- Do you know what the wolf's main food sources are? You'll find out in this chapter.
The wolf's diet consists of muscle, meat, and fatty tissue from various animals. The main sources of food in the wolves diet are caribou, musk oxen, maybe buffalo, flightless ducks like the Ptarmigan (in the James Bay Region of Canada), snowshoe hares (on Ellesmere Island), and rabbits. Wolves also fish for wade-herding salmon, Arctic grayling, or whitefish. Wolves do not digest vegetables very well, they might eat vegetables sometimes, but the wolves don't digest them very well.
It is commonly recorded that wolves may eat up to one-fifth of their body weight at a time. Wolves often go without food for three to four days, then gorge, eating as much as eighteen pounds in one sitting. A Russian record reports a wolf going without any food for seventeen days. Wolves can get "meat drunken" from too much meat. Wolves bury extra food and go back to it when the food is scarce.
The wolf is a highly intelligent and courageous hunter. Wolves hunt in groups and live in groups these groups are called packs. In regions where pray is small, packs may consist of seven wolves or less.
- Did you know that the wolf is believed to be an ancestor of the domestic dog?
Wolves have superb hearing and can read tracks well. Wolves cup their ears forward to hear better and to give signals to other wolves. In one sniff a wolf can tell if you are male or female, adult or child, if you are hunting or not, and even if you are happy or sad.
Wolves belong to the dog family as do the coyote and the jackals. The wolf resembles a sheep dog, but their heads and muzzles are broader and their tails are shorter and bushier.
Environment and Shelter
- Where do the Arctic wolves live? Read this chapter to find out!
Arctic wolves live in the Arctic, on the tundra, a place with not a lot of plant life. Wolves will desert their den if discovered by man kind. Wolves' can live in a lot of different habitats, ranging from the Arctic tundra to the forests and prairie, if suitable pray is present.
Adaptation
A wolf in winter is snow-white, in fact some wolves stay snow-white all
year round. Wolves fur changes so that they can adapt to the snow and
blend in with their environment.
- Did you know that wolves are not fast runners?
Wolves don't migrate south with the caribou, but wolves may follow a migrating heard for a long time hoping to get a single member.
Wolves usually travel in packs and frequently establish territories ranging from 40 to 400 square miles (100 to 1,000 square kilometers). They define their ranges with scent markings and vocalizations such as growls, barks, and their legendary howl.
Life Cycle, Mating and Reproduction
- Did you know that it's believed that wolves mate for life?
The nucleus of a wolf pack is the breading pair. An average litter is six pups. After the pups are trained to hunt and kill, they may choose to leave the pack or remain as helpers themselves. The pups are born in spring, and by Fall all the pups are ready to start hunting with their parents. The female gives birth to four to seven pups, which are cared for by their parents and other pack members, known as helpers. Only one male and one female in each pack will mate a year.
Return to Bank Street
©2000
The Wild Ones
c/o Wildlife Trust
61 Route 9W, Palisades, NY 10964-8000
Tel: 845.365.8337 Fax: 845.365.8177
