#21 - Red Wolf Identification - What Are The Signs.

So...  the Wolf - has officially spread to Maryland.  Relatives sent these two images taken off a motion detection camera.  Like all "native" American's they could only see the "Coyote" in the picture.  God love our stubborn beliefs - but you can see why - 'most people are scared of wolves' so it had better be a Coyote.

The letter said: 'your uncle saw another dead deer - taken down by a large canine.  Here are some photos of a large coyote caught on film from the front field - no wolves yet.'  The white dot/line is the eye's moving in time laps:

Here are some of the ways you can tell them apart:
1) Size and bulk of the main body - the term "husky" applies to the chest and neck of wolves.
Not so to coyotes:

2) Coyotes - have just the tiniest tip of their tails died black - Red Wolves have much larger swath of black at the end of their tail.  The fact that this demarcation is so pronounce in low light is a give away that the motion detector is showing a wolf not a coyote.

Here is a known original shot of a Red Wolf - done first in color - then with the color stripped out for the night time effect:

3) The shape from the abdomen to the chest increases in size in Red Wolves - not so in Coyotes - whose appearance is basically the same from the hips to the chest.  This shape gives to Wolf it's advantage in chasing down and killing deer - historically Coyotes do not take down adult deer.  With the cross breading of Coyotes and Wolves we may see that change.

Coyotes body type vs Red Wolf:

4)The power of the legs - not the firm stance and the substantial bone structure of the wolfs legs next to the coyotes in the top most pictures.

5) The final clue that I can give is found in the letter "another dead deer by large canine" My uncle was born and raised a hunter, I respect his observation that it was a "large canine" - my aunt - Hi Lou - however is - we'll she's smaller, doesn't carry a gun usually and you know how the mind works.  Anyway death by canine - not a Coyote thing.