In Praise of Wolves

by R. D. Lawrence

  Symptoms of this sickness include sudden onset, loss of appetite, listlessness, and bloody diarrhea caused by congestion and bleeding of the mucous linings of the intestines. Postmortems also reveal that bone marrow cells are destroyed and the lungs and liver are congested.

  Distemper, a worldwide disease of dogs, cats, raccoons, and other animals, does affect wolves and coyotes and kills the majority of pups that become infected. But, here again, it seems that this virus-borne disease is not an important factor in the mortality of wild coyote and wolf populations, probably because in a free-living state they do not come into regular contact with other infected animals. In captivity, however, distemper can become a serious disease of wolves and coyotes, usually because such captives are housed in rural-urban areas where also live concentrations of domestic dogs, for the virus can travel by air and can in this way infect animals some distance from a carrier. Physical contact with nasal discharges and saliva from infected animals also transmits the disease.

  Roundworms of the class Nematoda are extremely common parasites of animals and man. This group contains more than twelve thousand different species, the majority of which, fortunately, are harmless. Among those that do parasitize animals, there are some that are quite nasty. Probably the best known are the dog and cat roundworms, Toxocara canis and Toxocaro leonina, and although treatment is simple and effective, these parasites, some of which can be four inches long, are present in such numbers that it is practically certain that every coyote, wolf, dog, and cat will be affected by them at least once during its lifetime. Left untreated, they can seriously affect young domestic animals and it is not uncommon for puppies to be infected at birth if their mother had worms, for the organism can be transmitted to the unborn via the maternal blood. Wolves and coyotes in a free state are hosts to these organisms, which appear to have little effect on the animals, although their presence may indirectly contribute to a wolf’s death if it is also burdened by other parasites or is suffering from malnutrition.

  A little-known but quite common stomach worm, Physaloptera rara, has developed a clever way of getting inside the stomachs of wolves, dogs, cats, raccoons, and practically any other animal that enjoys eating things like crickets, grasshoppers, cockroaches, flour beetles, and ground beetles, all of which act as intermediate hosts to this nematode. When an animal eats an infected insect, it gets the worms, which then adhere to the mucous linings of the stomach and cause inflammations at each site. Affected animals produce dark, slimy diarrhea that contains some blood. Treatment is readily available, however.

  Wolves and domestic dogs are also infected by the giant kidney worm, a creature that may reach a length of thirty-nine inches and causes marked weight loss, frequent urination, trembling, anaemia, and bloating. Fortunately, this worm rarely attacks both kidneys, because if untreated it would completely destroy the affected organ.

  One of the most serious nematodal infections is produced by the dog heartworm, Dirofilaria imitis, which enters the right side of the heart and pulmonary arteries, affects the lungs and tissues, and causes fluids to pass into the stomach. Without treatment, death is inevitable, but because of its complicated life cycle, this worm is difficult to treat. Dr. Pence considers that prevention is definitely better than cure where this organism is concerned. Even so, preventive treatments must be administered to dogs, or to captive wolves and coyotes, throughout the mosquito season, for this blood-sucking insect is the intermediate host of Dirofilaria. A mosquito bites an infected animal, then bites a non-infected individual and passes on the condition, much in the same way that mosquitoes transmit malaria and encephalitis. Heartworm, essentially a southern-dwelling nematode, has in recent years invaded the northern United States and southern Canada, a circumstance occasioned by the increase of travel, particularly at holiday seasons (when there are hordes of mosquitoes present), by individuals who take their dogs with them. When such dogs are infected, they become instrumental in propagating the worms via mosquitoes. Humans can also be affected, although to date only one individual was found to have the worms actually inside the heart; all others suffered from invasion of their tissues. George Wilson’s wolf Homer died of heartworm in Michigan. After a postmortem a photograph was taken of the wolf’s heart, which had been opened to show a great cluster of spaghetti-like worms bulging out of the right chamber.

  *Unpublished manuscript, courtesy of the Fish and Wildlife Library, Ministry of Natural Resources, Toronto, Ontario.

  The oldest, easiest to swallow idea was that the earth was man’s

  personal property, a combination of garden, zoo, bank vault,

  and energy source, placed at our disposal to be consumed,

  ornamented, or pulled apart as we wished.

  Lewis Thomas, The Lives of a Cell

  5

  Brigit was still being harassed in mid-April of 1984, although by now Denali’s aggressiveness appeared to have mellowed somewhat, an impression I formed after watching the Alpha female’s behaviour as well as that of her mother, who, even though she continued to signal submission, was nevertheless more active and open in her movements than she had been during February.

  Watching the pack while caressing Chico on the morning after Sharon and I had once again arrived for a visit to the U.P., I detected considerable differences in the behaviour of all the wolves; on this occasion they ran out of the forested portion of their enclosure as soon as my car entered the Wuepper yard. Brigit, coming alone from the northern part of the compound, rushed up to the fence and stood tight against it, watching the car as I slowed and turned into a parking place opposite Chico’s kennel. Shawana, on the other hand, kept some distance from the wire, evidently interested in my arrival, but remaining on a knoll from which he had an unobstructed view of me. Denali was also watching me intently, but from farther back and partly screened by trees, while Thor, although he stood in the open, seemed to be far more interested in Denali than in my presence.

