Wolves in the Land of Salmon by David Moskowitz

Author:David Moskowitz
Language: eng
Format: mobi, azw3, epub
Tags: Science, Wolves, Ecology
Publisher: Timber Press
Published: 2013-04-15T04:00:00+00:00

Clearcuts, while providing excellent browse for deer and elk shortly after being cut, show a significant decline in carrying capacity for hoofed mammals for decades as the young forest canopy closes. Roads created to access timber allow for more human access and in turn a higher rate of wolf mortality. Western Cascades, Washington.

Wolves, such as this one in northwestern Montana, often use lightly traveled roads as efficient travel routes despite the increased likelihood of human encounters.

The howl of a wolf and many images that wolves conjure in people evoke deep wilderness and a spirit of wildness. Interestingly enough, though, the apparent association of wolves with wild, rugged, roadless country has little to do with their preferences for such landscapes and more to do with persecution by humans. What we see as either a noble or evil association between wolves and wild or primeval landscapes is actually a reflection of our own species’ ability to shape the behavior of wildlife. Certainly a wolf running along the forested ridgelines of the North Cascades, stopping to howl in the moonlight, creates a more archetypal image of wildness than that of an animal slinking into town to make away with scraps of bones from behind the local butcher shop. Yet both of these images reflect the habitat and behavior of wolves here in the Pacific Northwest.

In parts of British Columbia wolves actually select landscapes with roads and associated logged forests as these modifications increase moose populations. Furthermore, in places where humans show benign or positive behavior toward wolves—such as in national parks or in cultures generally accepting toward wolves, as in parts of Europe where wolf populations have been expanding—wolves carry out their lives in close association with humans. In Yellowstone, wolves hunt, travel, socialize, and raise their young literally before the eyes of thousands of interested humans.

The impacts of roads on wildlife distribution and ecological functioning of landscapes has evolved into its own branch of ecology—road ecology. Large highways, such as the Trans-Canada Highway and U.S. interstates 90 and 84 in our region, have been demonstrated to significantly limit or alter the movement and dispersal patterns of numerous large carnivores. Roads, through motor vehicle collisions, are also a source of direct mortality for wolves and other wildlife. While both of these impacts of roads are important for wolf habitat and distribution in the Northwest, more compelling is the association between roads and other sources of human-caused wolf mortality such as hunting, trapping, and poisoning.

Lightly traveled roads are often used by wolves for travel and hunting despite the increased likelihood of encounters with people. Similarly, human use of landscapes changes and generally increases with the addition of roads, further increasing the likelihood of interactions between the two species. Numerous studies have clearly identified that wolf mortality increases with proximity to roads. On the British Columbia coast, where most human traffic is by boat, shoreline acts similarly to roads in this regard.

During my own fieldwork I have found roads to be some of the best places to detect wolves.

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