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January marks the twenty-third calendar year of the Canadian Centre for Wolf Research and the second of its life as a not for profit society. For most of that time I have had the great privilege of being caretaker to our famous family of wolves. How did we get here? The story begins in England actually.
John Fentress, an eager American graduate student at Cambridge University in the 1960’s, was among the first students to enter a young scientific discipline known as ethology, or the study of animal behaviour.
John, together with Desmond Morris and David Attenborough, was instrumental in bringing wolves to the Whipsnade Zoo in London. John was given a pup to raise.
Lupey, his wolf from Whipsnade, eventually wound up in a ten acre wilderness enclosure in Nova Scotia, along with his mate and offspring in 1974. Lupey’s family is now in it’s third generation at the centre and so is the research team.
Dr. Fentress, his former graduate student Peter McLeod , now a tenured professor at Acadia University, and McLeod’s graduate student, Erik Barr are all currently conducting research at the centre.
Using non invasive techniques Dr. Fentress and Dr. McLeod study the social behaviour of the pack, how they communicate and how their behaviour develops. That means leaving the wolves alone as much as possible to conduct their own lives and to teach us their own lessons. There is no public access to the wolves.
Recently, researchers have developed techniques to analyze hormones in urine contaminated snow and feces. Erik Barr’s thesis project is to develop a quick, inexpensive technique to analyze DNA in feces, thereby aiding in the hormonal study of the wolves at the centre. Researchers could collect all the droppings rather than just those observed to occur, greatly increasing the sample size.
Erik’s technique could be applied to show researchers how wild wolves are related to each other in any sized geographical area without trapping and handling.
When federal and university financial support all but disappeared in the changing fiscal times the centre was faced with closure. There was a spontaneous outpouring of support from school kids, private donors and businesses. Enough money was raised to keep the wolves where they have always been. Thankfully the support for our not for profit society continues to grow. |
Dr. John Fentress
Dr. Peter McLeod
Erik Barr