Getting Wild with Wolverines

When Robert and I were recently invited to Zoo Montana to spend time with three wolverines, I was slightly apprehensive—though not for the reasons you might think.

Granted, the idea of getting up close and personal with a wolverine could be perceived as daunting: we normally study these wild carnivores with remote cameras, allowing us plenty of distance from the claws, jaws, and superhero powers for which they are renowned. But my reservations about meeting wolverines had nothing to do with fearing the animals themselves. I was much more concerned about the threats they might pose to my notion of wildness.

Wolverines in the wild are elusive and rarely seen, their wide-roaming nature signifying a freedom that we hairless apes can only strive to imagine. In the grueling hours required for me to zigzag my way from basecamp to a North Cascades peak (in summer, no less), a wolverine could shoot straight up a glacier, pose for a selfie on the summit, and lope to an avalanche slope 20 miles away to feast on a frozen mountain goat carcass pried out of pure ice. And, she could easily achieve this feat in the heart of winter, while I’m at home reading in front of the woodstove.

So as I packed my bags for Billings, I wondered: Would hanging out with wolverines in human care strip them of their wild mystique in my mind’s eye?

Our goals for traveling to Montana on behalf of our conservation work with Woodland Park Zoo were two-fold: to participate in a film shoot whose identity I’ll announce at a later date, and to test a synthetic scent lure we’ve developed for our carnivore research.

Traditional scent lures, paired with remote cameras to draw animals to the site, are made from animal ingredients sourced and widely used by trappers—and are thus an uncomfortable fit with the do-no-harm ethic underlying our noninvasive research.

Thanks to a grant provided by the Animal Welfare Institute, we were able to contract a team of innovators to create a synthetic version of our lure by mimicking its stinky scent profile with chemistry, much like the approach taken by the perfume industry. If the resulting concoction were to be marketed as perfume, I might call it, “Let’s Get Wild!”

So off we went with our vial of Let’s Get Wild!, as well as with a sample of traditional lure. By comparing their reactions to both, we hoped to evaluate how wolverines Ahmari (mom), Sid (dad), and their young kit, Enda, felt as a family about our experimental recipe. Sound like a dream mission for a couple of wolverine field biologists? It truly was.

I could go on and on about my day at the zoo—watching wolverines circle us for hours, curious but cautious as they appraised their gawking, awestruck guests.

I could try to describe their musky smell (pungent and sweet, like the littered floor of a pine forest), or the thrill of seeing first Ahmari, then Enda, and finally Sid, roll around like Labrador retrievers on a rock treated with Let’s Get Wild!—just a few drops enough to ignite their animal instinct.

I could even attempt to put words to the grace with which they wandered their enclosure: deft and gritty and strangely evocative of a tumbleweed sweeping across the landscape. But I’m hoping you’ll see all this and more on TV in the not-too-distant future. Stay tuned!

What I really want to tell you for now is that, contrary to my initial concerns, the experience I had in Billings brought me one step closer to wildness. For despite their human-crafted names, their manufactured habitat, and the tattered burlap sack they dragged around like a carcass, Ahmari, Sid, and Enda embody the unbridled mystery of every wolverine who has ever lived.