Difference Between North American and European Wolves

The American Wolf of the northern districts is covered with long and comparatively fine fur, mixed with a large quantity of shorter woolly hair, and it has a more robust form than the European Wolf. Its muzzle is thicker and more obtuse, its head larger and rounder, and there is a sensible depression at the union of the nose and forehead. Its more arched forehead is comparatively broad, the space between the ears being greater than their height. The ears are shorter, wider at the base, and more acute, and have, consequently, a more conical form, whilst the greater length of the hair on the side of the neck of this Wolf makes them appear even shorter than they are. Its neck, covered with a bushy fur, appears short and thick. Its legs are rather short, its feet broad, with thick toes, and its tail is bushy, like the brush of a fox.

The European Wolf, on the contrary, has a coarser fur, with less of the soft wool inter- mixed with it. Its head is narrower, and tapers gradually to form the nose, which is produced on the same plane with the forehead. Its ears are higher and somewhat nearer to each other; their length exceeds the distance between the auditory opening and the eye. Its loins are more slender, its legs longer, feet narrower, and its tail is more thinly clothed with fur.

The shorter ears, broader forehead, and thicker muzzle of the American Wolf, with the bushiness of the hair behind the cheek, give it a physiognomy more like the social visage of an Esquimaux dog than the sneaking aspect of an European Wolf. Buffon enumerates black, tawny-gray and white, as the colours exhibited by the fur of the European Wolves. In the American northern Wolves the gray colour predominates, and there is very little of the tawny hue. The general arrangement of the patches of colour is, however, nearly the same in both races.

["Fauna boreali-americana, or, The zoology of the northern parts of British America : containing descriptions of the objects of natural history collected on the late northern land expeditions, under command of Captain Sir John Franklin, R.N."]

Geographical variations

Wolves show a great deal of dimorphism geographically, though they can interbreed. The Zoological Gardens of London for example once successfully managed to mate a male European wolf to an Indian female, resulting in a cub bearing an almost exact likeness to its sire.

EUROPE

European wolves tend to have coarse fur with less soft wool intermixed than American wolves. Their heads are narrower, their ears longer, higher placed and somewhat closer to each other. Their loins are more slender, their legs longer, their feet narrower, and their tails more thinly clothed with fur. Pelt colour in European wolves ranges from white, cream, red, grey and black, sometimes with all colours combined. Wolves in central Europe tend to be more richly coloured than those in Northern Europe. Eastern European wolves tend to be shorter and more heavily built than Northern Russian ones.

NORTH AMERICA

North American wolves are generally the same size as European wolves, but have shorter legs, larger, rounder heads, broader, more obtuse muzzles, and a sensible depression at the union of nose and forehead, which is more arched and broad. Their ears are shorter and have a more conical form. They typically lack the black mark on the forelegs, as is the case in European races. They have long and comparatively fine fur, mixed with a shorter wooly hair, and are more robust. Fur colour in American wolves ranges from white, black, red, yellow, brown, gray, and grizzled skins, and others representing every shade between, although usually each locality has its prevailing tint. There are pronounced differences in North American wolves of different localities; wolves from Texas and New Mexico are comparatively slim animals with small teeth. Mexican wolves in particular resemble some European wolves in stature, though their heads are usually broader, their necks thicker, their ears longer and their tails shorter. Wolves of the central and northern chains of the Rocky Mountains and coastal ranges are more formidable animals than the more southern plains wolves, and resemble Russian and Scandinavian wolves in size and proportions.

[Wikipedia contributors. "Subspecies of Canis lupus." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 25 Feb. 2011. Web. 12 Mar. 2011.]

[euro wolf 1: http://www.flickr.com/photos/tambako/5460004298/ | Attribution-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic]
[n.a. wolf 1: http://www.flickr.com/photos/dennis_matheson/4333040740/ | Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic]

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