Natural World (1983) s32e04 Episode Script

HOWLING There is a remote corner of the planet where wolves still hunt buffalo, as they have for thousands of years.
It's the home of a remarkable wolf named Storm.
My name is Jeff Turner, and I've been filming wolves for 25 years.
But I've never met a wolf quite like Storm.
Now, I'm going to spend the next year getting closer to these wolves in ways that have never been possible before.
'By using the latest camera technology 'mixed with some good old-fashioned fieldcraft' HE WHISPERS: Hush, just wait.
You've got a wolf coming right here.
That was close.
'.
.
I will follow them and uncover the details of their family life.
' And in the process, I hope to understand how wolves like Storm have lived in this ancient wilderness for so long.
This is Wood Buffalo National Park, in Northern Canada.
And I love this land.
While the rest of the modern world is changing so fast, this place still feels timeless and unspoiled to me.
Despite the weather, winter is the best time to begin following the wolf pack.
HOWLING This is when a wolf pack is most visible and cohesive, travelling together.
The big white guy looks to be the alpha male wolf.
He's one of the biggest I've ever seen - a real force of nature.
I'm going to call him Storm.
The smaller wolf Storm is sticking so close to must be his mate.
A wolf pack is, at its heart, a family.
The leaders of the pack, the alpha wolves, are the father and mother wolf, and most of the members of the pack are their offspring of various ages.
The success or failure of a wolf pack depends on its leaders.
Just as in a human family, the mother and father wolf are the ones that provide food and security.
But the long-term survival of this family's bloodline depends on Storm teaching his kids the family business.
And the family business is hunting buffalo.
There is no prey bigger on this planet that wolves regularly take down.
Buffalo can weigh over a tonne and are 20 times the size of a wolf.
Yet the pack must hunt them every week or so.
Buffalo are supremely adapted to winter.
Their massively muscled heads and necks act like snowploughs.
They are so well insulated that snow lying on their bodies doesn't even melt.
While this sort of weather doesn't faze the buffalo, I can't say the same for myself.
Look at the front of my lens here.
I think we are going to have to call it a day here.
I think we've done about as much as we could do.
It's impossible to keep up with wolves with only my two feet.
But this year, I have some help.
Each day, the Delta pack can range 30 miles or more to find prey to hunt.
And I've never been able to see a wolf hunt from beginning to end.
But with the aerial camera as my eye in the sky, for the first time, I can follow every step.
OK.
Looks like we've still got the wolves out there.
I can see them in a tight bunch.
Ooh, OK, good! We've got a buffalo-wolf situation here for sure.
Storm and his family are true travellers.
But finding their prey is no easy task.
Wood Buffalo National Park is huge, it would take me a whole season to walk around it.
But the buffalo concentrate around the Peace and Athabasca Rivers, where they find the best winter grazing.
Killing a buffalo is a risky business.
But these wolves have hunted buffalo for hundreds, if not thousands, of years.
They know what they need to do.
Storm and his pack have to attack from behind, so they must get the herd to run.
The buffalo know that if they stand and face the wolves, they have the advantage.
Sometimes, these stand-offs can last for days.
But if this strategy were foolproof, there wouldn't be any wolves.
Eventually, the buffalo lose their nerve and make a run for it.
I can see how the wolves are testing the buffalo, looking for a young animal or one that is struggling.
During the winter, the buffalo have to break trail, running through the deep snow.
They tire more quickly than the wolves.
Scattering through the bush forces the wolves to split up and reduces their effectiveness.
But Storm is not distracted.
He's got a lock on his prey.
It's a yearling calf.
Storm is such a huge wolf, he's able to bring this 300-kilogram animal to a stop all by himself.
But the herd scattering through the bush has led one of Storm's younger sons into his own solo battle.
And he tries to grab the buffalo by the front.
And pays the price for this mistake.
I hope he wasn't hurt.
A broken bone would spell the end for him.
Wolves have to be in peak form to hunt buffalo.
He still has a lot to learn from his father.
For a single wolf, killing such a large prey is dangerous.
Storm is older and wiser.
Once he's wounded the buffalo, he pulls back and waits for the animal to die.
HOWLING I never realised until now that one wolf could bring down a buffalo.
It's remarkable what a strong and determined leader, like Storm, can do for his pack.
Thanks to his skill, his family has lots of meat to eat now, which will ensure the female gives birth to healthy pups in the spring.
And they will need all the help they can get.
