Article content continued

“That was more than I was expecting,” she said. While the number surprised her, “it doesn’t surprise me as much if you think of them all just using one portion of it, or (living there) just during one time of year.

“This kind of animal has learned to be very wary of people, so I think they see us a lot more than we see them,” she said.

But exactly which species they are remains complex.

Photo by National Capital Commission / Ottawa Citizen

Most of Canada has grey wolves, alias timber wolves. But there’s a slightly smaller type native around here called the Eastern wolf. It was once common both here and in the Eastern United States, but today lives mostly around Algonquin Park.

And as Eastern wolves fared poorly during the European settlement, they sometimes bred with coyotes, so that the distinction is now blurred.

Photo by National Capital Commission / Ottawa Citizen

The NCC study found a 72-pound male whose genes were mostly coyote, even though it was far bigger than coyotes are supposed to be. Its mate weighed only 42 pounds, which is more typical for the species. The big male also had some grey wolf genes.

The Gatineau wolves travel long distances.

One collared male, probably a young one, left its pack and followed Highway 148 to farmland near Shawville where it was shot and killed. Another young male with a collar also headed out on its own, travelling west and then north. It’s still active somewhere near Gracefield.

But two others with collars stayed closer to home. They turned out to be a mated pair.

“They had a more tightly defined territory,” Spence said. “They probably spent more than half of their time outside the park, south of the park in the Pontiac region. They went to the (Ottawa) River quite a lot. This was an interesting confirmation of our hypothesis that some of these ecological corridors that connect the park down to the river would be important.”