Summary of the Wolverine Workshop 2002

The Wolverine Workshop 2002 was attended by 50 individuals, including many biologists who are, or have been, involved in wolverine research over the last 25 years. Jeff Copeland opened the workshop with an introduction to The Wolverine Foundation, Inc. (TWF), a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting interest in the wolverine's status and ecological role in the world wildlife community. A tribute was made to Elaine Anderson, a director of TWF who passed away on March 26, 2002. Jeff also offered the TWF website as a forum for wolverine research abstracts and photographs from on-going wolverine research projects. The introduction was then followed by an open discussion on the topic "Wolverine Research: How Far Have We Come and Where Do We Go From Here". Audrey Magoun and Jeff Copeland moderated the discussions. Dale Pedersen filmed the proceedings and Cheryl Copeland and Judy Long made a written record. Maps of the Northern Hemisphere were provided for participants to record known distribution of wolverines. A map was also provided of snow cover in North America in April and May that demonstrated a close correlation between snow cover and published wolverine distribution maps. Jeff Copeland provided a preliminary summary of wolverine research projects to date and asked for added input from attendees to this list. Hand-outs summarizing wolverine habitat and population dynamics were passed out to stimulate discussion.

The discussion was divided into four sessions:

• Wolverine Distribution
• Population Dynamics
• Habitat
• Coordination of research and research priorities

It soon became apparent that researchers had many more questions than answers regarding the workshop theme. However, the nature of the questions reflected not only where we need to head in the future, but just how far we have already come in understanding wolverine biology, ecology, and population dynamics. Past research focused on basic questions of wolverine home range size, movements, habitat selection, and food habits, while we gathered additional information on denning and reproduction when possible. It became evident in the workshop that we are now exploring broader questions about factors that control wolverine distribution, reproduction, and habitat selection and the effects of human activities and development on population viability. We have also begun to realize that to make the most of research efforts on a species that is so difficult and expensive to study, we need to collaborate with our colleagues, share information, and pool our data in some areas to produce cost effective studies and meaningful results. We look forward to new technologies that are opening the door for expanded research on dispersal, survival, and habitat use that have been very difficult to address in the past. Several new studies of wolverines in the US and Canada are experimenting with GPS and Argos satellite collars on wolverines, DNA analysis is being used to answer a number of questions, and studies of hormones are being introduced to examine wolverine reproduction and stress. We anticipate some very interesting new findings over the next couple of years. At the end of the workshop, there was overwhelming support for the idea of holding a formal wolverine symposium in the near future. Over the next year, TWF will be working with other interested organizations and individuals to develop the First International Wolverine Symposium. Progress on preparations for the symposium can be obtained on TWF's website.

The following summary of the workshop is formatted as a list of 100 questions as they developed during the course of the workshop discussion. As a compilation of the ideas, thoughts, and interests of most of the current researchers involved in wolverine studies, these questions provide direction for wolverine research in the near future and a basis for developing an agenda for the First International Wolverine Symposium. We encourage researchers to review the questions and keep them in mind when designing and conducting current and future projects on wolverines.

