PROJECT NARRATIVE:
A STUDY OF THE EFFECTS OF AGASSIZ NATIONAL WILDLIFE REFUGE WOLVES ON THE REFUGE AND SURROUNDING AREA

Agassiz National Wildlife Refuge (Agassiz) is located in northwestern Minnesota along the edge of current gray wolf (Canis Lupus) range in the Upper Midwest. Agissiz is adjoined by Eckvold and Elm Lake State Wildlife Management Areas forming a 130-square-mile block of wildlife habitat that supports two or three packs of wolves. This block lies in Zone 5 of the Eastern Timber Wolf Recovery Plan ( U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service 1992), a zone which the Eastern Timber Wolf Recovery Team suggested be kept wolf-free because of the preponderance of agricultural land.

Delisting the wolf from the threatened list is anticipated to take place in the next three to five years. Although wolves have been studied in the wilderness setting, information is needed on how to manage wolves in areas where human conflicts will occur.

Objectives

1. Examine the role of the refuge as a core area for pack territories. Determine the number of packs, pack size, and number of lone wolves using the refuge. Compare information to data collected in early 1980's.
2. Examine the role of resident wolves and dispersing wolves to livestock depredations in the surrounding landscape and communities.
3. Determine distance, directions and fates of dispersing wolves from the Refuge.

Methods

Wolves will be live-trapped and radio-marked. The breeders will be collared with standard radio-collars, and the younger wolves with satellite collars, also containing conventional transmitters. Each wolf live-trapped will be implanted with a slow-release isotope to mark its scats for 12-20 months. ADC personel will collect wolf scats from all wolf-killed livestock sites within 25 km of the refuge and the scats will be tested for the isotope markers. Wolves will be tracked daily during May - October and once per week throughout the rest of the year.

Perham High School, through a Tapestry grant, secured funding for one satellite collar and the data time in 1997. The school science classes are participating in the project by downloading the satellite data, mapping movements with GIS technology and analyzing the data. They are seeking funding for satellite tracking for 1998.

Back to Agassiz Gray Wolf

Back to Agassiz