The spring and summer are the leanest months of the year for wolves.
There will be more mouths to feed, a den to defend and less chance to roam in search of prey.
That's when it'll be time for me to return.
Finding the den and watching how this family raises their pups through the difficult first year will tell me a lot about how well Storm's pack will endure.
The landscape of Wood Buffalo Park undergoes a radical transformation in the spring.
Like the other spring migrants, it's great to be back here again.
Getting around on the ground is easier, but there's still a lot of territory to cover.
Once again, I've got extra help.
Here, in the southern region of the park, is one of the largest inland deltas in the world.
But from the air, it doesn't take long to spot Storm and his pack.
They look different - they're shedding their winter coats.
I love watching wolves like this.
It's nice to be reminded that they are far more than just killers.
But this doesn't get me any closer to finding their den.
My best chance is to follow them back from a hunt when they take food to the pups.
And the spring provides a new hunting opportunity for the wolves.
The buffalo calves are a much easier target in their first few months.
It looks like a big female wolf from Storm's pack is scouting out the herd.
It's the only time of the year the wolves can hunt buffalo smaller than themselves.
There looks to be lots of calves in this herd.
But to get to the calves, she has to somehow get past these intimidating adults.
SHE HOWLS The female scout calls for some back-up.
Storm and some of the pack's younger wolves quickly respond.
You'd think with the calves around, the spring would make easier hunting for the wolves, but it's actually harder.
Buffalo mothers are fierce defenders of their calves and they're not encumbered by deep snow now.
Again, the only chance for the wolves is to get the herd running and break up this defensive barrier.
The buffalo soon get strung out in a long line.
This is what the wolves need.
Storm zeroes in on a lone calf.
But with a burst of speed, it gets back to its mother.
Storm comes back for a second try.
But even at full gallop, he can't get past the mother.
Wolves can run for hours, waiting for their chance.
But the buffalo have incredible endurance, too, even the calves.
I've seen these chases go on for 20 miles.
But an opportunity for the wolves lies ahead.
The water means the buffalo have to slow down and break their stride.
They can get injured or a calf separated from its mother.
For some reason, Storm and his offspring are letting the buffalo go.
But the big female wolf doesn't want to give up.
And it looks like she's seen something the other wolves have missed.
One of the calves is lagging behind.
Even with the calves, the wolves find it difficult to make a clean kill.
She has to work quickly, because the mother buffalo will soon come back looking for her calf.
If the buffalo can get back in time, there's a chance she can still save her calf.
In these situations, it's hard to know who to hope for - this mother buffalo and her injured calf, or the female wolf with hungry pups at the den.
Though still alive, the calf can't quite make it back onto its feet.
It's frustrating to have to leave now, but the chopper's running low on fuel, so we'll come back tomorrow to see what's happened.
This far north, sunrise is about 4.
00am, but it's beautiful.
The calf is still alive.
But I think it doesn't look very hopeful for that calf.
If it had been able to, I'm sure, you know, last night it would have gotten up and followed her so, you know, it's just a waiting game now between, you know, the cow eventually realising the calf isn't going to be able to follow her and she's going to be, going to go with her instinct to try to find and get back to her herd.
And she's going to have to abandon the calf.
She's torn and caught in between these two desires, but the calf is obviously unable to follow her at this point.
I mean, the only way to think about it is that this calf is going to feed a family of wolves.
It's hard to watch these predations, but death is a crucial part of the natural cycle.
The young of the buffalo is going to feed the young of the wolves.
With a full belly now, hopefully this wolf will head back to the pups.
This is where being able to follow the wolves from the air is really going to pay off for me.
I'm sure she's going to lead us to the den.
Most wolf dens are in thick brush.
I'll have to wait to see if she has pups here.
Oh, it's great to finally see a puppy.
They're so tiny.
This must be the mother wolf.
Besides Storm, she is the one most likely to bring food to the pups.
But she's different than the female I saw Storm with in March.
PUP WAILS It's not unusual for more than one female to come into season in a pack.
But it seems that only this older, larger female has given birth to pups this spring.
They're still very young.
Even so, they're hungry for meat.
They jump and lick at her mouth, which stimulates her to regurgitate the food she is carrying in her stomach.
This wolf is a strong and determined mother.
She's a good match for Storm.
I'll call her Susie.
For the next two months at least, the wolves will have to continue coming back to this spot with food to keep these pups alive.
It gives me a rare opportunity to film them from my hide and see how they raise the new members of their family.