1. What defines the wolverine's niche?
2. Why are there no wolverines in the Andes and other areas where habitat appears to be suitable?
3. Is the wolverine a generalist or should it be considered a habitat specialist?
4. Are wolverines dependent upon large predators?
5. Why are there historical records for wolverines on the plains in northern Canada but not on the Great Plains in the United States?
6. Do climatic factors drive wolverine distribution?
7. Does the wolverine's adaptation to cold climates constrain its distribution southward?
8. Are summer temperatures too hot for wolverines on the Great Plains?
9. Why were there no mammalian carrion specialists on the Great Plains?
10. Are there limits to how successful wolverines can "play" the hyena game?
11. Is the wolverine an ice-age relict?
12. How critical is snow to the survival of young kits?
13. Does the presence of large predators affect wolverine distribution?
14. Are trees important for wolverine to avoid predators and if so, how do wolverines avoid or separate from predators on the treeless tundra?
15. How are wolverines distributed in boreal forest habitat?
16. Why do wolverines limit themselves to upland areas in some locations despite the availability of carrion at lower elevations?
17. Do wolverines avoid roads?
18. Do roads contribute to why wolverines are frequently found at higher elevations in mountain habitat with roads in the valleys?
19. Is road traffic more important than the road itself?
20. In analyzing the effect of roads on wolverine distribution, how should a road be defined?
21. What determines where wolverine denning habitat is distributed?
22. Do wolverines choose denning sites based on predator avoidance, thermal protection, or summer rearing habitat for kits? all of these factors? some other factor?
23. Are wolverines balancing predator avoidance and food availability?
24. Because the Tetons and Sweden don't have wolves, do wolverines rely on other large predators to provide carrion?
25. How long does it take for wolverines to locate carcasses?
26. How many carcasses are necessary to support a wolverine population?
27. If prey is abundant, do wolverines make less use of carcasses?
28. How do seasonal movements of ungulates and other prey affect the food base for wolverines?
29. Are kill sites from human hunting important for some wolverine populations?
30. How many studies have been done where there is no human hunting?
31. Do wolverines move between elevations in response to availability of hunter kill sites?
32. If wolverines are attracted to higher elevations by gut piles from hunter kills, what drives elevational changes in wolverine distribution in areas where ungulate carcasses are not available as a result of hunting by humans?
33. Why do wolverines in Alaska appear to be less dense in lowland areas compared to mountainous habitat?
34. How important is food caching to the wolverine's survival or denning success?
35. How much does the wolverine's ability to disperse over long distances contribute to patterns of distribution? In other words, are wolverines occurring in some areas only because of distant source areas within dispersal distance?
36. What characteristics of den sites cause wolverines to use the same sites even after long periods of absence?
37. How much energy can wolverines obtain from digesting bones?
38. What role does small prey have in the distribution, production, and survival of wolverines?
39. Are there areas where wolverines survive winter with no opportunity to scavenge on large carcasses?
40. Do snowshoe hare cycles explain some of the variation in wolverine distribution, survival, and reproduction?
41. Do porcupines play an important role in the wolverine's diet in some areas?
42. Because wolverines climb fences to get into dumps, frequent areas around ski lodges in Banff Park, and den near snow machine trails in Sweden, is it accurate to say that wolverines avoid humans?
43. Has avoidance of humans evolved in response to hunting and trapping pressure, and if so, can wolverines habituate to humans if they are not killed by humans?
44. Does forest cover become more important as human activity increases?
45. Are wolverines avoiding dogs around human habitation more than they avoid humans?
46. Do wolverines use human camps only when food is scarce?
47. What is the minimum size needed to maintain a wolverine population without immigration?
48. Is access to remote areas reducing refugia for wolverines and is harvest increasing with increasing access?
49. Do differences in geographical distribution of reproductive and non-reproductive wolverines explain harvests heavily weighted to juvenile and subadult wolverines?
50. How much cross-border movement is there between wolverine populations in Canadian and the United States?
51. Is human population distribution in Canada and along the border between Canada and the United States isolating southern populations of wolverines in the United States?
52. How accurate are harvest records (for instance, what proportion of harvested wolverines are not reported)?
53. Can we determine source populations for wolverines taken in harvested areas?
54. How can we measure harvest pressure?
55. Is trapping effort significantly increasing in some areas?
56. In what areas is trapping pressure decreasing?
57. How can we efficiently and cost effectively gather data on reproduction?
58. Is counting den sites feasible in other areas outside Scandinavia, where 60-70 people may search for dens when conditions are good?
59. How important is getting reproductive data from field studies for population modeling and harvest management?
60. Is data on recruitment critical for managing harvested populations?
61. How important are transient wolverines in maintaining trapped populations?
62. Is inferring productivity from harvest sex/age ratios appropriate?
63. Can we assume that, because harvest is consistently made up largely of juvenile wolverines, sufficient reproduction is occurring somewhere and the population is not being overharvested?
64. Is harvest something we need to focus on? In other words, is there any jurisdiction where harvest is limiting population size?
65. Is the development of trend indices for wolverines possible and would they be sufficient and feasible for managing harvested populations?
66. Is the amount of available wolverine habitat the key factor in whether harvest is an issue for wolverine conservation and management? For instance, is harvest more of an issue in fragmented habitats or are there large areas of contiguous habitat where it is also a problem?
67. Because harvest levels in many areas are similar over many years, can we assume that there are sufficient refugia to maintain populations of wolverines?
68. Is harvest in some areas cutting off dispersal to other areas?
69. Is potential listing of wolverines as a threatened or endangered species increasing harvest effort?
70. What are the standards that different management jurisdictions have for managing wolverines?
71. Are published wolverine density estimates (5-6/1000 kmē ) affected by location of most research areas in more productive habitat?
72. Shouldn't we expect wolverine density vary considerably in any one area because of the factors that control maximum density?
73. If source areas must be large to sustain this low-density species, what are source areas for the contiguous United States with no large blocks of suitable habitat?
74. How are wolverine populations being maintained in fragmented habitats?
75. Is genetic information from harvested animals providing unbiased data on wolverine genetics?
76. What are the advantages of doing studies of dispersal given the high costs of these studies?
77. What are the movement patterns of wolverines in relation to habitat; for example, where do they choose crossing areas from one habitat block to another?
78. What is the definition of "source" areas for wolverines?
79. If wolverine research is where bear research was 30 years ago, can we use this parallel to direct future research on wolverines?
80. Is it better to study wolverines from the "bottom up" (individual studies in selected areas) or the "top down" (organized across its distribution within regions)?
81. How do researchers distribute sampling over the whole system under study with a wide-ranging, low-density species like wolverine?
82. Do we need many small studies to understand what we see at larger scales?
83. Is there an urgency to gather more information on wolverines because of increasing human development?
84. What will be the effect on research imperatives and funding if the wolverine is a listed CITES species?
85. Are wolverine research teams coordinating research efforts?
86. Is "persistence of wolverines" the basis for most wolverine research?
87. What are the different research goals for different regions-metapopulations in western United States, large and as yet unimpacted populations in Northwest Territories, and populations of unknown status such as northern Ontario and Quebec?
88. Is there a way to make wolverine studies more cost effective?
89. Can we save research money and time by relying on data from individual studies to generalize to broader areas?
90. Does a definition of dispersal require knowing if the animal has established a new home range?
91. If determining "rate of dispersal" (not movements) requires information on vital rates, is it legitimate to estimate rate of dispersal using generalized vital rates from other study areas?
92. Are vital rates from separate populations useful for interpreting or modeling wolverine population dynamics in other areas?
93. What are the problems with using collars on wolverines and how do we avoid it when implants aren't possible?
94. What are the advantages and disadvantages of remote cameras for wolverine research?
95. Can we answer some research questions by pulling limited data from separate studies?
96. How can specific effects that are observed in a given study area be used to answer broader questions about wolverine life history in general?
97. What must we keep in mind if we want to combine data from different studies? Coordination of efforts, methods, parameters?
98. Can we assess bias in research protocols if data from different studies has been collected in the same way?
99. How can we promote information exchange?
100. How can The Wolverine Foundation, Inc. play a greater role in facilitating exchange and summarization of research results?