Wolves

by Mech, L. David

• ISBN13: 9780226516974
• ISBN10: 0226516970
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2007-02-01
• Publisher: Univ of Chicago Pr

Summary

Wolves are some of the world's most charismatic and controversial animals, capturing the imaginations of their friends and foes alike. Highly intelligent and adaptable, they hunt and play together in close-knit packs, sometimes roaming over hundreds of square miles in search of food. Once teetering on the brink of extinction across much of the United States and Europe, wolves have made a tremendous comeback in recent years, thanks to legal protection, changing human attitudes, and efforts to reintroduce them to suitable habitats in North America.As wolf populations have rebounded, scientific studies of them have also flourished. But there hasn't been a systematic, comprehensive overview of wolf biology since 1970. In Wolves, many of the world's leading wolf experts provide state-of-the-art coverage of just about everything you could want to know about these fascinating creatures. Individual chapters cover wolf social ecology, behavior, communication, feeding habits and hunting techniques, population dynamics, physiology and pathology, molecular genetics, evolution and taxonomy, interactions with nonhuman animals such as bears and coyotes, reintroduction, interactions with humans, and conservation and recovery efforts. The book discusses both gray and red wolves in detail and includes information about wolves around the world, from the United States and Canada to Italy, Romania, Saudi Arabia, Israel, India, and Mongolia. Wolves is also extensively illustrated with black and white photos, line drawings, maps, and fifty color plates.Unrivalled in scope and comprehensiveness, Wolves will become the definitive resource on these extraordinary animals for scientists and amateurs alike.

Author Biography

L. David Mech is a senior research scientist with the Biological Resources Division, U.S. Geological Survey and adjunct professor in the Department of Fisheries, Wildlife, and Conservation Biology and the Department of Ecology and Behavioral Biology at the University of Minnesota. He is the author of The Wolf: The Ecology and Behavior of an Endangered Species, The Way of the Wolf, and The Arctic Wolf, among other books, and is coauthor of The Wolves of Denali. Luigi Boitani is a professor of vertebrate zoology and animal ecology at the University of Rome. He is the author of Dalla parte del lupo, coauthor of Simon and Schuster’s Guide to Mammals, and coeditor of Research Techniques in Animal Ecology.

Table of Contents

Foreword	p. ix
Preface	p. xi
Acknowledgments	p. xiii
Introduction	p. xv
Wolf Social Ecology	p. 1
Wolf Behavior: Reproductive, Social, and Intelligent	p. 35
Wolf Communication	p. 66
The Wolf as a Carnivore	p. 104
Wolf-Prey Relations	p. 131
Wolf Population Dynamics	p. 161
The Internal Wolf: Physiology, Pathology, and Pharmacology	p. 192
Molecular Genetic Studies of Wolves	p. 218
Wolf Evolution and Taxonomy	p. 239
Wolf Interactions with Non-prey	p. 259
Restoration of the Red Wolf	p. 272
Wolves and Humans	p. 289
Wolf Conservation and Recovery	p. 317
Conclusion	p. 341
Species Names Used in the Text	p. 345
List of Contributors	p. 347
References	p. 349
Author Index	p. 407
Subject Index	p. 419
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