Red Wolves Unleashed

The Red Wolf is one of nature’s most misunderstood and endangered predators.
For one thing, red wolves aren’t necessarily even red. Some are black or brown, but most have a reddish coloring behind their ears. As a cousin of the Grey wolf, the reddish coloring earned them their name. They are about the same size as German shepherds. They weigh between 45 to 80 pounds. They are about 30 inches long with very bushy tails.

Predators or Prey?

Red wolves are predators because they hunt smaller animals and eat their meat. Their preferred diet consists of rabbits, deer, and raccoons. In a pinch, they’ll eat berries or insects. They hunt individually or in pairs.

Other than animals like coyotes or Grey wolves that are akin to them, they don’t have any known predators. Well, aside from us!

Packs

A group of five to eight wolves is known as a pack. Packs of wolves consist of mother and father wolves. They travel with their young pups. The young pups leave the pack when they are old enough to start their own pack.

 Dangerous or Endangered?

By the 1970s, there were only fourteen wild red wolves accounted for according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife service. To help, they captured the fourteen remaining red wolves. These wolves were left to breed until their numbers were enough to release back into the wild in North Carolina. The red wolves found today all come from those fourteen remaining wolves!

They are not a threat to humans. In fact, red wolves are more afraid of humans than we should be of them.

Red wolves communicate by howling, barking, and yipping. They also use body language and marking their territories with their individual scents to keep other animals away. 

Habits and Habitats

Wolf packs are very territorial and will defend their territories fiercely especially their dens. Red wolves hide their dens in places like riverbeds, next to fallen trees, or even in drainpipes. They keep their newborn pups in the dens under the supervision of the older members of the pack.

Red wolves are at home in several different environments. These include swamps, coastal grasslands, and woodlands. Their dens can be anywhere.

Early in the nation’s history, red wolves were native to the southern states. They extended all the way up to Pennsylvania. But, hunting reduced their numbers almost to the point of extinction.