I don't have to wait long until the rest of the pack arrive.
You can see how the younger wolves are excited by the arrival of their father, Storm.
These younger wolves are his pups from previous years.
In fact, they still lick at his mouth to be fed like they did when they were small.
It's so rare to see this.
I feel very lucky.
But then, my eye in the sky spots a black bear approaching the den.
I see it before the wolves do.
They don't realise the approaching threat.
While the black bear would be hard-pressed to take on an adult, it could be after the pups.
Every time the bear tries to go into the trees where the pups are, Storm bites him in the rear, forcing the bear to turn back to face him.
By working together, a combination of pushing from behind and leading him on, Storm and his offspring get the bear away from the den.
I think that bear is just as happy as the wolves to be out of there.
The buffalo continue to regain their strength and weight on the spring grass.
But their search for this fresh feed can take them many miles from the wolf den site.
The calves are growing all the time.
They will be getting harder for the wolves to catch and kill.
The summer season pushes the wolves from both ends - the prey is more difficult to find and kill and yet, the need for more food is increasing all the time.
And although the pups are quite small, they grow fast.
It puts a lot of pressure on the hunting adults.
It's been two weeks since I've seen the wolves make a kill.
Storm and Susie head off with one of their eldest offspring.
I often wonder how it is that wolves know which direction to go.
It's a big country to search, but they do have a keen sense of smell.
They can tell when a herd has passed through, even two or three days before.
The scent has led the wolves into the forest.
The buffalo could be anywhere around here.
The trees make it harder for the wolves to isolate one calf.
Soon, the wolves push the buffalo out from the forest, where they can focus on separating one of the buffalo from the herd.
I can see her holding off Storm and Susie.
But then, the third wolf appears.
Now, she's really going to have a tough job to get her calf out of this predicament.
The calf knows its only chance is to stick tight to its mother's side.
I realise the wolves are just trying to injure the calf.
They don't have enough time to kill it before the mother buffalo would be on them.
The mother's best chance is to get back into the shelter of the trees.
Somehow, the mother and calf have given the wolves the slip.
They've also found another calf that was separated from its mother earlier in the chase.
There's no meat for the pups back at the den tonight.
It's been a couple of weeks since the pups have had anything to eat.
Most wolf pups die of starvation in their first summer.
Storm and Susie need to get their pups through these lean times and into the autumn.
Then, with the pups bigger, they can at last leave the den and widen their search for buffalo.
As much as I love watching these wolves, it's time for me to go.
I have my own family waiting for me at home, and it's been more than a month since I've seen them.
I'll come back in the autumn to pick up with Storm and his family.
I hope the pups will make it through.
September is my favourite month in the Park.
When I get back, the buffalo are just ending their breeding cycle.
You can see that big bull right there, he's just checking one of the cows.
They go up and sniff them, they get a scent and then, they can pass it through this special gland in their nostrils and they can tell if the female is in oestrus and whether or not she's ready to breed.
There's a lot more bulls in the herd right now than there would normally be.
And they're all checking females out and keeping tabs on who's ready to breed or not.
The bulls are so huge! I mean, their head has got to be, like, almost two feet across and they're going to weigh, like, 1,000 kilograms.
Like, a tonne.
It's really, really hard to imagine how these wolves can kill animals like this.
They are so big.
But these bulls actually become vulnerable to wolves at this time of year.
After a month of battling each other for breeding rights, they've lost weight and their energy levels are low.
Since I've come back, I'm surprised that, even from the air, we can't find the wolves.
They should be hanging out in the meadows with their pups.
Then, one day, Storm and Susie just walk out of the woods.
It's good to see them again.
Their family has grown in numbers since I saw them last.
Some of the wandering members of the pack must have returned to the fold.
At first, I don't recognise the pups.
I am shocked at how much they've grown.
They look more like adult wolves now.
But I'm relieved to see that all four pups are still alive.
Storm and Susie must be really good parents.
I count 17 wolves in the pack now.
During the spring and summer, some of the wolves in the pack had wandered away in search of buffalo.
With the pups mobile now, the family can hunt together again.
But the pups still won't have the endurance of the adults.
The pack has travelled down a long peninsula of land sticking out into the lake.
Rather than turn back, Storm decides to swim across to the other side, a distance of at least two miles.
But the wind is coming up and the waves on the lake are building.
The pups are trailing behind the much stronger adults.
Suddenly, I see Susie turn and start to swim back.
