Lone Wolf? No Thanks

The “lone wolf” trope has permeated Western culture for what feels like forever (or at least since Reagan was in office). It is meant to connote notions of going it alone and rugged individuality. Lone wolves don’t need anyone’s help to tackle dangerous situations or, indeed, to face any of life’s travails. Lone wolves wear a lot of leather, ride motorcycles sans helmets, can bullseye a bad guy’s noggin from all the way over there, and can kick your ass using any and every type of martial art practiced in the entire history of kicking people for fun and profit. Lone wolves are strong, vigorous, mysterious, and unknowable.

Here’s the thing. Being an actual lone wolf – as in an actual wolf that is not a member of an actual pack – pretty much sucks, and our version of the idea is tediously idealized nonsense.

The governing reality in the life of wolves (red and gray) is that they are very social animals – the most pack oriented of all canids, with the possible exception of hyenas. Wolf packs are rigidly hierarchical, led by an alpha male and an alpha female, that mate for life. The rest of the pack is made up of the alpha pair’s pups, and any number of subordinate and juvenile wolves, meaning that the pack a interrelated, multi-generational family. And like any human family a wolf pack is a dynamic tapestry of relationships. There is conflict, certainly, but also play and nurturing.

(Gray Wolves, Discussing Plans for Saturday)

Contrary to popular opinion (and among those who fetishize lone wolves it is a very popular opinion), a wolf does not choose to leave its pack. It’s not like it’s a goofy kid saying goodbye to the family farm and hitting the road to seek its fortune. In almost every instance, a wolf leaves its pack for one of two reasons: It is an older female (past breeding age) or a young adult of either sex, and instinct tells it is time to leave, or, for reasons that often remain inscrutable to human observers, a wolf is driven from its pack.

Since everything about the lives of most wolves is predicated on membership in a pack, leaving the pack only makes a wolf’s life more difficult. First and foremost, being a solitary wolf is far more dangerous than being part of a pack. An isolated wolf might have to travel several hundred miles in order to attempt membership in a new pack, or to mate and start a pack of its own, and during that journey it might cross into another pack’s territory and meet with hostility. Alpha wolves are very choosy about which animals are allowed to join the home team.

(Red Wolf. Stylin')

A wolf traveling alone through unfamiliar country is usually hampered by hunger. Wolves are pack hunters, and when they venture out for that purpose they work as a coordinated team to bring down their prey; usually large ungulates, like elk, caribou, and moose. Isolated wolves are almost never able to bring down something that large by themselves, and must instead feed on what they are able to catch, such as rabbits and gophers, smaller animals that provide less nourishment.

(Elk on the Menu)

Solo wolves, driven by hunger, are more likely to venture closer to human populations, where they raid garbage cans, invade chicken coops, attack livestock, and occasionally eat our pets. Part of what makes alpha wolves alphas is that they are smart, clever, and wise, and they have learned that getting too close to humans is a bad idea. Wolf packs do not attack livestock nearly as often as ranchers would have you think. Individual wolves, conversely, will resort to killing calves and sheep – especially sheep. (We have bred every ounce of wildness out of sheep and so, when faced with a predator, they haven’t the faintest idea how to react, and often just stand there stupidly, waiting to become lunch.)

A wolf without a pack is far more likely to become what is termed a “nuisance animal,” that has become “habituated” or “food conditioned.” Because it is a predator, the first reaction among many humans is to shoot it, but when cooler heads are on the scene the animal is sometimes trapped and relocated far from where it was getting into trouble. Relocating a wolf that was already attempting to relocate itself must be very stressful to the animal.

If a lone wolf successfully locates a new pack there is no guarantee that it will be accepted into it. If the alpha pair is disinclined toward opening the books to new constituents, the applicant wolf will be driven back into solitude. Rarely, an isolated wolf has been observed trailing along behind the pack that has sent him, um, packing, availing itself of scraps and never attaining full association. The pack will see to it that such a wolf is presented with frequent reminders that it is not welcome, only (barely) tolerated, and it would do well to mind its manners.

(Gray Wolf)

Let’s say the alpha pair is feeling gregarious, and looks benevolently upon the arrival of an unfamiliar wolf. That wolf, no matter its age or previously held position in its former pack, starts at the bottom, and must start climbing the status-ladder again. That being said, the newcomer will have the opportunity to fulfill its biological imperative to breed, which prevents the pack from becoming genetically stale, and is probably why it was invited inside to begin with.

And so we see that facts of life for a lone wolf are privation, increased danger, and more often than not, an early death. You don’t want to be a lone wolf. Be part of a pack. You’ll be safer. You will eat better. And you will wear a lot less leather.