Bad at Goodbyes

Rough Transcript

Intro 00:05

Welcome to Bad at Goodbyes.

On today’s show we consider the Red Wolf.

Species Information 02:05

The Red Wolf is a critically endangered mammal native to southeastern North America, specifically the coast of North Carolina.

The Red Wolf is a medium-sized canid with a slender build, measuring roughly 5 feet in length and averaging roughly 60lbs. They stand roughly 2 feet tall, measured at the shoulder.

They have a long, narrow muzzle and a wide head with large, pointed ears. Their legs are long and slender, with large paws, four toes on each hind paws. Four toes on the front paws plus a dewclaw, which is a vestigial toe located slightly above the paw, that aids in traction and gripping prey. It has a digitigrade stance, meaning it walks on its toes, an adaptation that contributes to highly-agile movement.

The coat of a Red Wolf is a mix of colors, primarily brown, beige, and grayish black, with a red tinge often highlighting the ears, head, and legs. This coloration helps the wolf blend into its habitat. The fur is medium-length, providing insulation and protection from the elements. In winter, the reddish hues become more prominent.

They have a medium-size black nose, and their sense of smell is exceptional, allowing them to detect prey over long distances, identify pack members, and interpret scent markings left by other wolves.

Red Wolves typically have yellow or amber-colored eyes. Their vision, while not as specialized as their sense of smell, is well-adapted for both daytime and nighttime hunting. They possess good low-light vision and a wide field of view, enabling them to detect movement in potential prey.

They have large ears, in relation to their head size, and their hearing is acute, capable of picking up faint sounds from prey or other wolves.

Red Wolves are highly social animals, living in packs that typically consist of a breeding pair and their offspring from multiple generations. Within the pack, there is a defined hierarchy, with the breeding pair holding the dominant position, leading the pack in hunting, defending territory, and raising young. The social dynamics of Red Wolf packs are complex. Cooperation and coordination are essential and individual wolves take on different roles throughout their lifespan. 

Communication within the pack includes a range of vocalizations, body postures, and scent marking. Howling serves as a long-distance communication tool, used for territorial displays, rallying pack members, and maintaining social bonds. Other vocalizations include barks, whimpers, and growls, each conveying information about the wolf’s emotional state or intentions.

Red Wolf also rely on nonverbal communication, like nuzzling and licking each other’s faces as a sign of affection and greeting. This is particularly common between breeding pairs and between parents and pups.

Similar to domestic dogs, Red Wolf will wag their tail to express happiness and excitement.

And though subtle, Red Wolf also communicate through facial expressions such as ear position, twitching their noses, baring teeth, and narrowing eyes.

Play behavior has been observed in both young and adults, which is thought to reinforce social bonds, establish hierarchy and to help young wolf practice important skills.

Red Wolves are monogamous, forming strong pair bonds that often last a lifetime. Courtship behaviors involve play, grooming, and scent marking. Mating and birthing typically occurs once a year, mating between January and March, with a gestation period of about two months, so birthing in April or May.

Den are carefully selected by the breeding pair, often in secluded areas like hollow logs, burrows, or dense vegetation, providing a safe haven for new pups, protection from predators and the elements. The female gives birth to a litter of 3 to 6 pups, although larger litters of up to 12 have been recorded. Newborn pups are blind and deaf, relying on their parents for nourishment.

Both parents play an active role in raising the pups, with the male often bringing food back to the den while the female nurses and cares for the young. Packs are alloparental, meaning other packmembers, usually older siblings from previous litters, also contribute to pup rearing, providing protection, grooming, and play. As pups grow, they begin to explore their surroundings and learn essential skills like hunting and social interaction from the adults.

Red Wolves reach sexual maturity around 1-2 years old, but they continue to develop physically and socially for several years. In this extended period of development they learn essential skills for survival, like hunting strategy, and complex communication and social interaction.

On average, in the wild, Red Wolf live about 8 years. 

Red Wolves are opportunistic carnivores, meaning their diet adapts to the available prey in their environment. Their primary food source is white-tailed deer. They also consume smaller mammals like rabbits, rodents, and raccoons. They are adaptable feeders, and their diet will vary seasonally depending on the availability of prey. They may also scavenge carrion or consume fruits and berries when other food sources are scarce.

