JACKSON, Wyo. — In the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem (GYE), the adaptability of wolves faces increasing pressures from human influences. Yellowstone National Park’s (YNP) Bechler Meadows provides a lens into understanding the relationships between pack survival, resilience and challenges in today’s modern landscape.
Bechler Meadows sits in the remote southwest corner of YNP and appears to be less-than-ideal habitat for canines. According to Wolf Biologist Aaron Bott, the area is one that receives eight times more annual precipitation and significantly more snowfall than Lamar Valley. The area also has a small number of elk and no bison. However, Bott writes in the 2022 Yellowstone Wolf Project Annual Report that four wolves were spotted in Bechler Meadows in 2002, including a collared white male wolf 192M initially from the Rose Creek pack in the north end of the Park.
From 2002, the Bechler pack persisted for two decades despite 192M’s death in 2009. Until a multi-year study began in 2019, the only information on them came from trail cameras and flyovers. Their 20-year legacy ended in pack dissolution; according to the 2022 Annual Report, it’s typical for an average of one pack to dissolve and one pack to form per year in YNP. And Bott confirms to Buckrail that a new group of wolves has been inhabiting the Bechler Meadows region again.
“Biologists are currently monitoring how the new pack uses the landscape,” Bott says. “Wolf behavior is largely influenced by their environment and humans. Due to their adaptability, wolves can tenaciously survive in almost any habitat as long as they have access to a protein-rich diet. However, to truly thrive, they require large and biodiverse landscapes with elk, deer or other wild prey.”
According to Bott, Bechler Meadows does offer a unique advantage to a limited wolf pack. The isolation and effort required to secure food reduces competition with other wolf packs that fight in more abundant areas of the Park for territory and resources. Bott tells Buckrail that interpack aggression is a “major cause of wolf mortality” within YNP, but Bechler Meadows provides a refuge of sorts for smaller packs to stay away from their canine competition.
Bechler Meadows also provides what Bott calls “modest refuge” from the high risk of human-caused wolf mortality outside YNP, in addition to increased regional recreation that impacts the natural system throughout most of the Park. But Bott notes that human impact is slowly introducing more limitations on those secluded spaces.
“Even in the wildness of the GYE, signs of civilization are only a stone’s throw away.”
Aaron Bott
“Even in the wildness of the GYE, signs of civilization are only a stone’s throw away,” Bott says.
Bott says these influences have important direct and indirect impacts on the social structure and behavior of remaining YNP packs that biologists are still trying to understand. He also highlights that human alteration of wildlife habitat disrupts wolves’ relationships with other species in the ecological system.
Bott’s work with these large carnivores contributes to broader efforts for practical coexistence in the GYE, where he advocates for increased awareness of cultural beliefs and emotions that get projected onto the scientific understanding of wolves as a necessary species.
“By better understanding these animals’ challenges, we can work towards resolving an increasingly complex human-wildlife interface,” Bott tells Buckrail. “Successful coexistence requires developing a shared vision rather than a struggle for agenda superiority. This approach entails acknowledging challenges and promoting creative solutions and compromises.”
Bott shares that once, after telling a rancher that “there’s no one silver bullet that will solve everything,” she told him there was: “our attitude.”
