Soda Butte Pack renamed.
It will be the Yellowstone Delta
Pack
January 4, 2001
The long-standing Soda Butte Pack has been officially renamed. It will now be the Yellowstone Delta Pack to reflect the territory it has most frequented since it was relocated there in 1996.
Wolf pack names are not changed frequently, especially when a pack shows continuity, which the Soda Butte Pack has done. However, none of the original 1995 members of the pack, including the pup from that year, 24F, are with the pack. Furthermore, the pack has not been near its release point, Soda Butte, since about April 1995. As most folks know, the Soda Butte area has been the core of the Druid Peak Pack's territory since 1996.
In April 1995, the Soda Butte Pack moved northward, out of Yellowstone, and whelped one pup deep in the Beartooth Mountains. Later it moved to the Beartooth Front and ranged from near Nye to Red Lodge, Montana. After whelping 3 pups on private land on the Front in 1996, the pack was captured and moved to Trail Creek, far to the south near where the Yellowstone River runs into Yellowstone Lake (the Yellowstone Delta). From there the pack moved to Heart Lake where they spent 2 rigorous winters in the deep snow preying on the small elk herd that winters at Heart Lake Geyser Basin. The alpha female, no. 14F, whelped her 3 rd litter there in 1997 inside an extinct hot spring cavern; but her mate no. 13M "Old Blue" had died of old age, and the litter of 1997 was to be 14's last litter. She never found another mate.
Meanwhile, the Thorofare Pack formed in the Yellowstone Delta area, but early in 1998 the Soda Butte Pack entered the Delta and surprised the alpha male of the Thorofare Pack tearing him to pieces even though he was the biggest wolf in Yellowstone at the time. His mate and one pup were then soon killed in an avalanche near Eagle Pass. They might have been trying to escape the area. The remaining 4 Thorofare pups survived the winter by migrating out. Two of these pups later joined with the former alpha male of the Nez Perce Pack to form the Gros Ventre Pack which lives just to the east of Jackson, Wyoming.
The Soda Butte Pack has remained the sole wolf pack in the southern half of Yellowstone Park ever since, with its range generally from Heart lake on the west to the east shore of Yellowstone Lake on the east and the headwaters of the Yellowstone River on the south.
In 1999 the pack did leave its snowy fortress and spent a winter month on the National Elk Refuge at Jackson. Mysteriously they left this land of plenty and went back to their deep snow home range.
In 1999 the sole pup from 1995, no. 24F, now 4 years old, left the pack to join with a wandering member of the old Washakie Pack to form the Teton Pack. Early in 2000, the long time alpha female, no. 14F, was found dead near a dead moose and it was feared the pack might disintegrate, but instead it was reborn. Another female in the pack had 7 pups, and new adult wolves joining the pack. The two of the three pups born on the Beartooth Front in 1997 are apparently still with the pack. It is not clear which wolf is the new alpha male, but it is believed 126F is the alpha female. She is from 14F's last litter of 1997.
Email addresses for members of Congress, other officials, and the media
Return To Maughan Wolf Report Page
Copyright © 2001 Ralph Maughan
Not to be reprinted, archived, redistributed, etc., without permission.
Ralph Maughan PO Box 8264, Pocatello, ID 83209