Wolf

There are many different species of wolves, leading to a diversity in size. Some wolves, like the gray or timber wolf, can be more than six feet long and weigh as much as 175 pounds! Wolves are very similar in appearance to some domestic dog breeds, although wolves will differ in general appearance depending on their species.

Different species of wolves will have different coat types and coloring. The most common type of wolf—the gray or timber wolf—usually has thick gray fur, but all black and all white varieties also exist.

One of the most common types of wolf, the gray or timber wolf can grow much larger than their dog counterparts. Other than their size, the iconic wolf howl is another feature that sets this animal apart from the dog.

The wolves began as an animal that once had the largest distribution of any land mammal outside of humans and lions—roaming from Alaska and Arctic Canada south towards central Mexico, and through Europe and Asia—living in every type of habitat except the driest deserts and most tropical forests.

In North America, specifically, the wolves’ luck began to change shortly after European settlers arrived. Fear of the wolf, and its predation on domestic animals, led it nearly to extinction in the 19th and 20th centuries.

Despite the U.S. federal government’s plan to systematically poison the country’s wolf population, the Endangered Species Act now protects wolves.

This protection—and their quick reproductive cycles—has helped the wolf population rebound. In fact, a large-scale conservation effort to reintroduce wolves to Yellowstone National Park has been underway since 1995 and has been highly successful at restoring the population there.