The Pipestones: The Rise and Fall of a Wolf Family
In the winter of 2008-2009, a new wolf family from the Pipestone Valley suddenly appeared in the Bow Valley of Banff National Park, taking up residence alongside the Bow Valley wolf family that had ruled there for over a decade. Within a year, these new wolves had eliminated the Bow Valley wolves and established a dominance that would last for five years in the heart of Canada's most famous national park. As the climactic chapter in a twenty-year observational study of wolves in Banff National Park, internationally respected wolf behavior expert G nther Bloch and widely renowned wildlife photographer John E. Marriott followed the Pipestones through the trials and tribulations of raising their family in one of the world's most heavily visited national parks. Bloch's work involved patient, time-consuming observations day after day for five consecutive years, resulting in matchless ecological and behavioral insights that go beyond the usual information that comes from studying wild wolves using telemetry and radio collaring. Bloch outlines the differences between a wolf pack and a wolf family, he describes A- and B-type personalities in wolves and how this impacted survival rates of the Pipestone pups and yearlings in the Bow Valley. He also details the three societal types of wild wolves, debunking the age-old myth of a pecking order from alphas to omegas, based on what he was able to observe in person with these wild wolves. Throughout the book, Bloch and Marriott describe some of the incredible wolf behavior they were fortunate enough to witness as part of the study. They watched a yearling female called Blizzard play with a mouse in the middle of the road for twenty minutes one frigid winter morning and saw the family playing tug-of-war one afternoon with a pair of men's boxer shorts. The most interesting observation was near the end of the family's dominance when a yearling named Yuma brought food repeatedly to a young pup called Sunshine that had suff.
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