The Wolves of Yellowstone
A Rewilding Story
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- $15.99
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- $15.99
Publisher Description
Here is the fascinating true story of the wolves who restored the ecosystem at Yellowstone National Park, written by Catherine Barr and illustrated by award-winner Jenni Desmond.
In the 1930s, the last wolves disappeared from Yellowstone National Park.
Without them, elk herds overran the plains. Bears starved, rabbit families shrunk, and birds flew away to new homes. Then plants and trees started to die off, too-even the flow of rivers was affected.
Could the park be saved . . . by the wolves it had lost?
After years of planning, in 1995 a team of experts was ready to find out. They carefully relocated fourteen wolves from the Canadian Rockies to Yellowstone. This is the story of their homecoming.
Engaging, informative, and hopeful, The Wolves of Yellowstone shows us that every creature plays a role in sustaining a thriving ecosystem.
A Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Barr and Desmond deliver a visually striking account of the 1995 reintroduction of 14 gray wolves from Canada to Yellowstone National Park, after more than 60 years without wolves' presence. Divvied into three parts and myriad subsections, the book contextualizes the hunting of wolves before moving into a chronological close-up of the reintroduced wolves' first year; following sections detail the positive impact of the wolves' reintroduction on a host of other species. Wildlife-abundant watercolors and labeled vignettes that use straightforward prose combine to give this natural history narrative a nature journal's feel, as in a spread that shows a pack's takedown of a young elk: "The wolves' powerful chests slice through snow as they bound nose-to-tail." An excellent resource for teaching about the interrelatedness of ecosystems and keystone species, the volume concludes with a graphic that explains how this apex predator restored and maintains a balanced ecosystem, and presents other examples of rewilding experiments around the globe. Ages 5–8.
