SALISBURY – The Salisbury Zoo recently received a 2-year-old male red wolf from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s (USFWS) Red Wolf Recovery Program in North Carolina.
Bowie has joined Shiloh, the female red wolf, as a companion.
The red wolf is the world’s most endangered wolf. Once common throughout the Eastern and South-Central United States, red wolf populations were decimated by the early 20th century as a result of intensive predator control programs, as well as the degradation and alteration of the habitat that the species depends upon.
This past year, however, there have been exciting developments towards the recovery of the red wolf. USFWS released 10 adults into the wild at the North Carolina recovery area. Those, along with four adults from 2021 and four from 2020, brings the total to 18 wolves released to the wild in the last two years. For the first time since 2018, a pure litter of red wolves was born into the wild. This is a huge step towards the conservation of this species, the zoo reports. The Salisbury Zoo has participated in the red wolf recovery program and exhibited red wolves since 2007.