WINTER WOLVES
By Austin Homkes
Three wolves from the Cranberry Bay Pack on a frozen beaver pond in early December 2022. We placed this camera over open water in October 2022 in the hopes it would get footage of wolves once the pond froze—and we were quite pleased when we checked the camera in late January!
At the end of October as the 2022 field season was wrapping up and our seasonal summer field crew prepared to disperse across the country, we checked our nearly 200 trail cameras spread across the Greater Voyageurs Ecosystem one last time before winter set in. The transition from fall to winter in the Northwoods is often referred to as freeze-up, which refers to the period when the lakes and many beaver ponds ice-over. Often freeze-up is accompanied by fresh snow and sometimes a large snowstorm or two.
Freeze-up is a special time to capture wolves on camera. Wolves spend most of the summer months traveling as individuals in their territories, bringing food back to their pups that are not strong or fast enough to travel with other adult wolves. But by freeze-up, pups are the size of small adult wolves and have the capacity to travel with their parents and other pack members. Thus, during freeze-up, we often get our first glimpse of packs traveling as a single unit with their pups in tow.
A wetland complex starting to freeze over in late October in the Greater Voyageurs Ecosystem.
Additionally, wolves have their thick winter coats by freeze-up, which gives them the stoic look many think of when they picture wild wolves in the North. Set these winter-ready wolves against the red, orange, and yellow background of autumn or under conifers dusted with the first snowfall of freeze-up and the scene is set for stunning footage of wolves traveling together.
Videos of entire wolf packs give us our first concrete data of how many pups have survived through the summer. While the pups have full winter coats and are roughly the size of their packmates, they still have a distinctive “younger” appearance—smaller body, narrow muzzle, facial structures that are still growing/developing —that makes them easy to identify and count on video.
Austin Homkes setting up a trail camera on a remote beaver dam in Voyageurs National Park just before freeze-up occurred.
During freeze-up, we set up cameras in strategic locations. For example, shorelines become frozen pathways for wolves as vegetation dies back and the ice forms on the edges of lakes. Similarly, beaver dams freeze solid and become clear of the dense, bushy grasses that grow on them in summer. As a result, wolves use these dams as bridges across wetlands before the ponds themselves freeze over.
We have found from years of trial and error that beaver ponds themselves, once frozen, are popular places for wolves to travel and meander. The wind-swept ponds often have less snow on them than the surrounding forest and make for easy travel for wolves. Plus, beaver lodges offer a clear landmark to scent mark and an opportunity to sniff the would-be prey huddled in darkness just inches away through a fortress of frozen mud and sticks. Thus, we often point our cameras over the open water of beaver ponds in late fall to captures wolves walking on the frozen pond.
The Shoepack Lake Pack wandering the shoreline of Lake Kabetogama during freeze-up.
Many of our trail cameras are placed deep within Voyageurs National Park and require boat travel to reach. When ice forms on the lakes during freeze-up, these cameras are marooned in the park until the lake ice grows thick enough to snowmobile on. Similarly, south of the park, many trail cameras are placed on remote roads and trails which become undriveable by mid-December and can only be reached by snowmobile.
Freeze-up is a unique time in the Northwoods and accessing our cameras during this period can be tough. Often, we check our cameras in fall and then must wait for winter to set in so we can check them again. We simply hope that all the cameras are working as desired during this 2-3 month period of waiting!
A beaver pond freezing-up in October. Wolves will start traveling on the frozen ice of beaver ponds such as this shortly after they freeze-up...and these are the kind of spots we want our trail cameras.
By early-to-mid January, the lake ice is generally thick enough to safely cross and there is sufficient snow to snowmobile. At this time, we make our way to each our trail cameras to see what they recorded during freeze-up and the early winter season. On occasion we are lucky enough to observe intimate and special moments of wolf packs interacting with each other, defending and maintaining their territories, chasing and hunting prey, and thriving during another Northwood’s winter.
This year, we captured some exquisite footage of the Cranberry Bay and Nashata Packs during freeze-up. We observed the Cranberry Bay pack traveling across frozen beaver ponds as a pack of 8 wolves, led by the almost white-colored breeding male of the pack, Wolf V083. On the shores of Lake Kabetogama, we had several observations of the Nashata Pack traveling and playing around in the snow, enjoying the onset of winter. Freeze-up is truly a wonderful and beautiful time in the Northwoods!
Four wolves from the Cranberry Bay pack standing on a frozen beaver dam in December 2022. The wolf looking straight at the camera is clearly a wolf pup that is starting to look more and more like an adult.