Wolves In Yellowstone

Improved Essays
The historical norms of masculinity that led to the eradication of wolves in Yellowstone was the belief that man is a righteous hunter and wolves are seen as an evil hunter. This belief arose from the early American settler’s culture of fear of the wild creatures that they assumed inhabited the “wilderness”. The presence of wolves symbolized one 's existence with in the wildness. As such, it was long believed that wolves were an explicit representation of the wilderness. The early American settlers believed that the wolves were wilderness therefore wherever the wolves were it was declared to be wilderness. For example, that men are noble and merciful while wolves are savage and merciless. This notion was perceived through the concept of …show more content…
Wolves does not naturally have any regular predators; they are considered apex predators. Apex predators are very important in an ecosystem because they help the ecosystem to stay biodiverse. For example, wolves which are apex predators, they eat on the elks that would normally feed on the willows. Consequentially, the elimination of wolves was seen as an object of concern because now that there would be no more wolves to feed on the elks, the willows stared to slowly decline. The willows are important to the ecosystem because they serve as the basis of a food web/chain with small insects, birds, mammals, fungi and bacteria. Beavers for example depend highly on the willows because they use them for dams and lodges. Next, the beavers provide a pond to many reptiles and amphibians. In return this increases many of different animals up and down the trophic levels. An ecosystem will become less diverse as there are changes from different trophic levels, a term called trophic cascades will begin to occur as the apex predator is eliminated from an ecosystem. With the willows being gone there is not a place for other small animals to live and eat because their served as their home. Another example of Apex predators would be humans. Humans do not have any natural predators, and humans are very important to the ecosystem

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    In Prompt 1 we learn on how the effect of fear can change the ecosystem, and how it saved Yellowstone National Park. According to Sentence 8 in Prompt 1, "By the second year, the answer was obvious. In the parts of Yellowstone that the wolves hadn't yet reached, female elk grazed peacefully while their calves gambolled around them. " It was a scene out of a Disney film," said Laudre.…

    • 623 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    He was not shy of the humans he was fabled to have assisted in creating, and would teach them lessons about human nature and behavior through his tricks and stories. This view of America’s small wolves is far more respectful and thoughtful than that of the European settlers that settled the…

    • 1266 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    I believe that changes to living and non -living parts of an ecosystem impact population within the habitat because if you take away or put something into an ecosystem you are affecting everything around you. Especially if you put in or take out a keystone species. Keystone species are animals that other animals rely on and need to grow. So if you take away an animal that everyone relys on you are hurting all the other animals.…

    • 466 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Recovering the Landscape of the Ioway by Lance M. Foster goes into great detail about what Iowa, or how the Indians who were natives here called it, Ioway, was once like. Foster states that the state of Iowa was once a vast prairie, but today less than 0.1 percent of that prairie remains. He states that Americans typically associate the buffalo with the great plains, rather than thinking of them once being in the tallgrass prairie that once covered Iowa and Illinois. Foster, being a member of the Iowa Tribe of Kansas and Nebraska, explains just how big of a role the buffalo played to the tribes here when they once roamed. He also goes into some detail on some of the different methods in which the tribes would hunt the buffalo such as even…

    • 742 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Wolves had been missing in Yellowstone National Park for more than 70 years. As a result, the ecosystem of the Park had completely changed. Without any predator that threatened them, the number of deer had grown overreact, destroying vegetation and forcing other species to look elsewhere in order to survive. In 1995 they decided to reintroduce a small number of wolves. Only with their presence, the wolves managed to recover the entire ecosystem: from bears, foxes, eagles, otters, up to all kinds of animals were benefited by the wolves and recovered their habitat; and not only that, they recovered the lost vegetation, halted the erosion and even changed the course of rivers.…

    • 1016 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Mule Deer Research Paper

    • 770 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Introduction: Mule Deer once thrived in Western Nebraska, but now their population has gone down due to hunting, predators, and disease. Many people take for granted the wildlife that we have. Mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) once roamed the western United States in the millions (Holechek et al 1982). When the first white man came in the early 1800’s, the number drastically declined. The reason for this is partially due to the Tragedy of the Commons.…

    • 770 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Survival in the wild is strenuous for all living beings, even for those adapted to nature. Wolves, even with their strong statures, their powerful senses of smell, and their sharp canines are no exception. Storms, fires, starvation, pollution, and other animals are just a few of the dangers of living in the densely packed forests that wolves tend to make their habitats. However, although humans have their own needs to take care of, kind and determined people can go the extra mile just to protect and nurture weaker animals, despite the difficulty of doing so. Some of these goodhearted people have invested in creating places of shelter for injured and sick wolves who are unable to return to the wilderness.…

