RIP Yellowstone’s Druid Wolf Pack

[Zach Matthews]

The Druids, who anyone familiar with PBS’s excellent program “Nature” will know, have apparently succumbed to disease and other wolves:

http://www.helenair.com/news/state-and-regional/article_491da506-2a7e-11df-8a2c-001cc4c03286.html

Zach

[Steve K.]

Having fished and backpacked this area for several years….the story has special significance.

Thanks for posting.

[John Williams]

Very sad news indeed.
While I never spotted one of them while out there. I heard their howls while plying hte waters of Upper Slough.
JW

[John Bennett]

One of the reasons I was hoping to make it to YNP possibly later this was to photograph them.

Sad news, but it’s hard to be “sad” about such a success story.

[Zach Matthews]

John –

There are still tons of wolves in YNP and many of them are descendants of the Druids.

[Mark Landerman]

John –

There are still tons of wolves in YNP

And too many outside YNP.

[John Bennett]

Thanks Zach.

My “hope” is that come fall I’ll be able to start crossing off some bucket list destinations and YNP is near the top. Am looking at something of a road trip to get some landscape/scenic photography in and to dip my toes and wet a line in places only ever read about.

And you know I cant make a trip like that without packing the long glass for wildlife. The wolves and Elk of YNP are very high on the list.
Im dieing to repeat similiar shots to this but from a wilder setting.

From what I know/knew of the pack it the most commonly photographed and as you stated that likely has to do with their location and proximity to the road as anything else. It wont stop me, and hopefully another pack will move in or other opportunities for wolves would present themselves.

[Zach Matthews]

Hey John –

Got my names crossed; the Druids are in Lamar Valley, not Hayden Valley.

[John Williams]

John,
Just find the Jasper Bench and park and wait sooner or later you will see a very wide variety of YNP’s mega-fauna. Better yet wet a line in the Lamar as it flows past the Bench. Yellowstone Cutts, Bison Elk and Wolves all go together well.
JW

[Eric DeWitt]

Great article in the latest Nat Geo about the wolves out west.

[Mike Cline]

Here’s the latest official YNP data on the wolves.   Doug Smith and his crew are doing the latest Spring count this month. http://www.nps.gov/yell/naturescience/wolves.htm.  The Annual reports are interesting reads.

As always there’s another side to the story as this website attests too: http://www.saveelk.com/index.html.  Apart from being a bit graphic it does point out the tremendous pressure wolves are putting on the elk populations.  From a YNP perspective, the fact that the Madison River elk herd (those elk you always see at Madison Junction) has been cut in half in the last 10 years and some fear it might actually disappear because of wolf predation.

Another great summary of the Wolf situation in YNP is found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Wolves_in_Yellowstone

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