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'Wolf Island' to get virtual book launch

Posted 10/16/20

ELY- On Tuesday, Oct. 27, from 5 – 6 p.m. on the website of The International Wolf Center, join authors L. David Mech and Greg Breining in celebrating the release of their new book, “Wolf …

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'Wolf Island' to get virtual book launch

Posted

ELY- On Tuesday, Oct. 27, from 5 – 6 p.m. on the website of The International Wolf Center, join authors L. David Mech and Greg Breining in celebrating the release of their new book, “Wolf Island: Discovering the Secrets of a Mythic Animal.” This virtual event will include remarks by Mech, followed by a conversation moderated by Breining and audience Q&A. International Wolf Center Executive Director Grant Spickelmier will offer introductory remarks, with the audience Q&A moderated by IWC’s Interpretive Center Director, Krista Harrington. To register, go to www.wolf.org.
Signed copies of the book will be available for purchase via the International Wolf Center’s Wolf Den Store at shop.wolf.org. A portion of the sales of Wolf Island will be donated to the International Wolf Center to help them continue their work to educate the world about wolves. Mech founded the Center in 1985.
About Wolf Island:
In the late 1940s, a few wolves crossed the ice of Lake Superior to the island wilderness of Isle Royale, creating a perfect “laboratory” for a long-term study of predators and prey. As the wolves hunted and killed the island’s moose, a young graduate student named Dave Mech began research that would unlock the mystery of one of nature’s most revered (and reviled) animals. Mech eventually became an internationally renowned and respected wolf expert. This is the story of those early years.
Wolf Island recounts three extraordinary summers and winters Mech spent on the isolated outpost of Isle Royale National Park, tracking and observing wolves and moose on foot and by airplane—and upending the common misperception of wolves as wanton killers of insatiable appetite. Mech sets the scene with one of his most thrilling encounters: witnessing an aerial view of a spectacular hunt, then venturing by snowshoe (against the pilot’s warning) to examine the carcass in the face of fifteen hungry wolves. Wolf Island owes as much to the spirit of adventure as it does to the impetus of scientific curiosity. Written with science and outdoor writer Greg Breining, who recorded hours of interviews with Mech and had access to his journals and field notes from those years, the book captures the immediacy of scientific fieldwork in all its triumphs and frustrations. It takes us back to the beginning of a classic environmental study that continues today, spanning over sixty years—research and experiences that would transform one of the most despised creatures on Earth into an icon of wilderness and ecological health.