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Range and Habitat: Current range is Northern United States, Alaska, and Canada with the Mexican gray wolf subspecies in Arizona and New Mexico. They have successfully adapted to every habitat available to them, from arctic tundra to southern desert. They can survive any climate or terrain where sufficient food is available. Range in Minnesota is the Northern forests, although in recent years they have been moving as far south as Lake Mille Lacs.
Habitat and Distribution: The wolf pack is one of nature’s most sophisticated social orders, as well as one of the most intensively studied throughout the world. A pack is usually a family group of 5 – 8, consisting of a dominant pair of breeding adults (alpha pair) and their young of 1 or 2 years. Some packs also contain older related animals. It has a complex social hierarchy maintained through a variety of vocalizations, body postures, and scent marking. Wolves have keen senses of sight, hearing, and smell and can travel at approximately 5 miles per hour for long periods of time while hunting or traveling within their territory. A wolf pack may spend 8 – 10 hours a day on the move and cover about 30 miles a day during winter hunts. A wolf can attain a tip speed of about 30 miles per hour.
Diet: Wolves evolved as a predator of large hoofed mammals, with a tightly organized social structure, which enables them to work cooperatively to bring down preys much larger than themselves. They are opportunistic and will usually kill what is easiest to catch such as the weak, sick, injured, old and very young. Wolves will also scavenge carrion, and will take healthy, strong animals when possible. Living in a “feast or famine” world, wolves often go several days without successfully making a kill, but can gorge themselves and consume over 20 lbs. when the hunt has been successful. Diet consists of a variety of large and small animals, including beaver and moose. In Minnesota white-tailed deer make up about 80% of their diet. Zoo diet: Mazuri exotic canine dry and beef knuckle bones.
Breeding and Maturation: The pack’s social structure generally determines which wolves will breed, usually only the “alpha” pair, and produce a single litter of pups. However when prey is abundant, a wolf pack will occasionally have multiple litters born that spring. The breeding season is usually late January through early March, with a litter of 2-6 pups born 63 days later in a den located in a rock crevice or a hold dug by the parents. They are born deaf and blind, but can hear within a few days. After 4-6 weeks, the pups usually leave the den and begin to investigate their surroundings. As the pups mature, the pack will move to a more open area or “rendezvous” site within their territory. By fall pups are large enough to hunt with the pack. Wolves generally reach adult size by 10 months of age, live 8 – 10 years in the wild and 10-14 years in captivity.
Miscellaneous: Man is the wolf’s major predator, but bears and pumas may prey on wolves in the wild. Wolves will also prey on each other, especially in territorial disputes. Pups are preyed on by eagles, lynx and bears.
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