Red Wolf Is Left On The Brink Of Extinction With Only Less Than 20 Left In The Wild

These creatures have been declared extinct once and are in the risk of facing the same fate again.

Liezel

• Published in Animal Stories
• September 28, 2022

Wolves, the ancestor of our favorite furry pooches, are beautiful and majestic animals. And many people fear them for their fierceness, intelligence, and their great hunting abilities.

What most people don't realize is that wolves also play an important part in maintaining the balance of an ecosystem.

They keep the numbers of their prey like deer and elk in check to make sure they don't balloon out of control and consume all available resources in the habitat. Additionally, the carcasses of their prey that they leave behind also help to redistribute nutrients and provide food for other wildlife species like scavengers.

Despite being a top predator, however, wolves have also fallen at the hands of humans and development. They've been losing huge chunks of their natural habitat and hunting grounds and many of them have also been hunted down.

One kind of wolf that has been hardest hit is the red wolf which is now one of the most endangered carnivores on Earth. The saddest part is that the breed has not only faced extinction once but twice.

With less than 20 red wolves out in the wild right now, the future for these majestic creatures might be looking grim. But there is still hope.

The red wolves are now facing extinction again

As of 2021, there is an estimate of about less than 20 red wolves out in the wild and all live in the same area of North Carolina. But back in 1980, these creatures were actually declared extinct.

They suffered at the hands of humans

Much like their grey wolf cousins, the red wolves suffered a huge decline in their population all because of humans. However, the red wolves suffered more.

So in 1980, in an effort to prevent the species from going completely extinct, the last surviving red wolves were captured and put in a breeding program meant to help their population thrive again.

Fortunately, it was a success.

They recovered from the brink of extinction once

Seven years after the start of the program, eight red wolves, four males, and four females were released back into the wild of North Carolina. From then on up until 2006, their population grew and reached over 130 individuals.

However, they faced another steep decline in their numbers after that.

The red program crashed

“The red wolf program has almost entirely crumbled since I’ve been working here,” Heather Clarkson from the Defenders of Wildlife, told The Guardian. “It took nearly 20 years to get the program to a strong place, that’s the really sad part because now it’s crashed.”

Now, the wolves are facing the same fate again

Now, the International Union for Conservation of Nature has classified the species as critically endangered again with less than 20 wolves out in the wild. Despite this, there is still hope for these beautiful creatures.

People are working to get their population flourishing again

“Our goal is to work together to establish an implementation plan,” John Tirpak from the Fish and Wildlife Service told National Geographic. “We really need to reach jointly established recovery goals for the red wolf.”

They're not just making great efforts to rehabilitate the wolves' numbers but also help them thrive in the wild.

The red wolf is only one of the creatures that have been pushed to the brink of extinction because of humans. There are plenty more beautiful creatures out there that are facing the same cruel fate and they need our help to survive and thrive.

Without our action, we may keep losing one species after another until there's nothing left in the wild.

Liezel