L. David Mech
Wesley E. Newton
Bridget Borg
Shannon M. Barber-Meyer
2016
<div class="clear contain articlemetadata">
<p class="description">Risk to predators hunting dangerous prey is an emerging area of research and could account for possible persistent differences in gray wolf (<i>Canis lupus</i>) pack sizes. We documented significant differences in long-term wolf-pack-size averages and variation in the Superior National Forest (SNF), Denali National Park and Preserve, Yellowstone National Park, and Yukon, Canada (p<0.01). The SNF differences could be related to the wolves’ risk when hunting primary prey, for those packs (N=3) hunting moose (<i>Alces americanus</i>) were significantly larger than those (N=10) hunting white-tailed deer (<i>Odocoileus virginianus</i>) (F1,8=16.50, p=0.004). Our data support the hypothesis that differential pack-size persistence may be perpetuated by differences in primary prey riskiness to wolves, and we highlight two important extensions of this idea: (1) the potential for wolves to provision and defend injured packmates from other wolves and (2) the importance of less-risky, buffer prey to pack-size persistence and year-to-year variation.</p>
</div>
<p class="articleAffiliations">Risk to predators hunting dangerous prey is an emerging area of research and could account for possible persistent differences in gray wolf (<i>Canis lupus</i>) pack sizes. We documented significant differences in long-term wolf-pack-size averages and variation in the Superior National Forest (SNF), Denali National Park and Preserve, Yellowstone National Park, and Yukon, Canada (p<0.01). The SNF differences could be related to the wolves’ risk when hunting primary prey, for those packs (N=3) hunting moose (<i>Alces americanus</i>) were significantly larger than those (N=10) hunting white-tailed deer (<i>Odocoileus virginianus</i>) (F1,8=16.50, p=0.004). Our data support the hypothesis that differential pack-size persistence may be perpetuated by differences in primary prey riskiness to wolves, and we highlight two important extensions of this idea: (1) the potential for wolves to provision and defend injured packmates from other wolves and (2) the importance of less-risky, buffer prey to pack-size persistence and year-to-year variation.</p>
application/pdf
10.1163/1568539X-00003391
en
E.J. Brill
Differential wolf-pack-size persistence and the role of risk when hunting dangerous prey
article