    • 688 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Wolf Restoration

    • 1192 Words
    • 5 Pages

    The wolves have both use and existence value to park visitors and non-visitors alike. With varying results by season, up to 44% of respondents said they personally benefited from hearing or seeing the wolves (Duffield et al. 2005). Up to 66% said they received satisfaction from simply knowing that there were wolves present in Yellowstone. It’s no wonder that both the 1991 and 2005 surveys recorded nearly 70% support for wolf restoration in the park. Conversely, an increase in the wolf population correlates to a decrease in other big game populations such as elk, bison, and moose.…

    • 1192 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Gray Wolf Research Paper

    • 501 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Although others may have a good point, coyotes, dogs, mountain lions, bobcats, vultures, and other predators all create a higher death toll of cattle than wolves per Source #4. However, it is important to realize that wild wolves are benefiting ecosystem in nature which are very important. The government shouldn’t make the illogical choice of removing wild wolves just so ranchers can earn more money. Wolves don’t kill the most cattle and are helping certain ecosystems thrive, therefore, the government should protect wolves in the…

    • 501 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Wolf Reintroduction Essay

    • 614 Words
    • 3 Pages

    One of the most renowned rewilding projects which has demonstrated the effects rewilding has on a whole ecosystem, was the reintroduction of grey wolves (Canis lupus) into Yellowstone National Park in the North West of the United States. The wolves were reintroduced to the park in 1995-1996 and have subsequently recolonised the whole park and some of the surrounding area known as the greater Yellowstone ecosystem (GYE) (Smith et al., 2003). The reintroduction of the wolves has had a great effect on the ecosystem of Yellowstone; the wolves have greatly reduced the numbers of ungulates, especially Elk which have been found to support the wolf packs almost entirely (Smith et al., 2003). The wolves have also had an effect on many of the other organisms…

    • 614 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    William Cronon’s essay entitled “The Trouble with Wilderness” is an intelligent and thoughtful work of environmental philosophy that addresses the relationship between nature and man while defining and contextualizing the idea of wilderness. Cronon argues that we must change the way that we think about wilderness. With this idea of man’s perspective of wilderness, Cronon goes on to describe the ways in which man has looked at wilderness throughout history. From a state of fear and intimidation, to one of romanticism and awe, and finally to a state of escape and adventure; the way in which people view wilderness is constantly shifting- therefore the actual definition of wilderness is also shifting. This constant change has created a unique relationship…

    • 1078 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Rambunctious Garden Critical Book Review Emma Marris opens Rambunctious Garden by dedicating the book to her mother for sending her to Audubon Day Camp. Though her statement is unexplained, Marris seems to reference how she began to care about nature. In his A Sand County Almanac, Aldo Leopold wrote about how direct interactions with nature can lead one to care about the land, to develop a land ethic (Leopold 223-225). Audubon Camp was how Marris developed her land ethic.…

    • 1135 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Wolves travel in packs of 10-30 and have two leaders and they are called the alpha male and alpha female and they are in charge of the pack. Wolves are a really good predator to be on Isle Royale because they really help manage the predator to prey ratio but they are not quite as useful in the Upper Peninsula because they are getting a little to friendly with coming in to small towns and a few years ago they were found right in the middle of Crystal Falls MI in someone's backyard at a standoff with the homeowners dogs, the homeowner called the Michigan Department Of Natural Resources and they gave them permission to shoot and kill the 2 wolves that were endangering them and their…

    • 1010 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    ) After over dramatic stories of vicious wolves, the Michigan legislature rushed a bill through last year’s session allowing for a purely recreational hunting season of wolves granting the same practices that virtually wiped out their population in the first place.(“Michigan.”) The bill was eventually signed into law as Public Act 520 by Snyder in the winter of December 2012.(Smith.) Now the people of Michigan are trying to change this conclusion and decided to take matters into it’s own…

    • 570 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    Several decades have passed, and we now know that the reintroduction of the wolves to Yellowstone was an overall success, despite a few mishaps with livestock losses to ranchers and poaching losses to the wolf packs. Over time, the greater fears of the ranchers were proven to be insubstantial, and wolves and humans appear to be living side by side in a guarded sort of harmony. The wolf packs have grown and the…

    • 1976 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Great Essays