Finally, the beaver came back as well, and started building dams that drew fish and even more water and trees back to the area.

The surviving trees weren’t being eaten as much, so they started to grow taller and to spread.Īs the trees grew taller, birds returned to nest in them. More wolves meant less elk, and the elk that survived spent less time eating because they were keeping an eye out for wolves. Compared to its former glory, it was now a barren wasteland.Īfter the successful reintroduction of the wolves, beginning in 1995, it seemed like the landscape changed and did a complete 180 from where it had been heading. The land converted to grasslands and dry shrub-lands. The beaver dams broke and allowed water to flow through too fast to soak up in the surrounding landscape. Once those trees were gone, a whole host of other animals left: birds, beaver, and fish that lived in the beaver ponds. Soon, the elk population skyrocketed, and they devastated the ecosystem by eating too much young, tender willow and aspen trees. This set off a chain of ecological events known as a trophic cascade – when one tiny change in an ecosystem ripples out and causes many other effects.Īfter the wolves were gone, the bears and coyotes that were left weren’t able to kill as many elk as the wolves had done. Wolves were officially declared extinct in the park by 1926. What happened to Yellowstone when wolves were gone? Everyone’s heard the story that bringing back wolves to the Yellowstone ecosystem suddenly returned it to normal, but did you know that claim may be only partially true? To see both sides of the story, let’s look at one of the most successful wolf reintroduction programs in history, at Yellowstone National Park.

Wanted wolf scavengers halls of wisdom