  Remembering that it had been necessary to call to the wolves during our February visit, I was pleased that they had recognized the sound of my car and had evidently linked me with the vehicle, just as Chico had done; but whereas the big, shaggy dog had been pleasurably excited by my arrival and had demonstrated his recognition of automobile and human in the way he wagged both his tail and the rearmost part of his body, his mouth stretched into an enormous smile, the attention of the wolves seemed to be divided between interest in my visit and some other influence that was beyond my ability to detect.

  As before, I had come alone with an enormous package of chicken parts, including a large breast for Chico, who engulfed the offering and proceeded to crunch it up with more speed than efficiency while wagging his tail and pressing his body against my leg so as to allow me to continue caressing him while he was busy eating. When the dog had swallowed his meal, he licked his lips, paws, and the still-snowy ground; then he solicited more caresses. As I stroked his head, I continued to watch the wolves, noticing at this time that Shawano seemed torn between trotting up to the fence and running back toward Denali, who remained in the same place and was still staring at me. Intrigued by the big wolf’s behaviour, I lingered beside Chico for some minutes, watching as Shawano ran back to Denali, turned, and immediately trotted back toward the fence. He did this eight times while I remained beside the dog.

  Judging that it was time to approach the wolves, I left Chico, opened the car trunk, and emptied the meat into my carrying bag, again putting the strap around my neck and allowing the bulky haversack to hang against my chest. I began to walk toward the fence. Brigit redoubled her attempts to get my attention; Shawano moved closer to the fence, but stopped about fifteen feet from it, there to look alternately at me and at Denali. Thor also remained where I had first seen him. His interest was still fixed on Denali, who continued to look at me, her stance elegant, head up, ears forward, feet well planted on the ground, the image incarnate of a very dominant wolf.

 
Before I was halfway to the fence, the behaviour of the wolves told me that they had picked up the scent of the raw meat I carried and had probably done so the moment I opened the trunk of my car. Nevertheless, when I reached the wire, only Brigit was there to take food from my fingers. Shawano, who had been quite ready to take chicken pieces from my hand in February, would not do so now. Yet his behaviour told me that he was hungry and that he expected me to toss food to him. For some moments I resisted the wolf’s will, feeding Brigit instead. She, of course, was delighted to be the only one near me; she gorged, eating piece after piece of meat until her stomach began to bulge. Seeing this, I gave in to Shawano’s silent pleas and tossed a chicken breast high over the wire. Brigit ran for it when it landed midway between the Alpha male and the fence, but Shawano, uttering a low growl, dashed forward and grabbed it. Now he turned, loped to his former place, and there ate the meat, ignoring Denali’s soft whines and Thor’s drooling stares.

  Twice more I fed Shawano, and on each occasion he took the chicken and ate it. Now Denali showed signs of agitation. She was obviously hungry, but refused to approach any closer, and since her location was at least one hundred feet from where I stood, it was difficult for me to throw a piece of chicken high enough so it would ‘clear the nine-foot-high fence and still have enough power to span the distance. But selecting a leg, I tried, heaving as hard as I could. The meat landed some thirty feet short of Denali. Shawano, Brigit, Thor, and Denali had all watched the offering’s trajectory, four lifted heads that swung in unison with the flying chicken. When the leg landed, Shawano dashed up to it, went to pick it up, then dropped it as Thor started loping toward Denali.

  The big Alpha ran at his subordinate, who immediately retreated. Shawano went up to Denali; she licked him, whining. Meanwhile, Brigit, opportunistic as ever, had scuttled forward, grabbed the chicken, and returned swiftly to the fence, staying close to me as she, ate. While she was thus engaged, I threw a second piece of meat, trying to get it closer to Denali, but failing again. This time, however, the Alpha female dashed forward, grabbed the food, and ran back to her place. Thor stayed where he was, probably because Shawano now stood between the Beta and Denali. It was at this point that I recognized the influence I had earlier sensed, but had been unable to identify.

  Even though Denali was pregnant and due to give birth within the next two weeks, Thor was very much captivated by her. Shawano, of course, was well aware of his son’s interest and he was quite obviously determined to keep Thor away from Denali. This was why he dared not come up to the fence – he was afraid to do so in case the Beta should sneak in while the Alpha was eating. That part of Shawano’s behaviour I could readily understand, but what seemed little short of extraordinary was the fact that the Alpha male did not rush upon his subordinate so as to punish him severely.

  Observing more closely, I eventually realized that Denali, far from resenting her son’s quite open advances, appeared to be enjoying them. It seemed to me that the she-wolf was actually flirting with both males, that she knew perfectly well that she was occupying centre stage and that she was going to continue in that position for as long as she could! When Shawano dashed up to place himself between Thor and Denali, the she-wolf whined at her mate, showed discreet submission, and licked his mouth when he got within her reach. Conversely, when Shawano left, lured to his knoll in the hope of securing more chicken, Denali’s stance altered and she again showed herself to advantage, meanwhile casting glances at Thor that I can only describe as flirtatious.

