Return of the Gray Wolf
...y structure. Also, the way wolves learn, communicate and amuse themselves shows the complexity of animal capabilities. The combination of strength, intelligence and coordinated pack behavior has made wolves very successful. Found in Europe, Asia and North America, the wolf was the most widespread land animal next to humans. The largest type of the animal ranges from 80 to 120 pounds. Human respect for the wolf was lost once the competition for meat was evident. As the human race became dependent on livestock, wolves were loathed for their need of this meat. Gray wolves originally ranged coast to coast across North America. They numbered in the hundreds of thousands and came in a variety of subspecies; the eastern timber wolf, the midland wolf, and the Mexican wolf. However Europeans settled the new land and for many years government agencies paid cash bounties and federal hunters killed off many. By 1960 there were only a handful of wolves alive, they took refugee in Mexico’s Sierra Madre. Finally the bounty ended in 1965 and the wolf population began to increase. Wolves are tough, built to breed quickly and explore widely. Minnesota now supports more than 2,000 wolves and the population is still expanding into Wisconsin and Michigan. In 1996 the FWS officials transplanted 31 Canadian wolves into Yellowstone National Park. 35 more were released into central Idaho’s Frank Church- River of no return wilderness. The federal wildlife service will define the western population as recovered as soon as then breeding packs are established and when 10 packs establish themselves in the Montana region. The Federal wildlife Service met their goal by 1997, putting the recovery ahead of schedule and under budget. The success of the reintroduction of timber wolves in the west has prompted scientists and wildlife experts to consider reintroducing the timber wolf into New York State’s Adirondack Park. Not everyone shared the wildlife advocate’s opinion about reintroducing timber wolves back into the environment. Hunters thought that their ...