Wolves saved Yellowstone National Park - The Northern Range

yellowstone the world's first national park protected to ensure that was always wilderness to inspire the human spirit for generations to come [Music] it all began in 1995 when yellowstone park workers released 31 grey wolves into the wild over the year and did not interfere with their lives at all although they expected certain changes they certainly did not expect the cascade of environmental change it will cause to this day ecologists are astonished by the continuing wave of direct and indirect consequences of this step throughout the ecosystem [Music] the northern range is the hub of wildlife in yellowstone so much of the wildlife in yellowstone lives here it's 10 of the area the park yet half the wolves live here it's arguably the most carnivore-rich area in north america and it's been studied a lot the northern range has been referred to as the serengeti of north america and that's because of the vast numbers of angular species mostly and so when people look out they may in one afternoon in the valley bottom of a northern range valley they may see bison elk pronghorn mule deer wolves and bears and all of these species interacting with each other [Music] well the northern range is the northern area of the park where the northern yellowstone elk herd spends the winter so it's winter range for the biggest elk herd in the park and it's probably the densest year-round wolf population at any location in north america we roughly have uh 35 to 40 wolves uh year round in the park portion of the northern range but we've been as dense as a hundred walls just in the northern part of yellowstone and we have pretty high bare densities and cougar densities as well so we have a great mix of carnivore species and we have high density you know 50 years ago that was not the case we came into the northern range as yellowstone was designated a park and changed a lot of things so wolves coyotes mountain lions bears to some degree were all being removed in vast numbers wolves were eliminated by people directly in the early part of the 20th century so what happens when you kill off the predators well the prey increases to very high levels and starts impacting the environment and by doing that the l kurds shot up and no one really knows how high they shot up 20 30 000 was the estimated figure and they were degrading the environment our policy on helping restore nature is fairly clear if humans did it we'll help the system get back on the right track so what was missing were all these carnivores and so they were not performing their ecological function cougars came back to yellowstone on their own through natural dispersal we started seeing signs of that in the 80s and we reintroduced wolves in the mid 90s and now that wolves and cougars have been restored and bears have increased the new story is about what happened to all the elk and what is happening to the willow and aspen now that the elk have declined and these carnivores are back the willow is relied on by a lot of animals and so it's kind of a positive feedback loop the more willows there are the more moose and beaver and the healthier the ecosystem because of those animals being involved too and so beavers are of course nature's engineers and they'll build lodges and dams that will help raise the water tables and raising the water table is one of the things that the willows rely on the most they can't deal with cut banks and swiftly moving creeks they have to have that slow moving water so this smaller elk herd is more natural we're seeing a response of will on aspen which used to be suppressed we've got wolves and cougars back we've got more bears so yellowstone's system now is a national park service success i story the northern range is incredibly unique not only for the greater yellowstone ecosystem but for the world protecting yellowstone is important to just protect the species that live here but also provide people a place to be able to see natural processes and use that throughout their life for making decisions on what they think is important [Music] i think a huge value of the national parks is to instill awe of nature into people going out on a landscape filled with grizzly bears is not the same as you know going to the mall and seeing wolves bring down an elk or seeing two wolf packs clash right in front of you are life-altering events there's no question we are changing people's lives by having places like yellowstone and the northern range is probably the heart of the park and the park's the heart of the ecosystem so it's all built upon each other but it grounds zeros the northern range [Music] [Music] you

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Keywords: wolves, saved, yellowstone, national park, the northern range, how wolves saved yellowstone, wolves return to yellowstone, America's National Parks, world’s first national park, yellowstone wolf documentary, yellowstone wolf reintroduction, yellowstone wolf pack, yellowstone wolf video, yellowstone wolf population, yellowstone wolf tracking, Wolves Saved Yellowstone, wolves in yellowstone, wolves yellowstone, ecosystem conservation, trophic cascade, wolf, wolves ecosystem, animal

Id: fTPt70vA39k

Length: 8min 32sec (512 seconds)

Published: Tue Jan 05 2021