A dog-like animal darts across the road. Is it a wolf or a coyote? Or even a hybrid of the two?
The Ministry of Natural Resources and Trent University PhD student John Benson hope to answer that question in a multi-year study tentatively set to wrap up at the end of next year.
They also hope to find out the animals' survival and reproduction rates, genetics, predation and feeding habits, and behaviour.
For the study, 20 female and 21 male wolves were collared between 2007 and 2009, of which 28 were adults, six were yearlings and seven were pups. There were also 22 male and 13 female pups implanted with internal radio transmitters in the spring of 2009.
Interbreeding
In Ontario, there's interbreeding between "genetically distinct species" of gray wolves and eastern wolves, and eastern wolves and coyotes creating offspring in a pup that's either predominantly carries traits of one of its parents — a gray wolf/eastern wolf hybrid, a eastern wolf/coyote hybrid — or a mix of all three. Gray wolves and coyotes don't interbreed directly, but share a common link with the eastern wolf, according to Benson.
"For simplicity I generally refer to the animals we're studying as wolves, but keep in mind that many are wolf/coyote hybrids," he said in an e-mail.
The animals are separated into two study areas: Western Algonquin Park and the region between Parry Sound and Huntsville.
"These two areas are very close geographically and have similar landscapes, but differ greatly in terms of amount of human activity," said Benson. "The area between Huntsville and Parry Sound has many more roads, houses, and people than western Algonquin. By studying animals both in and outside of Algonquin Park we hope to determine the influence of a protected area like Algonquin on hybridization between wolves and coyotes."
There's not yet a completed formal analyzation of data collected to date, wrote Benson, but there are some preliminary results.
Animals, he wrote, caught in Algonquin Park are mostly larger and "are predominantly eastern wolves, whereas the animals outside of the park are mostly coyote/wolf hybrids or eastern wolf/gray wolf hybrids. Hybridization has occurred both inside and outside of Algonquin, but appears to be much more common outside of the park."
Also, while Benson said it's too early into the study to determine whether there's a difference in survival rates depending on whether the animal lives in or outside of the provincial park, there are signs the causes of death are different depending on where it lives.
"In Algonquin, most mortality is due to natural causes, such as wolves killing other wolves," he wrote. "Outside of Algonquin most of the mortality is due to human causes, such as being hit by vehicles on the roads."
The animals collared or implanted with transmitters represent between 20 and 22 different packs and were caught by either live trap (at which time a blood sample is also taken) and released at the same site, captured with the use of net-guns shot from a helicopter in the winter, or where pups caught by hand while in the den and with the transmitter implanted on site.