Behavioural differences between European and North American Wolves
There as been the claim that European and North American wolves behave differently, especially when it comes to encounters with humans. This was brought up in a comment in this question on a wolf encounter in Bulgaria.
The claim seems to be that European wolves are more aggressive than their brethren across the pond.
Is this true? Are there measurable differences? What are the differences and can they be explained?
This post was sourced from https://outdoors.stackexchange.com/q/19641. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
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I can speak for Italy, but bare in mind two things. First, I am an economist, interested into wolves because of side projects (i.e. the connection between the increase in the wolves population and local tourism) and sheer passion for nature. Second, the Italian wolf is different from the Eurasian wolf, which is more common in Europe, while the former is mostly in Italy, and in part on Swiss and French Alps. To my knowledge, the danger to humans, from Italian wolves, derives mostly from two interrelated aspects: (i) proximity to towns; (ii) hybridization (see here and here for evidence of hybridization in Italy). Because of those two factors, a higher percentage of local wolves might be less afraid of humans and, thus, more prone to come in contact with them. Besides that, I am not sure I have heard of average differences in behaviors.
This post was sourced from https://outdoors.stackexchange.com/a/19965. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
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