She must have decided that it's going to be too far for the pups to swim.
Now, some of the sub-adults and other pack members turn back with her and the pups.
But Storm and the other adults keep on going.
They still have a very long way to swim.
It was smart that Susie turned back - the pups look exhausted.
SHE HOWLS Susie calls for her pups.
Finally, she has all four of her pups together, but Storm and the rest of the pack are far away now.
Adult wolves are excellent swimmers, but it's a long swim in cold water.
I'm always amazed at the endurance of these animals.
They hardly look winded.
Storm and the other adults have just one priority - to find food for themselves and their family.
Even if it means leaving the pups behind.
But their swim was in vain, there doesn't appear to be any animals here to hunt.
The only food is an old kill.
They have to gnaw the dried scraps from the bones.
Although Susie and the pups are far away now, they can still stay in contact.
HOWLING Wolf howls can travel several miles over open country.
HE HOWLS MULTIPLE HOWLS ECHO AND RESPOND Storm and the others don't find anything new to eat, and head back to meet up with the rest of their family.
The pups will go hungry tonight.
The longer they go without a kill, the weaker the pups will get and the less distance they'll be able to travel to find prey.
If Storm is to save his pups, they need to make a kill soon.
Next morning, I find the whole pack back together again and on the hunt for buffalo.
Luckily, it doesn't take them long to find a herd.
They really need to make a kill now.
They're looking for easy prey.
But as the herd starts to run, it's apparent that there are few, if any, calves in this herd.
The pups get left behind as the adults push the herd.
I'm not sure what the wolves are looking for with this herd.
There doesn't seem to be any calves, only adults.
Then, I see Storm spot something and sprint past all the buffalo.
Even the buffalo seem surprised by what he's doing.
What is he after? They're really legging it, but I still can't see what they are running to.
Two bulls! A young one and an old one.
I wonder what drew them out here to these two lone animals in the middle of a chase.
The wolves seem very relaxed.
They take a moment to rest up and have a drink.
The pups even catch up.
Finally, the bulls take off and head for the willows.
The wolves don't seem worried at all.
It doesn't seem like a hunt any more.
It's strange, the wolves just seem to be focused on the older bull, like they're waiting for something to happen.
I'll come back in the morning to see if the wolves are still here.
The next day, it looks like the old bull just laid down and died.
There doesn't appear to be any sign of a struggle.
The wolves must have sensed something wrong with this old bull that I couldn't see.
I don't know what happened here, but I do know that we humans rarely realise how sophisticated the wildlife we share this planet with really is.
GROWLING One of the pups is laying on top of the kill, claiming the spoils.
Finally, one of the adults has had enough.
The pups will now have to start to earn their place at the dinner table.
Storm's family now has enough food to see them through the next few weeks.
But winter will soon be here.
Then, I'll discover whether Storm and Susie's pups have learned enough to pass their toughest test - participating in their first buffalo hunt.
But as I leave the park again, I fear for their long-term future.
Flying south, I realise that the modern world is marching towards their ancient home.
The Alberta Oil Sands, the third largest crude oil reserve in the world, is directly upstream, right on their doorstep.
In the past decade, air emissions have increased substantially .
.
while leaks from the toxic holding ponds into the surrounding water supply have more than quadrupled.
Over the next seven years, oil production from here is expected to double.
How will this affect the wolves and buffalo? No-one knows for sure.
Winter brings me full circle with the wolves.
A year ago, I first met Storm and I've learned he is a truly impressive leader for his family.
He and Susie have kept all four pups alive.
And they've grown so much, it's hard to tell them now from the adults.
But have they learned any hunting skills from their parents? Winter is the season when the pack is at full strength.
All of the wandering members of the family are back.
And now is the time when they can really bring down large prey.
There's a couple of black wolves in the pack now.
It's rare to see black wolves this far north.
This hunt will be the first real test for the pups.
Now, they need to be able to contribute to the family's survival.
It looks like some of the pups are in the chase.
One after another, the wolves of the pack join in to help.
Together, they quickly subdue the buffalo.
I see some of the pups helping out as well.
It seems to me that Storm and Susie have taught their children well.
Through my year with Storm and his pack, I've learned something of how wolves have lived in this ancient wilderness for so long.
Their success comes down to the strength of their family, which, in turn, comes down to the strength of their leader.
I do worry about their future.
But for now, this latest generation of pups will be able to grow up in this beautiful wilderness under the watchful eye of a remarkable wolf called Storm.