Red Wolves employ a combination of stealth, speed, and endurance to capture prey. They often hunt at dawn and dusk, taking advantage of low light conditions to stalk their prey undetected. Working cooperatively as a pack, they can successfully hunt larger animals like the white-tailed deer, which a lone wolf would be unable to subdue. Once a kill is made, the wolves will consume the most nutritious parts first, such as the organs and muscle tissue. The Red Wolf occupies a top position in its food chain.

Historically, the Red Wolf’s native habitat once encompassed a vast area of the southeastern United States, stretching from Texas to Pennsylvania. Today they are restricted to roughly 250 square miles on the North Carolina coast, within the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge, roughly 150 miles east of Raleigh.

This is the Mid-Atlantic Coastal Plain bioregion, a landscape characterized by low-lying terrain and abundant waterways including brackish marshes, hardwood swamps, evergreen shrub bogs, and pocosin wetlands. Pocosins, unique to the southeastern US coast, are shrub-covered wetlands perched atop sandy rises, forming a “swamp-on-a-hill.”

It’s a humid subtropical climate, with four distinct seasons, with hot summers and relatively mild winters. Summer highs reach the 90s °F, winter lows dip to just around freezing. The area receives 55 inches of annual rainfall resulting in lush greenery.

The Red Wolf shares this habitat with Barred Owl, fetterbush, scarab beetles, Black Bear, swamp lily, Common Yellowthroat, White-tailed Deer, bald cypress trees, Water Moccasin, Green Heron, American Goldfinch, River Otter, Resurrection Fern, Iris, Bald Eagle, Opossum, Swallowtail Butterfly, Rose Pogonia, Prairie Warbler, Eastern Box Turtle, Monarch Butterfly, Brown-headed Nuthatch, Wax Myrtle, Raccoon, Carnivorous Pitcher Plants, Great Egret, Eastern Cottontail Rabbit, American Alligator, Spanish Moss, Yellow Fringed Orchid, Fireflies, Marbled Salamander, and many many more.

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In the dream, there are no guns, in the dream there are no men with guns, that is all, that is the whole dream. A narrow dirt trail, through thick green woods, trod by generations of the pack. The long lingering scent of family.

And no smell of man, or of gunsmoke. That’s all, a forest path and no men with guns, in the dream.

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The historic decline of the Red Wolf population stems from multiple overlapping anthropogenic activities, anthropogenic, simply means human-caused. 

Human encroachment is a major factor in the loss and degradation of their habitat. Extensive land clearing, throughout the Southeastern US, for agriculture, logging, and development has drastically reduced the forests and wetlands of the Red Wolf’s native environment.

From the late 18th through the early 20th century, private and government-sponsored predator control programs resulted in the widespread killing of Red Wolf. Wolves are often perceived as a threat to livestock and game animals, leading to their sanctioned slaughter via trapping and individual and organized hunts with firearms.

Relatedly, the overhunting of white-tailed deer, for food and sport, the Red Wolf’s primary prey, has also contributed to their decline.

Today, Human-induced climate change poses an imminent threat. Their current habitat rests just 3 feet above sea level and federal climate scientists forecast 2-7 foot sea level rise in this area of the North Carolina coast by the end of this century.

But currently the leading cause of death and population decline amongst wild Red Wolves are vehicle strikes and gunshots. Negligent human drivers running them over with their cars and trunks. And cowardly small minded human landowners with easy access to underregulated firearms illegally shooting them.

The Red Wolf was first listed as “threatened with extinction” under the Endangered Species Preservation Act in 1967. With the passage of the Endangered Species Act of 1973, the Red Wolf’s status was elevated to “endangered,” granting it even stronger legal protection.

At that time, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service initiated a captive breeding program. Over 400 canids were captured from the remaining wild population. But only 14 were deemed pure Red Wolf and formed the foundation of the captive breeding program. Despite these efforts, the Red Wolf was declared extinct in the wild by 1980.

But in 1987, the Fish and Wildlife Service reintroduced a small group of captive-bred Red Wolf to the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge. The animals began to establish territories, form packs, and successfully reproduce in their native habitat. This is a substantive conservation accomplishment, the Red Wolf was rewilded.

