Photo Friday -the extraordinary

About 15 years ago, a couple of wolves crossed the border from Italy to France and since then around 50 have made their home in the Mercantour National Park. Wolves were previously extinct in France since 1937.

These wolves are Italian wolves ,Canis lupus italicus, also known as Apennine wolves and they are a sub species of the European Grey wolf.


These are some pictures of Italian wolves taken at Parc Alpha. They are semi-wild and like the other wolves in the parc are deliberately not habituated to humans or tamed as they are part of a breeding programme and the idea is that the offspring will be as wild as possible.


Wolves are viewed from specially constructed hides and they will stay in the treeline or leave if they hear too much noise. All the photos are taken through double glazed windows.

This is another pack of wolves at the parc - these are from eastern Europe. They are quite a bit bigger than the Italian wolves.

We were lucky enough to arrive at this hide when the wolves were feeding.



This is one of the two cubs belonging to this pack. According to the warden, we were very lucky to see the young one as they usually hide in the trees and have food brought to them.
he was quite bold and boucny, like a half grown Alsatian puppy.




This is one of the older pack members taking food back to some of the females and other cub.
Wolves will cache prey for leaner times and I was amazed when these wolves started to dig in front of us to cache some meat.

Tags: Canis lupus italicus, wolves, wolf, parc Alpha, mercantour, Italian wolves, European Grey wolf, photos, cache, pup