Researchers forced to cut short an annual survey of wildlife on a remote Lake Superior island this winter due to unusually warm weather announced Tuesday that they managed to gather data that shows the wolf population is stable. Isle Royale is a 134,000-acre island situated in far western Lake Superior between Grand Marais, Minnesota, and Thunder Bay, Canada.
Researchers typically conduct aerial surveys of the island to develop population estimates and observe animal behavior. The island doesn't have a landing strip so the scientists use skiplanes that can land on the ice surrounding it. A team led by Michigan Tech University researchers was two weeks into this year's seven-week survey in January when unusually warm temperatures left the ice around the island unsafe for their planes to land.
And fewer moose are having calves, the team said. Less than 6% of the moose the researchers observed this winter were calves. That's higher than last year's estimate of 2%, but still far below the long-term average of 13%.