Wolves are characteristically mellow in their demeanor, much more easy-going than most of the dogs I’ve known.  One of the ways this behavior serves them well is in crossing raging glacial rivers.  They don’t struggle and paddle furiously like a dog is likely to do but instead relax and play the angles and currents intelligently, easing across while riding the flow somewhat downstream, often appearing even to enjoy the task.  Two hundred miles (320 km) northeast of Denali, I have documented summer wolf crossings of the mighty, muddy Yukon River where it was almost a half mile (.8 km) wide.  At least twice, radio-collared wolves that were denning on the north side of the Yukon crossed to the south side to hunt and were back at the den within a day or two.    

 

I’ve had my share of accidental close encounters with assertive grizzly bears and irate mother moose with young calves.  But the most apprehensive moments have come during river crossings - including a couple where I lost to the current and almost didn’t make it out.  So it is with particular interest that I observe the masters.  My pilot and I watched a demonstration of the skillful, relaxed way they do it during an August 12, 2008 research flight in Denali, when the Stampede alpha pair crossed the Toklat River in flood stage.  Normally a glacial river flows as a series of braided channels on a wide gravel bar, with a lot more gravel showing than water.  But after many days of rain, sections of the gravel bar had turned into broad, fast-flowing sheets of water, deepest where the main channels had been.  As we came upon the radio-collared Stampede male and female, on a hunt 15 miles (24 km) north of their den, they were already partly across the river and about to take on the worst of it.  The following photos (and the one at the top of the page) show what we watched, in awe, while circling above:

 

 

 

 

 

Below (2 photos):  The wolves continue along the shallows, toward the convergence of the two channels. Note in the second photo that they are studying the right-side channel as they proceed.  They seem to be anticipating a helpful deflection partly across the left channel by the force of the current from the right channel where it veers into the left channel at a downstream narrowing of the river.  Their pace has been deliberate, without any indication of wanting to cross upstream.

 

Below (6 photos):  Without hesitating, the female turns into the left-side current ...

 

 

... and quickly just her head is above water (abeam the downstream end of the island, not quite half way across).

                  

 

The male is about to take the plunge as the female (just to the right of bottom-center) continues across. Look carefully at the angle of intersection of the two channels and the more concentrated current of the channel originally on the wolves’ right side - again, strongly suggesting that they correctly anticipated an advantage in crossing here.

 

 

Within seconds the male joins her, both with only their heads above water in the dangerous standing waves (see also photo at top of page).  There is no indication of panic or struggling.  They seem remarkably relaxed.