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Text: Vientiane hardcore
Edited by Vientiane hardcore
«——【Preamble】】 ——»
In 2015, Science Net published a news article saying that there were only about 50 to 70 wolves left in the world, the smallest number of wolves in the world.
In order to preserve their race, these wolves actually mated with local coyotes and gave birth to babies when they couldn't find a mate!
This move probably preserved their genes, but scientists believe that their genes have also become less pure, and the species is likely to become genetically extinct.
But this kind of wolf will do everything to continue the race, and it is not enough to "court" the coyote, even the wild dog.
In May 2019, the Russian Satellite News Agency published an article in which researchers at Princeton University in the United States found a large number of genes for this wolf in the captured Texas wild dogs!
Forty years ago, this wolf was declared extinct in the wild, and in order to perpetuate its genes, 200 individuals were released into zoos, hoping that they could continue to continue their race genes while staying away from natural and man-made disasters.
Biologists later studied the genes of the captured dingoes, and they thought they might also be descendants of the endangered wolves and coyotes.
So the academic world exploded again, this kind of wolf seems to be quite romantic, in order to be able to give birth to offspring and continue the gene, you can try anything.
So what kind of wolf is this critically endangered wolf, and why did it fall to the point of being paired with coyotes and wild dogs to give birth?
«—[The wolf who can't find his lover]—»
This wolf teetering on the brink of extinction is called the red wolf, which is considered by many to be the prototype of the "red wolf" in the cartoon.
As for how this breed evolved, many biologists once wondered, because the results of genetic research showed that red wolves did not seem to exist independently in the long evolutionary process, and they also had very similar genes to gray wolves and coyotes.
Red wolves are confined to a very limited area, currently living only in hidden areas such as woodlands and swamps in the northern Carolina of the United States, and their bodies are generally cinnamon and brown, and the tip of the tail is also slightly black.
They are smaller than their favorite counterparts, gray wolves, and have significantly shorter fur and longer legs.
When winter comes, their coat color will become a little reddish, and they still look very special.
Like most wolves, they prefer to move in packs, and sometimes if two red wolves have a breeding advantage, they may drag their families into a small group.
Interestingly, each of these red wolf groups has its own territory of a specific range, and only one pair of high-status red wolves in a group can breed.
As for the remaining red wolves, they can only help the head wolf raise their children, and if they want to gain the power to continue the offspring, they have to become the "wolf king" themselves.
Of course, after studying their genes, it was found that many red wolves have coyote genes in their bodies, especially gray wolves, so researchers believe that the number of red wolves has dropped too much, so when they can't find a mate, red wolves will choose other wolves to mate.
Of course, in a desperate situation, it is not impossible for the red wolf to choose the wild dog as its target.
So why is the number of red wolves so scarce that they have babies with different subspecies?
«—[Hunted wolf]—»
In the early 20s, people living in the Americas used poisoning, hunting and other means to hunt red wolves on a large scale, because people feared that their presence would harm the development of animal husbandry, so they once treated them with the mentality of killing them all.
Coupled with the development of animal husbandry, the habitat of red wolves has gradually shrunk, and the number of red wolves that cannot eat their stomachs has further declined.
In this way, within a few years, the red wolf almost disappeared, and the few remaining red wolves even had a problem finding a target to breed.
Desperate, they eventually came up with a solution: mate with a gray wolf and leave offspring.
But this is not a good solution, because there are genetic differences between different wolves, so the crossbred offspring born are also mixed with gray wolf genes in the bloodline.
In this way, the population characteristics of red wolves have also faded in the process of continuous hybridization, resulting in genetic "extinction".
Fortunately, at the end of the 70s of the 20th century, some researchers found 14 red wolves with purebred genes in the wild, so they brought them back to artificial captivity, and the red wolf race was rarely continued.
But the breeding and recovery of red wolves is difficult, because even if a herd of red wolves is raised through artificial feeding, once the red wolves are released into the wild, they are still more likely to form families with gray wolves.
Later, as the number of red wolves in this group increased, people successively released hundreds of captive red wolves outside, but this number is still too small, so the problem of red wolves not finding a target is still very serious.
In addition, the release of red wolves has caused complaints from locals, who believe that the released wolves have killed the deer on their land, so there is no way to protect this dangerous animal.
In order to keep the red wolves alive, the U.S. Wildlife Service issued a notice that the farmed red wolves will no longer be released into the wild.
And at that time, the United States did not list the red wolf as a protected animal, because the red wolf released into its habitat was not sure whether it could survive and reproduce, so to a certain extent, it could not be regarded as a wild species.
Some researchers believe that because many red wolves in the wild carry the genes of other wolves, their population, as a kind of hybrid offspring, does not seem to have special protective significance, after all, as long as the cross is possible, it is possible to reappear.
But there are also some experts who believe that genetic "pureblood" should not be used as a criterion for protection, and they feel that many animals have mixed ancestry, and even hybrid animals should be protected to a certain extent.
And many wolves have had ancestors who have crossed the genre, which makes many wolves genetically similar, so Robert Wayne, a biologist at the University of California, believes that red wolves should still be protected even if they lose their identity as a separate species genetically.
This biological and sociological contradiction means that the Endangered Species Act in the United States has controversial limitations in many cases and needs to be further improved.
So why are red wolves and wild dogs able to breed among themselves?
«—[Red Wolf and Wild Dog]—»
First of all, both wolves and dogs belong to the canine family, dogs are a subspecies of wolves, and dogs are now believed to have been domesticated by wolves.
Therefore, they are genetically very close to each other, so there is no so-called reproductive isolation between them, so the reproduced offspring can also reproduce normally.
Not to mention the gray wolf, which is essentially the same creature as the red wolf, so it is natural for them to reproduce with each other.
However, the domestication of humans has made the difference between dogs and wolves more obvious, and people will artificially intervene in the reproduction of different breeds of dogs in order to fix their genes.
But wolves are different, when they can't find a mate early, their nature will drive them to find the same kind of animal to breed.
Of course, if there is a large number of people, animals generally do not choose different organisms from themselves to reproduce, which is nature's means of ensuring species diversity.
However, the red wolf is too weak compared to other wolves, and it is not easy to protect themselves, because their bodies are already petite and look very thin, so it is basically impossible to hunt large animals.
Therefore, they can usually hunt some rabbits and pheasants to eat, and if they are lucky, they can catch a deer and feast on it in a group battle, and they will often go hungry at other times.
Therefore, some red wolves will sneak into the farm to steal some poultry, but they can't find anything to eat, and if they come across the carcass of a dead animal, they will barely take it to feed their stomachs.
Therefore, the survival of red wolves in the wild can be described as very difficult, and many people can't help but feel sorry for the imminent extinction of such animals.
Reference:
China Science News, "The Fate of the Endangered Red Wolf in the United States is Unclear", 2015-7-2
https://paper.sciencenet.cn/htmlnews/2015/7/321919.shtm
Russian Satellite News Agency "Researchers Find Genes of Extinct Wild Wolves from Dogs" 2019-1-15
https://sputniknews.cn/20190115/1027355240.html
China Biotechnology Information Network, "Genetic Research Reveals the Limitations of the Endangered Species Act in the United States", 2016-8-9
https://biotech.org.cn/information/142602/