L. David Mech

'A fine, comprehensive survey of the ecology and habits of the wolf - his food, habitat, hunting, mating, social behavior and much more. Written in non-technical language, the book sets down just about everything that we know about this beautiful and - propaganda aside - shy animal, who, authorities agree, has never in this country attacked a man.' - The New York Times Book Review

The Ecology and Behavior of an Endangered Species

The Wolf

Greg Breining

Discovering the Secrets of a Mythic Animal

Wolf Island

The world’s leading wolf expert describes the first years of a major study that transformed our understanding of one of nature’s most iconic creatures In the late 1940s, a small pack of wolves crossed the ice of Lake Superior to the island wilderness of Isle Royale, creating a perfect “laboratory” for a long-term study of predators and prey. As the wolves hunted and killed the island’s moose, a young graduate student named Dave Mech began research that would unlock the mystery of one of nature’s most revered (and reviled) animals—and eventually became an internationally renowned and respected wolf expert. This is the story of those early years. Wolf Island recounts three extraordinary summers and winters Mech spent on the isolated outpost of Isle Royale National Park, tracking and observing wolves and moose on foot and by airplane—and upending the common misperception of wolves as destructive killers of insatiable appetite. Mech sets the scene with one of his most thrilling encounters: witnessing an aerial view of a spectacular hunt, then venturing by snowshoe (against the pilot’s warning) to photograph the pack of hungry wolves at their kill. Wolf Island owes as much to the spirit of adventure as to the impetus of scientific curiosity. Written with science and outdoor writer Greg Breining, who recorded hours of interviews with Mech and had access to his journals and field notes from those years, the book captures the immediacy of scientific fieldwork in all its triumphs and frustrations. It takes us back to the beginning of a classic environmental study that continues today, spanning nearly sixty years—research and experiences that would transform one of the most despised creatures on Earth into an icon of wilderness and ecological health.

Richard A. Hook

William Laughlin Robinson

Thomas F. Weise

You will love An Experimental Translocation of the Eastern Timber Wolf and its exciting, fascinating, and endlessly informative backgrounds on the Eastern Timber Wolf. Hook writes detailed and mesmerizing passages about this lovely creature that still roams the Great Lakes today.

An Experimental Translocation of the Eastern Timber Wolf

Comprehensive study of the wolf's habits, behavior, and relationship with other animals and the environment

Patrick D. Karns

Role of the Wolf in a Deer Decline in the Superior National Forest

Explains to a general audience the behavior of the wolf in its habitat with information on social hierarchy, communication, feeding, courtship, and reproduction

The Way of the Wolf

For more than nine years the wolves in Alaska's Denali National Park were the subject of intense research by a group of renowned scientists led by L. David Mech. The result of their work is the most comprehensive study of a population of wolves and their prey ever available. This accessible, fascinating, and extensively illustrated book will appeal to researchers, general readers, and wolf enthusiasts across the world.

The Wolves of Denali

United States. National Park Service

This field study took place in Isle Royale National Park, Canada began in June 1958. There, Meech met Donald E. Murray of Mountain Iron, Minnesota, who served as one of the aircraft pilots for the project. During the 3-year project, the team achieved great things in the aerial observation of wolves and their hunting with a grant from the National Science Foundation.

The Wolves of Isle Royale

Written with a general audience in mind, The Way of the Wolf focuses on wolf behavior and biology, offering an overview of the animals' social hierarchy, communication methods, feeding habits, courtship, and reproduction. A new understanding of the world's most misunderstood and maligned animal. 75 full-color photographs.

Daniel R. MacNulty

Douglas W. Smith

The interactions between apex predators and their prey are some of the most awesome and meaningful in nature—displays of strength, endurance, and a deep coevolutionary history. And there is perhaps no apex predator more impressive and important in its hunting—or more infamous, more misjudged—than the wolf. Because of wolves’ habitat, speed, and general success at evading humans, researchers have faced great obstacles in studying their natural hunting behaviors. The first book to focus explicitly on wolf hunting of wild prey, Wolves on the Hunt seeks to fill these gaps in our knowledge and understanding. Combining behavioral data, thousands of hours of original field observations, research in the literature, a wealth of illustrations, and—in the e-book edition and online—video segments from cinematographer Robert K. Landis, the authors create a compelling and complex picture of these hunters. The wolf is indeed an adept killer, able to take down prey much larger than itself. While adapted to hunt primarily hoofed animals, a wolf—or especially a pack of wolves—can kill individuals of just about any species. But even as wolves help drive the underlying rhythms of the ecosystems they inhabit, their evolutionary prowess comes at a cost: wolves spend one-third of their time hunting—the most time consuming of all wolf activities—and success at the hunt only comes through traveling long distances, persisting in the face of regular failure, detecting and taking advantage of deficiencies in the physical condition of individual prey, and through ceaseless trial and error, all while risking injury or death. By describing and analyzing the behaviors wolves use to hunt and kill various wild prey—including deer, moose, caribou, elk, Dall sheep, mountain goats, bison, musk oxen, arctic hares, beavers, and others—Wolves on the Hunt provides a revelatory portrait of one of nature’s greatest hunters.

