Talk:Pack (canine)

Wolfpack

 * Pack (canine) was created this evening as an incomprehensible sub-stub. I added the Social behavior section from Wolf in there to fill it out, but it obviously needs to have its own content. About 10 pages link to Pack (canine), so I think it's worth the effort. Fernando Rizo T/C 06:36, 1 August 2005 (UTC)

This may be too vast a topic
The article is titled pack (canine) but only seems to be about gray wolves, with an attempt to describe dog behaviour as parallel to gray wolf behaviour. What about the behaviour of the rest of the canines?

The coyote (Canis latrans) and the Simien wolf (Canis simensis) and the gray wolf (Canis lupus) are closely related canids; what about the pack behaviour (if any) of the other two?

What about other wolves? Or foxes, dingoes, jackals, and lycaons? Is their pack behaviour identical to that of the gray wolf? All of the species?

What about habitat? Is the pack behaviour of gray wolves in different habitats the same? (It's not.)

Even if the gray wolf and the dog are genetically nearly identical, can the behaviour of the human-adapted, self-juvenilized domestic dog be compared to that of wild wolf?

But most of all -- where are the citations for the information that is there now? --Hafwyn (talk) 04:56, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Topic of this article...
Looking at where this links, the reason for this article as originally written seems not to be to discuss packs of canines but to discuss outmoded theories of wolf behaviour as applied to domestic dog/human interactions. I will add to the "alpha" section, along with the descriptions of packs of canines, and take out the uncited stuff about wolves.--Hafwyn (talk) 20:05, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Wolfpack
The usage of wolfpack and wolf pack is under discussion, see Talk:Wolfpack. 184.144.163.181 (talk) 05:03, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Need to make a deletion
Not sure where to start here, but this is the gist of the problem. New Guinea Singing Dogs are nto pasck animals at all and are not considered as such. The study group mentioned in this article was actually described as a group, not as a pack. The NGSD in the study were separated onr from another as necessary so they wouldn't fight. No one anywhere in the world keeps Singing Dogs in a "pack" and absolutely no studies have been performed on the wild population about which literally nothing is known.. Additionally, when I clicked on the reference, it came up as "can't find this page" so the reference link is no good. Personally, I feel the NGSD paragraph needs to be deleted. I will delete it it in 7 days if no one objects. Oldsingerman20 (talk) 01:33, 29 August 2011 (UTC)


 * I have commented it out. I can not find the original reference either, but there are plenty of other papers that pretty much states that they aren't one of the pack-forming canids.--  Obsidi ♠ n   Soul   07:40, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

Dominance and the "alpha" wolf
"One of the most persistent theories in dog training literature is the idea of the "alpha wolf", an individual gray wolf who uses physical force to enforce dominance hierarchy within the wolf pack."

This doesn't seem to match with anything I've read. From the information I've gathered about wolves, body language is used to assert dominance moreso than physical force. Lowered head, teeth bared, and a couple barks. But if physical force was needed every time than I think we would have many more dead wolves. Naturaldoubt (talk) 18:08, 27 November 2012 (UTC)

helllo — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.75.71.10 (talk) 13:59, 18 May 2016 (UTC)

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Dog training?
It remains unclear why the section "Use in dog training" is included in an article titled "Pack (canine)". It should perhaps be better located under Dog training. William Harris •  (talk) •  11:57, 29 March 2019 (UTC)

Self-contradictory sections?
The Social Dynamics and Hierarchy of a Gray Wolf Pack section and Dominance and the alpha wolf sections appear to contradict each other. The first (Social Dynamics) describes a rigid dominance-based pack structure, but that section is followed by a statement that dominance is parental-status-based and isn't won through fighting in natural packs.

Also, in attempting to reconcile the differences, I did come across Mech's full 1999 paper at https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1343&context=usgsnpwrc and I believe this to be a better source due to including the full information (while still being short enough to be easily read) rather than only the beginning summary paragraphs. Personally, I'm more inclined toward Mech's view here, but believe the contradiction should be resolved either way --75.129.79.118 (talk) 13:37, 6 October 2019 (UTC)


 * I believe the "Social Dynamics and Hierarchy of a Gray Wolf Pack" section to be nearly fully outdated and reliant on inaccurate sources. It was added by a single person earlier this year. I was somewhat hesitant to fully remove it, and instead edited the most egregious parts, but if others agree I would be inclined to substantially remove what appears to be likely misinformation. taulover (talk) 19:23, 19 November 2019 (UTC)


 * Both of you are absolutely right; I think the entire section on pack dominance structure needs to be rewritten and a few of the sources thrown out or presented as anecdotes. While the whole alpha/beta/omega wolf pack ideology is entrenched in our social understanding of wolves, Mech's paper observes that most of these conclusions were drawn from wolves forced to live together as a 'pack' under non-natural conditions.  This article's suggestion that wolves contest for alpha status is not supported by evidence (as noted in Alpha (ethology)); rather, social hierarchy is mostly determined by age, with sexually mature offspring preferentially leaving to start their own packs rather than competing with their parents.  In a sense, packs are the same as any (large) nuclear family: mom and dad are the only breeders, outsiders are occasionally welcomed in (adopted?), and for the most part the rest are just brothers and sisters who, upon coming of age, strike out on their own.
 * As for the other resources, three pertain to the Sawtooth Pack, a 1990s-era experiment whereby a number of related wolves were kept on a 25 acre enclosure in close proximity to researchers. They indeed organized themselves into a hierarchy, but one wonders if lower-ranking individuals would have left had they been able to.  None of the other sources mention beta or omega wolves, and as such I propose this article shouldn't, either.  Rriegs (talk) 06:41, 24 December 2019 (UTC)


 * I have gone ahead and removed the sections on beta and omega wolves. As we discussed, those sections are also egregiously outdated and inaccurate. I also made some additional wording changes to try to fix some additional errors that I had missed on my first edit of the article. taulover (talk) 03:02, 27 December 2019 (UTC)


 * === The lone wolf ===

These singular outside wolves, often referred to as lone wolves, are vulnerable to food scarcity and territorial attacks, and generally make up less than 15% of a wolf population. Lone wolves usually are typically sexually mature offspring having dispersed from their natal pack, although lone wolves can also occur due to being forced out of the pack. In times of prey scarcity, low ranking wolves may choose to go off on their own if the pack cannot supply sufficient food. These lone wolves may then attempt to join into an existing wolf pack or, more commonly, find a mate and begin a new pack family as the breeding pair.

Remodeled version ^. What do all think of this variant. Should it replace the current one ? Gimly24 (talk) 18:56, 22 August 2021 (UTC)

Merging from Attachment behaviour in wolves
Pinging the voters of the AfD discussion on Attachment behaviour in wolves, in which merging the content to here was decided. Since the AfD was closed more than two months ago, could someone perhaps have a look at what content should be merged, so that the decision can be implemented? Felix QW (talk) 06:58, 6 April 2022 (UTC) I have now merged the content of the relevant section verbatim into Pack (canine). The remaining content can be found in the page history of Attachment behaviour in wolves. Felix QW (talk) 18:49, 17 May 2022 (UTC)