  Having reached these conclusions, I began to understand why Shawano refrained from attacking Thor. I had witnessed similar behaviour in wild wolves, but on all those occasions, the Alpha male had unhesitatingly attacked a rival, often helped by the Alpha female. If I was reading the present situation correctly, Denali’s obvious enjoyment of the attention she was receiving suggested to Shawano that she would not back him up if he attacked Thor. Furthermore, she might even take Thor’s part, in which case the Alpha male would be deposed as swiftly and effectively as Brigit, his onetime mate, had been. Was this yet another love triangle in the making?

  Thor has inherited qualities from both his parents and is a magnificent wolf, a calm and self-assured individual who, at the time, was already fully mature and almost as large as his father. Though he was four years younger than Shawano, who was then seven, Thor’s size, youth and determination might well allow him to defeat the larger and more experienced wolf. As I watched the interplay between father, mother, and son, I thought back to the many times I had seen similar behaviour demonstrated by wild wolves.

  As with Jim’s wolves, a pack in the wild begins with a breeding pair that may have grown up together and, as young adults, left the family of their own accord, perhaps because they had become pair-bonded and were prevented from breeding by their Alphas, or for any one of a variety of other reasons. More usually, however, the future progenitors of a pack are loners who have left their units voluntarily or have been chased away. Inherently social, such animals need the companionship of their own kind and will often team up upon meeting. If a lone male and a lone female come together in this way, they will breed at the proper season and form a family, although two males or two females may also become a team.

  In any event, the original breeding pair constitutes a pack of two and, obviously, each wolf automatically attains Alpha rank, as was the case with Shawano and Brigit. Later, when pups are born and grow to adulthood, the expanded pack develops the age- old, complex hierarchical rituals from which a “pecking order” emerges. As a rule, the parent wolves retain their Alpha status and the strongest and most determined of their male and female off- spring become the Betas. In Thor’s case, however, he inherited his rank in the absence of other sibling males, although he exhibits qualities that would probably have allowed him to gain that position in any event, just as Denali became the Alpha female of the pack in competition with her mother and sister.

  From the foregoing it becomes clear that Alpha rank, although it is automatically assumed by a single pair, must at some point be relinquished to a fitter challenger, or when age, injury, or illness weakens a dominant wolf. Occasionally, as in Brigit’s case, a wolf becomes Alpha because of the absence of other individuals who are better able to exert leadership: it is then only a matter of time until a dominant animal, like Denali, emerges and takes over.

  In the wild state, when an Alpha is forced to step down, he or she may remain within the pack and occupy a low-ranking position; or such a wolf may be chased away or may leave voluntarily to become a loner. In captivity, however, a demoted wolf has no choice but to remain as part of the pack and can be killed if its presence continues to present a challenge to its successor. If the defeated wolf happens to be a female, the real or assumed challenge she may present to her successor surfaces with the onset of the breeding season, reaching its peak during the height of the estrous cycle and thereafter slowly diminishing, disappearing altogether a week or ten days before the pups are born. But if the demoted animal happens to be a male, his presence may present a continuous threat to the new leader’s authority.

  What I had witnessed that morning indicated that Thor was aspiring to the male leadership of the pack. Under such circumstances, a fight between him and Shawano was sure to develop. Who would win? What would happen to the loser? Only time could answer these questions. Meanwhile, all I could do was to warn Jim, so that he could keep an eye on the situation during that evening, for even if I elected to stay with the pack for the rest of the day, there would be little that I could do to break up a fight if one should develop, since I was a relative stranger to the wolves and had no authority over them. Indeed, it would be foolhardy for me to seek to intervene.

  When I got back to Marquette, I telephoned Jim at his studio and alerted him to the possible developments, but I continued to worry about the wolves and I spent a restless night, waking several times to realize that I had been dreaming about a figh
t between Shawano and Thor.

  Next morning, I hurried through breakfast with Sharon and George, keeping my own counsel but doing my best to join in the general conversation. Afterwards, dashing to the supermarket for a supply of chicken parts, I was aware that my anxiety had communicated itself to my wife, who guessed the cause of my worry even though I had not spoken about it to her. As she explained later, she had overheard part of my telephone conversation with Jim and had realized from my behaviour that I was seriously disturbed by events in Ishpeming. As a result, she too had spent a restless night.

  As I neared Jim’s property at about ten o’clock that morning, I suddenly realized that I was suffering from considerable anxiety, a negative state that would be instantly detected by the wolves and might well precipitate aggressive behaviour. This wouldn’t do! Drawing the car off the road, I parked and got out, then I began to pace up and down on the edge of the highway, willing myself back into a tranquil state and refusing to allow imagination to disrupt my newly acquired equanimity. When I felt I was emotionally ready to proceed, I got back into the car and made myself drive slowly the rest of the way, about two miles, reminding my- self that Jim had telephoned me early that morning to tell me that all had appeared to be well with the pack before he left for his studio.