McIntyre’s obsession with wolves has resulted in a fascinating book that shares his observations of the Yellowstone Wolf Project. He worked for the National Park Service for many years, spending winters in Big Bend National Park (Texas) and Yellowstone Park (Wyoming/Montana) during the rest of the year. Officially, his job was to educate the public about wolves in Yellowstone. He went way beyond this and spent almost every waking hour outside of his work, going out and observing the wolves at dawn and dusk. He has over 100,000 observations of wolves with over 12,000 pages of notes in his journals. From June 2000 to August 2015, he went out for 6,175 consecutive days! 15 years of daily trips in search of wolves! The Rise of Wolf 8 describes the activities of the wolf packs of Yellowstone. His stories track the development from 31 wolves being introduced from Canada in 1995 until the early 2000s. I kept thinking about my dog Obi and how I can still see glimpses of his genetic ancestry of wolves.
Yellowstone now has a stable population of around 100 wolves. The park is huge; half the size of Massachusetts, but there is only enough prey for 10-12 good-quality wolf territories. In the Western Upper Peninsula of Michigan, where I am from, there are over 400 wolves. My neighbor spotted one trotting down the alley behind my house in my village of Caspian. There is much more prey with white-tailed deer ubiquitous throughout the area. I have only seen a wolf one time. In the late 1980s, I was riding home with my parents from cutting the lawn. My dad and my brothers cut lawns, fixed docks, and tidied up brush when we were in college during the summer. A wolf was walking down a forest service road in northern Iron County and came right past us.
Facts About Wolves
- Wolves are most active during the twilight hours, just before and after dusk and dawn.
- Wolves form long-term pair bonds, something only 3-5% of the 5,000 mammal species in the world do.
- Adult wolves love playing with wolf pups and protect them. This can be seen today with dogs and children.
- Wolf youngsters lick the face of other wolves to beg for food. Wolves regurgitate meat for their young.
- The average rate of wolf pup survival was 73% from 1995 to 2017.
- Wolves can recognize individual from their howls.
- Wolves reach sexual maturity at around 22 months.
- The average life span of a Yellowstone Wolf is between 5 and 6 years.
- The wolves generate $35.5 million annually from tourists.
- Wolves can sniff the air for scents of infections, disease, and injuries while hunting.
- They are successful only around 5% of the time when approaching prey.
- I was also amazed that they can bring down adult elk and juvenile bison.
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