explain the appearance of hybrid "coy-wolves" preying on deer in Eastern states such as Connecticut in recent years. And it may explain how coyote genes are making their way into Western gray wolves. "Eastern wolves may act as a conduit for coyote genes making their way into gray wolves by mating with both of them," Wilson says.

 

From an evolutionary standpoint, it appears that gray wolves only invaded North America after Eastern wolves had split off from a coyote-like ancestor more than 150,000 years ago, White says. Ice Ages and an extinct species of North American wolves called Dire Wolves, as fearsome-looking as the name suggests, might have kept them out of the American West before then.

 

Darwin suggested that different landscapes and prey could lead to new species splitting off from one another over time in his 1859 book, pointing to wolves in the Catskills as an example. "As a scientist, I'd love to be in Darwin's company on the difference between these wolf species," White says.

Whether it be over females or food, male Grizzlies often duke it out to establish dominance and territory rights---outstanding pictures of two male bears in the Katmai National Park in Alaska battling over food below

Japanese photographer Shogo Asao captures two grizzly bears fighting in Alaska's Katmai National Park

theaustralian.com   

 

A pair of grizzlies had an extraordinary stand-up fight after one pinched the other's lunch. Picture: Asao/Photoshot/Solent Source: Supplied

A pair of grizzlies had an extraordinary stand-up fight after one pinched the other's lunch. The beasts' ferocious roars echoed through a forest during the tussle, sparked by one male trying to steal salmon a rival had caught from the river. Picture: Asao/Photoshot/Solent Source: Supplied   

  IT'S a fight that would even make Daniel Geale and Anthony Mundine take a backward step.

A photographer has captured the moment two 2.4m tall grizzly or brown bears went claw to claw after one tried to steal a salmon the other had caught for his lunch.
Shogo Asao  60, who found the bears brawling in Katmai National Park in Alaska, felt like a "dead man walking" as the enormous creatures roared and fought three metres away from him.

 

"Suddenly, I saw two bears watching each other and roaring," he told the Daily Mail newspaper.
"They quickly began fighting wildly, without noticing that I was very near to them. One ran away until it was just three metres in front of me, and the other chased it at full speed.
"They were roaring, beating, clawing and chasing each other."
The professional photographer from Tokyo, Japan, captured the showdown.
"This is the first time I had seen such an exciting scene," he said. "I was so close to the violent animals that I felt like a dead man walking."

Bear-knuckle bust-up

A pair of grizzlies had an extraordinary stand-up fight after one pinched the other's lunch. Picture: Asao/Photoshot/SolentSource: Supplied

 

The two grizzlies, thought to be around six years old, exchanged blows for a few minutes before moving into the trees and continuing to fight, then disappearing from view.
"Female bears usually hunt salmon at isolated places away from the waterfall," the photographer said.
"They have to take care of their babies and want to avoid fighting.