Throughout the 1990s, the Red Wolf population at Alligator River Refuge steadily grew and by the mid-2010s, the Red Wolf population had reached an estimated 120 individuals. 

In the last decade though, the wild population of Red Wolf has been in decline, due to, as mentioned before, poaching and vehicle strikes. To address these issues, the Fish and Wildlife Service has intensified law enforcement efforts, installed wildlife crossing signs and fencing to reduce road mortality, and increased public outreach and education programs.

The Fish and Wildlife Service continues to maintain the captive breeding program, systematically studying, tracking and reintroducing Red Wolf into the wild. I would like to share with you a few highlights from the Fish and Wildlife Service’s June 2024 Red Wolf Recovery Program Update. I found this report oddly moving, so I compiled five entries and will read them to you now, pretty much verbatim.

I should note that the Red Wolf wild population is all tagged by numbers, so the following numbers refer to specific individual wolves.

• In January 2024, four of the wild Red Wolf pups (2499M, 2500M, 2502F and 2503F) born into the Milltail family group on Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge in Spring 2023 were captured, fitted with orange collars with orange reflective material, and re-released. 
• In February 2024, a wild female Red Wolf (2359F) was captured by private trappers and handed over to Red Wolf Recovery Program biologists. To try and create a new breeding pair, she was placed in an acclimation pen in Pocosin Lakes National Wildlife Refuge with a male (2443M) born in at the Endangered Wolf Center as part of the Red Wolf Captive Program. They did not have a litter, so 2359F was released in June 2024. For now, 2443M will remain in the pen and future attempts will be made to pair him with a wild female and release them if successful.
• On February 25, 2024, an adult wild female Red Wolf (2538F) was captured on private lands and added to the known population. She is estimated to be 7 years old. 
• On April 8, 2024, a wild female Red Wolf (2280F) was captured after exhibiting uncharacteristic behavior for her, such as being visible close to open farm field roads, acting very lethargic, and appearing to have vision issues. She was diagnosed with an untreatable cancerous mass on her brain and the decision was then made to humanely euthanize her.
• Last December, a wild female Red Wolf (2413F) was captured by Red Wolf Recovery Program biologists and placed in an acclimation pen with a male (2444M), born at the Endangered Wolf Center to try to encourage a new breeding pair. This was successful and this April the new pair had a litter of 5 pups in the acclimation pen and they were all released in late May 2024. The family group moved a few miles away from the acclimation pen and settled in; 2444M appeared to be transitioning well into the wild and as a new father. Tragically, his life in the wild was cut way too short and he was a vehicle strike mortality on Highway 64 on June 5. Monitoring of 2413F and the pups will continue, and feasible management actions will be taken to assist with survival of the pups, if possible, after the loss of their father.

Though there are many reasons to celebrate the Red Wolf conservation program as a profound and frankly species-saving success, nevertheless the species has been considered Critically Endangered on the IUCN Red List since 1996 and their population is currently in decline.

Most recent counts estimate that less than 20 Red Wolf remain in the wild.

Citations 29:06

IUCN – https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/3747/163509841

Journal of Heredity, Volume 109, Issue 5 – https://doi.org/10.1093/jhered/esy020

U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service – https://www.fws.gov/project/red-wolf-recovery-program

National Wildlife Federation – https://www.nwf.org/Educational-Resources/Wildlife-Guide/Mammals/Red-Wolf 

Smithsonian’s National Zoo & Conservation Biology Institute – https://nationalzoo.si.edu/animals/red-wolf 

Journal of Biological Conservation, Volume 262, October 2021 – https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2021.109321

Wikipedia – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_wolf 

Music 30:46

Pledge 41:47

I honor the lifeforce of the Red Wolf. I keep its human name in my record. I am grateful to have shared time on our small bright planet with this amazing little being. I lament the ways in which I and my species have harmed and diminished this species.

And so, in the name of the Red Wolf I pledge to reduce my consumption. And my carbon footprint. And curb my wastefulness. I pledge to acknowledge and attempt to address the costs of my actions and inactions. And I pledge to resist the harm of any plant or animal kin or their habitat, by corporations and governments.

I pledge my song to the witness and memory of all life, to a broad celebration of biodiversity, and to the total liberation of all beings.