| Summary: | A controversial wolf hunt in 1998 killed 633 wolves in the 13,000 km2 Rennie Lake area of the Northwest Territories, a region straddling the tundra-boreal forest transition, and another 125 wolves from adjacent areas. Although wolves have been hunted there for decades, the controversy focused on the number of wolves killed and use of snowmobiles in the hunt. From available records, annual kill has averaged 258 wolves ±59.7 (±1 SE, n=10 years). The territorial government considered the 1998 hunt sustainable given the reproductive potential of wolves and also noted that a higher than average number of caribou brought a corresponding increase in wolves following them. We re-examined the Rennie Lake area wolf hunt and evaluated radio-tracking and genetic data for wolves to determine the potential influence of the hunt on overall wolf survival and implications of reduced wolf predation on caribou. Our analysis suggests that the 1998 hunt targeted an estimated 2700 wolves from an area of at least 200,000 km2 in which an unusually high number of migratory caribou had congregated. Removal of about 750 wolves in 1998 could have released an estimated 15,000 caribou from predation that year, or 3% of the estimated half million caribou in the area then. If predation is additive mortality for caribou, then our data challenges the hypothesis that migratory caribou are lightly influenced by wolf predation. Accordingly, the commercial Rennie Lake wolf hunt may not only be a commercial hunt for fur, but also an indirect form of predator control.
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