Wolves start trek earlier this year
By MIKE STARK
Gazette Wyoming Bureau
For the third time in three years, the Nez Perce wolf pack has vanished
from Yellowstone National Park.
The pack, which could have as many as 20 members, hasn’t been seen in
Yellowstone since mid-October. A few members have been spotted in recent
days — all in different places — but no one has seen the distinctive,
all-gray pack that usually lives between Old Faithful and Madison
Junction.
The pack’s disappearance has become almost expected with the onset of
winter, but this year’s departure seems to be happening earlier than
usual, according to Doug Smith, Yellowstone’s top wolf biologist.
“They’re moving around but, to be honest, I don’t know why. My best guess
is that they’re probably looking for food,” Smith said. “This is kind of
an annual walkabout.”
The pack left Yellowstone in November 2001 and resurfaced in eastern Idaho
near Afton, where they caused a local stir before returning to the park.
Last December, the pack left Yellowstone for six weeks, turned up at the
National Elk Refuge near Jackson, Wyo., and eventually wandered back home.
But Smith said he’s not sure whether the Nez Perce pack is coming back
this year.
One of the males from the pack, No. 72, has been spotted with a female
wolf near Green River, Wyo., Smith said. The male, one of nine pups born
in northern Montana and brought to Yellowstone in 1996, may be the pack’s
alpha male.
“I think he’s gone for good,” Smith said.
Meanwhile, other members of the pack appear to have splintered off,
including one spotted recently near Henrys Lake, west of Yellowstone, and
two more near Old Faithful. Those sightings could indicate that the pack
has broken up.
“It remains to be seen if they’re going to get back together,” Smith said.
“Their pattern is [they wander off and] they get together in Yellowstone.
I’m not sure that’s going to happen again this time.”
The departure of the Nez Perce pack has become a peculiar trait for one of
the park’s largest packs. Unlike Yellowstone’s northern range, where
competition can be fierce among wolf packs, the western portion of the
park has relatively few packs.
The Nez Perce pack has to contend only with the Cougar Creek pack, which
tends to roam just east of West Yellowstone, Mont., and a pack near
Bechler on the southwest corner of the park. Both are smaller than the Nez
Perce pack and aren’t likely to get into a skirmish.
“If the Nez Perce ran into them, they’d have superior numbers, which is
important in wolf warfare,” Smith said. “So I doubt they’re getting pushed
around by those other groups.”
More probable, he said, is that the pack is leaving its home territory
looking for food. The fall is probably the most difficult season for
wolves to be hunting elk because many of the fawns and calves are strong
and fast, and they don’t have to worry about getting stuck in deep snow.
“Right now is the worst time of year to be a wolf,” Smith said. “If
they’re going to be food-stressed, this is the time.”
With elk more difficult to catch, the main alternative in that area
becomes bison, which also can be a chore to take down. So, Smith figures,
the Nez Perce pack may tend to wander off this time of year in hopes of
finding other food elsewhere.
“They’re a bigger pack and part of the problem is that bigger packs have
greater food needs,” he said.
Wolf biologists have been looking for the pack daily but have come up
empty. If the pack is still traveling together, the wolves should be easy
to spot. As one of only two packs in the Yellowstone ecosystem in which
every member is gray, the Nez Perce wolves are a distinctive sight
wherever they go, Smith said.
If the pack is seen somewhere outside Yellowstone, wildlife officials will
simply monitor its location and progress but won’t take any measures to
move the animals unless they’re causing trouble.
For now, biologists would just like to know where the wandering wolves
will turn up.
“I’ll follow every lead we get,” Smith said.