The Behavior of Wolves Hunting Wild Prey

Wolves on the Hunt

Throughout the continents of Eurasia and North American primitive man evolved in association with wolves. Wolves competed with him as a hunter, and raided his flocks and herds. Inevitably, folklore became rich in tales of this powerful, resourceful creature. Europeans reached North American with their attitudes already formed. The wilderness pressed in upon their tiny settlements in constant threat and all energies were devoted to destroying it and turning its inexhaustible resources to use. Over vast areas of the continent the wolf went down with the wilderness before the unprecedented effectiveness of our technological attack on the ecology of a continent. Today, however, there is a great tide of concern over the consequences of our assault on the wild lands and wild creatures on the continent, and more and more biologists are devoting their knowledge and energy to searching studies of our land and its native biota. The wolf has been the subject of detailed study by a number of ecologists on this continent who make use of all the research devices now available. Much of our knowledge is very recent, is increasing rapidly, and has resulted from the work of a mere handful of keen, resourceful, and courageous students of wolf biology. This, the first book to attempt a complete account of the biology of the wolf, draws from years of field research and upon the rich literature from two continents. --From the foreword by Ian McTaggert Cowan

Wolf

The Wolves of Minnesota

Louis Daniel Frenzel

Ecological Studies of the Timber Wolf in Northeastern Minnesota

Luigi Boitani

Wolves are some of the world's most charismatic and controversial animals, capturing the imaginations of their friends and foes alike. Highly intelligent and adaptable, they hunt and play together in close-knit packs, sometimes roaming over hundreds of square miles in search of food. Once teetering on the brink of extinction across much of the United States and Europe, wolves have made a tremendous comeback in recent years, thanks to legal protection, changing human attitudes, and efforts to reintroduce them to suitable habitats in North America. As wolf populations have rebounded, scientific studies of them have also flourished. But there hasn't been a systematic, comprehensive overview of wolf biology since 1970. In Wolves, many of the world's leading wolf experts provide state-of-the-art coverage of just about everything you could want to know about these fascinating creatures. Individual chapters cover wolf social ecology, behavior, communication, feeding habits and hunting techniques, population dynamics, physiology and pathology, molecular genetics, evolution and taxonomy, interactions with nonhuman animals such as bears and coyotes, reintroduction, interactions with humans, and conservation and recovery efforts. The book discusses both gray and red wolves in detail and includes information about wolves around the world, from the United States and Canada to Italy, Romania, Saudi Arabia, Israel, India, and Mongolia. Wolves is also extensively illustrated with black and white photos, line drawings, maps, and fifty color plates. Unrivalled in scope and comprehensiveness, Wolves will become the definitive resource on these extraordinary animals for scientists and amateurs alike. “An excellent compilation of current knowledge, with contributions from all the main players in wolf research. . . . It is designed for a wide readership, and certainly the language and style will appeal to both scientists and lucophiles alike. . . . This is an excellent summary of current knowledge and will remain the standard reference work for a long time to come.”—Stephen Harris, New Scientist “This is the place to find almost any fact you want about wolves.”—Stephen Mills, BBC Wildlife Magazine

Behavior, Ecology, and Conservation

Wolves

The interactions between apex predators and their prey are among the most impressively choreographed in naturegreat whites chasing seals, lions hunting antelope, and wolves outmaneuvering deer. Each of these interactions demonstrates physical strength and endurance, and a deep coevolutionary history. Wolves are often thought of as killing machines (especially among ranchers). In a general sense, like great whites, they are. The wolf has evolved to kill prey much larger than itself, a wolf, or especially a pack of wolves, can kill just about anything it wants. But this lifestyle comes at a cost--wolves spend a third of their time hunting. And their successes and failures help drive the functioning of the ecosystems they imhabit. "Wolves on the Hunt "is the first book to focus explicitly on wolf hunting. It contains a compelling mix of analyses of behavioral data, original field observations, and introductory texts that cover the major wolf interactions with their prey. Organized around the species the wolves hunt-- deer, elk, moose, caribou, dall sheep, bison, muskoxen, arctic hare, among othersit is a revelatory exploration of the life and evolution of one of nature s most revered great hunters."

Conducted over nine years in Alaska's Denali National Park, presents the results of the most comprehensive study of wolves and their prey ever availabile.

L. David Mech

About

Books

Join the club