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MI: Isle Royale planning to consider wolves, island dynamics

JOHN PEPIN – Journal Staff Writer, The Mining Journal

HOUGHTON – Officials at Isle Royale National Park plan to address the island’s dwindling wolf population within a broader context, using a comprehensive planning process expected to get under way this fall.

In the meantime, park officials do not plan to bring wolves in from outside the park.

Park Superintendent Phyllis Green said the park’s planning process will consider management of wolves, moose and vegetation.

In this 2006 file photo, a pack of gray wolves is shown on Isle Royale National Park in northern Michigan. On Wednesday, Isle Royale Superintendent Phyllis Green announced that authorities have rejected, for now, a proposal to introduce new wolves to the federally protected wilderness as a way to revive the wolf population. (AP file photo)

The park consists of one large island surrounded by more than 450 smaller islands and encompasses a total area of 850 square miles, including submerged land that extends 4.5 miles out into Lake Superior.

Isle Royale wolves have been in decline for more than a decade. Park officials said the current wolf population consists of a single breeding pack, raising concerns the wolves may continue to suffer from low genetic diversity and could die out.

“The plight of these nine wolves is a compelling story, but we are charged with a larger stewardship picture that considers all factors, including prey species, habitat and climate change, which could, in a few generations, alter the food base that supports wildlife as we know it on Isle Royale,” Green said in a news release.

The park will develop a management plan addressing the many complex factors that affect persistence of Isle Royale wolves and their role in the island ecosystem, including relationships with moose – which is their preferred prey – the condition of island vegetation and the effects of ongoing climate change.

“Many people are waiting for us to bring new wolves to Isle Royale or to announce that we’re leaving their future gene pool up to wolves that may migrate from the north shore of Lake Superior when winters are cold enough for an ice bridge to the island,” Green said. “This issue is bigger than only wolf genetics.”

As park staff develops the new management plan and environmental analysis, they will continue to monitor the remaining wolves on the island. Scoping for the project is expected to begin this fall.

Overall, animal populations on islands are generally small with fewer species than on the surrounding mainland. Consequently, Isle Royale’s biodiversity is generally lower because the islands’ isolation has restricted migration of organisms from outside populations. Nineteen species of mammals inhabit the park, far fewer than what exists within mainland environments.

Though park officials won’t bring wolves to Isle Royale in the near future, Green said there is time to fully explore the consequences of such an action. If the island population of wolves declines to all males or all females and if the moose population grows to over-browse island vegetation, bringing wolves to the island remains an option, she said.

For the past two years, park managers have discussed island and wolf management with wildlife managers and geneticists from across the U.S. and Canada and have received input during public meetings and from Native American tribes of the area.

“Our decision on a way forward is supported by our review of the best available science, law and policy,” Green said.

In the early 1980s, the Isle Royale wolf population reached 50. Then a parvovirus outbreak cut the number to a dozen. In March 2013, there were two small packs on the island, with two pups born last spring.

The decline of genetic diversity in the wolves has been documented in a long-term ecosystem study of the predator-prey relationship between wolves and moose on Isle Royale. The study has been ongoing for 56 years.

Green said the park will continue to collaborate with Michigan Tech University scientists who conduct the study and has also initiated a project with the U.S. Geological Survey to model the impacts moose have on park vegetation.

Park officials said Isle Royale lies in a transition zone between northern hardwoods and boreal forests and some climate models predict the park’s landscape will change from cold-adapted boreal species to warm-adapted species.

“We need to monitor the island and share information about the changing ecosystem to ensure this remains a dynamic wilderness setting and that park visitors will have a wilderness experience for generations to come,” Green said.

Green said severe weather events, including the development of winter ice bridges that enable passage to the island for mainland wolves, are linked to the changing climate.

Park officials said there is still a chance of nature replenishing the gene pool as wolves are able to move to and from the island via the bridges. An ice bridge formed this winter, but park personnel and researchers don’t know if any wolves migrated to the island.

Park officials said there were no wolves on Isle Royale when it was established as a national park in 1940. The first wolves likely arrived about 65 years ago by walking over 18 miles of Lake Superior ice that connects the island to an area near the Minnesota-Ontario border.

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