Well, it finally happened. After being a model wolf mother all summer, and having road-kill provided for her, the nearly toothless Teton pack female, no. 24F, struggling to feed her five pups, has inadvertently tasted her first beef. Park officials says she was seen feeding on a cow calf that had died of natural causes An Associated Press report says she was probably attracted to the carcass by a group of coyotes that were scavenging the dead calf.
This does not jeopardize her. She didn't kill the calf, but she has tasted beef now, and there is always the danger that she will add beef to her list of things to eat; and the cows are omnipresent in the area each summer even though it is a national park.
Her litter is the first wolf pups known to have been born in Jackson Hole in over a half century.
Update on 9-23. The latest Jackson Hole News has additional information about the Teton Pack. The pack has been receiving about 3 carcasses a week of road-killed deer, elk, moose, or antelope. The carcass of one road-killed bison was also provided this summer.
The hunting season outside Grand Teton National Park is underway, and the the remains of elk are becoming available -- the viscera (gut piles). Officials are now "tapering off" the supplemental feeding and they will end it when the annual elk hunt inside Grand Teton National Park begins Oct. 16.
Unfortunately, while no. 24F certainly knows how to hunt, she is not very capable anymore without her teeth or the Soda Butte Pack, or the help of her healthy but late, mate, no. 133M, who was hit on U.S. 26 on June 21, 1999.
The pups have not learned to hunt because of the supplemental feeding. What this pack needs is for a healthy single male wolf to appear to make the pack complete again. Undoubtedly there are some lone wolves in the general area, but a meeting is just my speculation. Such an event probably saved the Rose Creek Pack back in 1995 after Chad McKittrick had killed the alpha male, and no. 9F and her eight pups had been raised all summer in the Rose Creek enclosure. Wolf 8M wandered by and discovered the penned pack and remained until they were released.
The cows will soon be gone from the vicinity of the Teton Pack, but the fact that no. 24F now knows that cows are food too, foretells problems down the line, probably next summer. For now the availability of elk will increase rapidly with the hunt and the elks' annual migration to the National Elk Refuge, although the Teton Pack will probably face competition with the Gros Ventre Pack and maybe her old Soda Butte Pack as these other two packs will probably winter again on, or near, the Elk Refuge.
Update 10-3-99. The cattle are gone now and the Elk Ranch Reservoir area is open to the public. Wolf 24F and her pups are wandering and hopefully killing wild animals. I inspected the area on 10-2. The cattle overgrazed the area, leaving little for wintering elk on the land they grazed, although adjacent meadows hold plenty of grass, sagebrush and willows.. I learned the politico/economic facts of the situation, and I am preparing an article. I find the injustice of the situation appalling, and I am not talking about the wolves. Stay tuned . . .
Email addresses for members of Congress, the media, and other officials.
Return To Maughan Wolf Report Page
Copyright ©1999 Ralph Maughan
Not to be reprinted, archived, redistributed, etc., without permission.
Ralph Maughan PO Box 8264, Pocatello, ID 83209