Howls heard in unexpected places

ONE FOGGY MORNING in September, I slipped out of a motel room at dawn with my Great Dane, Isis, and headed for the banks of the Yellowstone River in Gardiner, Mont., just north of Yellowstone National Park. Clouds hung low over the peaks. As we trotted along, I sucked in breaths of air that smelled like snow.

Isis suddenly stopped in the middle of the street. Her antenna-dish-sized ears swung forward, and her ruff stood erect. An instant later, I caught the sound she’d heard: a couple of distant barks followed by a long ululant howl. The drawn-out howl came again: full-throated notes starting low, rising to a peak, then slowly sinking away: “Oooooooooooooooooo!”

Later that day, peering through a telescope as wet flakes of snow fell around us, I watched a wolf pack relaxing; five wolves, two black, one husky gray, and two coyote-colored, curled up in the autumn-dry grass. One stood up, shook the snow off its thick fur, stretched and then curled up again.

I’d read the research on wolves’ return to Yellowstone. Their contribution to the health of the ecosystems was clear from the data: The elk were wary again, moving like wild herds rather than zoo animals, and their bloated populations were shrinking; willow, aspen and cottonwood stands were beginning a patchy recovery after decades of unchecked elk browsing; coyote numbers had dropped; grizzly bears were again dining at wolf kills; and beavers, long absent, had returned to the northern part of the park. Essential ecological relationships, broken by wolves’ absence, were mending.

But will we be able to welcome wolves home to the rest of the West the way we’ve embraced them in Yellowstone?

Gray wolves are not waiting for our invitation; they are already dispersing throughout the West. Last year, a young female wolf made it as far as central Colorado: Her body -- belly full of deer meat, legs broken -- was found on the shoulder of Interstate 70 west of Idaho Springs. Her radio collar identified her as Wolf 293, a member of the Swan Lake Pack from northern Yellowstone, some 400 miles away.

Wolf 293 was just a pup in 2003 when biologists shot her with a tranquilizer dart and attached a radio collar to track her movements. She spent her first year learning wolf ways with her siblings in her natal pack, one of Yellowstone’s oldest and most successful wolf packs. She was a year old -- almost mature -- when she was last located by radio telemetry near Mammoth Hot Springs in January 2004.

After that, Wolf 293 vanished from contact until she was found dead in Colorado six months later. Apparently, Wolf 293’s pack had no room for another potentially dominant adult female, so in her second spring, she struck out to find her own space.

Before Wolf 293, the last-known wild gray wolf in Colorado was killed in 1935, the victim of a culture that believed predators such as wolves, mountain lions and grizzly bears were, at best, a menace.

Wolves have long haunted our species’ myths and dreams -- their eye-shine glittering in the darkness, their shaggy forms patiently circling us with evil intent, fangs ready.

Even today we’re still gripped by such stereotypes, and wolves are still viewed as a problem. Until last month, when a federal judge overturned the attempt, the Bush administration tried to weaken the Endangered Species Act protection for wolves in the lower 48 states. And in Alaska, where wolves never enjoyed such protection, hunting is common.

We can’t precisely trace Wolf 293’s route from Yellowstone to Colorado. I imagine her trotting steadily south along the flanks of the mountains, edging around open basins, and stopping each evening on some ridge or hill to broadcast her rich, full-throated call.

Then she listens, ears pricked forward, swiveling to catch any response. But there is no reply, and she trots on, hunting, resting, until she is hit crossing the river of traffic, drags herself off the roadway and dies, still alone.

Wildness reminds us that life is not simple, truth is not black and white; that sameness is slow death and diversity rejuvenating. Without wolves -- as difficult as their journey will be -- an essential kind of wildness is missing from the West’s spare mix of peak and valley, canyon and mesa.

Look at Yellowstone. Only a decade after wolves’ return, biologists cautiously conclude they have opened up niches for dozens of other species, leading to a healthier landscape.

On our daily dawn walk, Isis and I stop in the open landscape beyond town, ears perked, listening intently for news of the wild. I hope for the howl of wolves, home again across the West.

Susan J. Tweit is the author of “Barren, Wild, and Worthless: Living in the Chihuahuan Desert” and “Seasons on the Pacific Coast: A Naturalist’s Notebook.” A longer version of her essay will appear in the forthcoming anthology, “Comeback Wolves” (Johnson Books).