wolves
In 2013, two wolves from the Alexander Archipelago in Alaska made a swim to Pleasant Island, which is 50 square kilometers. The wolves thrived and grew to a population of 13, but wiped out all the deer on the island in doing so. What happens to the wolves next attracted the interest of biologists, who anticipated the animals would probably make the arduous swim back to the mainland. Instead, the wolves adapted and started hunting sea otters, which came to represent 60 percent to 70 percent of their diet. There is an issue, though, one of the wolves died in 2020, and a postmortem analysis found that the wolf had the single highest level of mercury ever recorded in a wolf. Yes, the wolves of Pleasant Island are mad as hatters. They had mercury concentrations 278 times the level found in wolves in the Alaskan interior, which coincided with adding sea otters — aggregators of heavy metals in shellfish — to their menu.
Gennaro Tomma, bioGraphic
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