Arctic Wolf Research Paper
Biology AB – Animal Behaviour
Tihomir Svilanovic 9F
Artic Wolf
The Arctic Wolf (canis lupus arctos) is a subspecies of the broader Gray Wolf family (canis lupus), and inhabits the Canadian Arctic, as well as the northern coast of Greenland, roughly upwards of 70 ͦNorth latitude. The arctic wolf’s primary biomes are the arctic & alpine tundra, the taiga, and the alpine biome. Contrary to popular belief regarding its harsh habitat and the much-publicized climate change, the endangerment status of the arctic wolf is listed as “Least Concern” by the IUCN and WWF, and, in fact, it is exactly due to their unforgiving environment that the arctic wolf is one of the only subspecies of wolf that is unthreatened, as it leaves them relatively …show more content…
Although we were unable to attend the feeding of the wolves, there were still a few pieces of untouched meat lying on the ground. In light of the wolves’ inactivity and obvious weakness for heat, we took this as a sign that the wolves’ usually sizable appetite was affected and overridden by their weakness to the heat; that they were too hot to eat. Their inability to handle high temperatures was quite apparent from the very start, as they were quite often sticking their tongues out and breathing heavily while walking/lying on the ground; something dogs often do when they get hot in the summer in order to cool themselves. Regarding their enclosure, we found out from a zookeeper that the terrain in it was not quite ideal. The wolves had plenty of logs and pieces of wood scattered about them so that it would resemble a forest and to make it more interesting for them to range the enclosure, but the terrain itself was actually too steep, as the enclosure was built into the side of the “hill” in the Schönbrunn Zoo. This means that the wolves are actually unable to make use of the logs to jump over when they are active in order to emulate their behaviour in nature, and amuse themselves, and, in effect, it reduced their area, as some parts were too steep to walk over, and made the bottom half very unappealing to them (especially as most of it was walled off by the small observer’s hut, in effect disabling them from looking outside their enclosure from half of the bottom part). When the wolves did come down to the fence, they did not appear to be fazed or unnerved by the observers, and, indeed, they did not show any signs of being affected by a relatively large
Tihomir Svilanovic 9F
Artic Wolf
The Arctic Wolf (canis lupus arctos) is a subspecies of the broader Gray Wolf family (canis lupus), and inhabits the Canadian Arctic, as well as the northern coast of Greenland, roughly upwards of 70 ͦNorth latitude. The arctic wolf’s primary biomes are the arctic & alpine tundra, the taiga, and the alpine biome. Contrary to popular belief regarding its harsh habitat and the much-publicized climate change, the endangerment status of the arctic wolf is listed as “Least Concern” by the IUCN and WWF, and, in fact, it is exactly due to their unforgiving environment that the arctic wolf is one of the only subspecies of wolf that is unthreatened, as it leaves them relatively …show more content…
Although we were unable to attend the feeding of the wolves, there were still a few pieces of untouched meat lying on the ground. In light of the wolves’ inactivity and obvious weakness for heat, we took this as a sign that the wolves’ usually sizable appetite was affected and overridden by their weakness to the heat; that they were too hot to eat. Their inability to handle high temperatures was quite apparent from the very start, as they were quite often sticking their tongues out and breathing heavily while walking/lying on the ground; something dogs often do when they get hot in the summer in order to cool themselves. Regarding their enclosure, we found out from a zookeeper that the terrain in it was not quite ideal. The wolves had plenty of logs and pieces of wood scattered about them so that it would resemble a forest and to make it more interesting for them to range the enclosure, but the terrain itself was actually too steep, as the enclosure was built into the side of the “hill” in the Schönbrunn Zoo. This means that the wolves are actually unable to make use of the logs to jump over when they are active in order to emulate their behaviour in nature, and amuse themselves, and, in effect, it reduced their area, as some parts were too steep to walk over, and made the bottom half very unappealing to them (especially as most of it was walled off by the small observer’s hut, in effect disabling them from looking outside their enclosure from half of the bottom part). When the wolves did come down to the fence, they did not appear to be fazed or unnerved by the observers, and, indeed, they did not show any signs of being affected by a relatively large