Wolf pups enjoying fall in the Northwoods #Video

A really nice look at 3 Cranberry Bay pups this fall, or at least what we think are 3 pups! Once pups reach the October/November period, it can be tough to tell them apart from adults.

The easiest way to tell pups from adults at this time is by looking at facial features. Pups often appear to have faces that just don’t quite look like adults—a very scientific explanation, we know! In other words, pups' faces don’t often look fully developed. In particular, their snouts look shorter and more “boxy” or blunted than an adult.

Of course, telling the two apart is more of an art than a science come late fall and winter, and we would never say we could pick out the pups 100% of the time. There are instances when it is abundantly clear that a wolf is a pup but then there are also numerous instances were it is pretty tough.

In this instance, the back two wolves in the first couple frames definitely look like pups to us. The front wolf is hard to tell but we would guess a pup. The Cranberry Bay Pack was 7 wolves at this time, of which two were the ear-tagged breeding pair (V083 and V084) and 5 were untagged wolves.

In Spring 2021, the pack was 4 adult wolves and had a litter 4 pups. Assuming no adults joined the pack, which we think is likely, then at least 3-4 of the 5 untagged wolves are pups.

If 4 of the untagged wolves are pups, then an adult wolf from the spring must have dispersed and left the pack sometime during the summer. This would be completely normal and largely expected.

Regardless, we can safely conclude most untagged wolves in the Cranberry Bay Pack are pups just by doing some simple math and making a few reasonable assumptions!

Learn more about the Voyageurs Wolf Project:
Website: http://www.voyageurswolfproject.org

---