Reintroduction of wolves in Yellowstone

Wolves are carnivorous mammals which belong to the dog family and are quite similar to dogs in many ways. Nevertheless, they are bigger than dogs because their legs are longer than those of a dog. Wolves can survive in hostile climate zones. For example, they can survive winter seasons, which are composed of total darkness. A large number of wolves are in Yellowstone National Park, which is one of the famous national parks proven in 1872. It is partially positioned in Wyoming and spreads into Montana and Idaho. It is a tourist destination for its natural features like geysers and boiling mud pots across the park. In the 1800s, the westward extension led settlers and their livestock to be in direct contact with innate predator and prey varieties (VanSomeren, 2016). This interaction led to the destruction of wolves’ prey grounds as Agriculture succeeded. After destroying their prey base, wolves began to attack domestic animals, which resulted in their elimination by individuals living in the park. Other predators which were killed together with wolves were bears, coyotes, and cougars. The killing of these predators was made to protect the livestock.

After the establishment of the Yellowstone Park in 1872, the gray wolf was dominantly present. The coordination between the park managers and human being activities gave rise to the extermination of wolves. These killings of wolves in the park were observed at higher rates between 1914 and 1926, whereby wolf packs were gone entirely. In 1926, the park management declared that wolves were nonexistent, and the need to reinstall them commenced by the National Park Service and the US Forest Service under the initiative known as an environmental impact statement (EIS). Their inexistence affected the ecological system because the few bears and coyotes could not terminate elk (Staff, 2017). It also resulted in the rapid multiplication of the elk population, thus upsetting the ecosystem by consuming the young and aspen trees. The destruction of these trees further resulted in the exit of other animals like birds, beavers, and fish that were habituating at beaver ponds.

The Capture and Restoration of the Wolves

The reintroduction of wolves successfully began in early 1995 when a long white truck entered Roosevelt Arch. The car had eight wolves inside, collected from Jasper National Park in Alberta, Canada. These were the first batch to be seen in Yellowstone Park after almost seventy years of their destruction by the hunters. More wolves were later reintroduced to the pack by late 1996. Although most people were for the idea of wolf reintroduction, it was nervous for the ranchers surrounding the park because they feared that they would escape the enclosure and feast on their livestock (Yellowstone, 2017). The scientists backed up the idea of wolves to be reinitiated in the park, for they knew wolves would positively affect the Yellowstone ecosystem. For instance, controlling the elk population, which had increased in the absence of wolves and inflicted devastation on the range.

As people changed their attitudes towards the wild ecosystems, they began to ask whether it was fit for Yellowstone Park to be wolf-less. Since the wolf population was diminishing globally, the Endangered Species Act was formed to protect the decline from destruction by man (VanSomeren, 2016). A group of US Fish and Wildlife Service and Canadian wildlife scientists began the process, and to start with, they captured wolves in Canada. They brought them to Yellowstone Park and central Idaho. Their first pack comprised of fourteen wolves and they were confined temporarily in Yellowstone Park. As discussed earlier, 8 of the 14 wolves were brought into the park on January 12, and the other batch of 6 was delivered on the 19th of January 1995. Each pack is comprised of wolves from different species. In the second year of restoration, eleven more wolves were brought to Yellowstone Park on January 23, 1996. Shortly, another four wolves joined the pack, and their size ranged from 72 to 132 pounds and approximately nine months to 5 years old.

All wolves were radio-collared since they were from Canada. In their temporary location, they experienced limited human contact and were fed with elk, moose, deer, or bison, which were remnants of the park. Law enforcement rangers regulated the number of times wolves would come into contact with humans (Staff, 2017). Their confinement locations and environment were out of binding for visitation and were labelled to inhibit illegal entry. They were checked regularly by the biologist to determine their welfare. The examinations were done by visual surveillance as they put food in the confined zones. Some individuals showed concern about these animals being habituated to humans while still in their confinement pens. Nevertheless, wolves usually dislike human encounters.

The Impact of Wolves Restoration in Yellowstone Park

Wolf restoration would have a more significant impact on the biodiversity of the Greater Yellowstone Ecology. Wolves primarily depend on elks whose remains provide food to higher types of animals more so the hunting species. In later winter, they feast on bison. It is so surprising that bears facilitate the wolf kill nearly at will which is contrary to expectation and observation from other regions where the two species exist. These skills, in turn, provide resources for bears when there is a low food supply (VanSomeren, 2016). Due to hostility between wolves and coyotes, initially, it was observed that the number of coyotes was decreasing in the wolf grounds. Reducing coyotes promoted other minor predators, such as rodents and birds of prey. Thus, the coexistence between the wolves and other species led to the restoration of the ecosystem in Yellowstone Park.

The presence of wolves in Yellowstone Park has led to complications in the growth of the elk population, whereby the rate of elk calves surviving to adulthood has decreased, as well as the constant survival of the adult elk. These constraints mostly affected the habitation of the elk family, that is, how and where to habitat (Staff, 2017). These impacts were foreseeable but analyzed on simple structures of one to 2 hunter and target species. There are four big predators in Yellowstone Park, and sometimes they prey on elk and humans too hunt elk in the outdoor of the park. Therefore, the contacts of the wolves with their favorite prey and other ungulates have built a new level of complication thus making it difficult to project long-term inhabitation changes. Not only elk was affected by the reintroduction of wolves into Yellowstone Park, but also beavers. Before the restoration of the wolves, there was one colony of beaver in the park. Recent reports suggest that nine beaver colonies are habituating the park, and it is most likely that more settlements of beavers will multiply in the near future. The bird species and fish which had left after the consumption of aspen trees have resumed to the park.

In conclusion, it is evident that after the Rangers killed all the wolves in Yellowstone Park, its ecosystem was significantly affected. The growth of elk was notable, and in turn, the elk population consumed some aspen trees. With the restoration of the wolves in Yellowstone Park, the ecosystem was reinstated to its normal state. There was mutual existence between the predators and prey. Thus, the restoration was significant to the life of Yellowstone Park.

References

Staff. (2017). 1995 Reintroduction of Wolves in Yellowstone. Retrieved from My Yellowstone park.com: https://www.yellowstonepark.com/park/yellowstone-wolves-reintroduction

VanSomeren, L. (2016). Did Yellowstone wolves really save the park’s ecosystem? Retrieved from UNTAMEDSCIENCE: http://www.untamedscience.com/biology/ecology/ecology-articles/wolf-reintroduction-yellowstone/

Yellowstone. (2017). Wolf Restoration. Retrieved from National Park Services: https://www.nps.gov/yell/learn/nature/wolf-restoration.htm