Reading Barry Lopez’s book “Of Wolves and Men”:
[…] disadvantage. The important thing to bear in mind is that generally wolves do not overrun the prey population and kill it out, although they have been known to do so, just as they have, extraordinary as it seems, practiced a kind of fallow-field farming by not killing deer in certain parts of their territories for four or five years, letting the prey population recover there.
I think he got his fiction mixed up with reality, wolves don’t live very long; this would be half of their lifespan.
They could very well be leaving an area alone because there’s less of their favorite prey there. How would you determine their motivation?
To me it sounds like they moved to richer areas where it was easier to find suitable prey.
Behold, fellow wolves! A deer in the clearing! It has been days since our last meal but we must allow this one to live.
Interesting if true.
Really makes me feel the one quote from The Matrix where Agent Smith calls humans a disease for constantly moving to one area, consuming all the resources in said area and moving on.
In comparison, animals are so much more considerate.
