Hokkaido wolf

Hokkaidō Wolf (Canis lupus Hattai )

The Hokkaidō Wolf (Canis lupus Hattai ), also Ezo Wolf (Japaneseエゾオオカミ, Ezo Ōkami ) called, was a subspecies of the wolf, and is sometimes referred to, together with the Honshu Wolf as Japanese wolf. The Hokkaidō Wolf is now regarded as the Honshu Wolf extinct. The distribution included the Japanese island of Hokkaido ( Ezo ), where he lived until the middle of the Meiji period.

During the Honshū Wolf is one of the smallest subspecies of the wolf due to the Inselverzwergung, reached by morphological studies of Hokkaidō Wolf normal body size, mtDNA sequences of two Hokkaido - wolves were identical to those Canadian wolves. The morphological and genetic characteristics indicate that the ancestors of Ezo wolves were genetically related to the ancestors of the Canadian wolves.

The last specimens of this subspecies died in 1889 due to a poisoning campaign by Japanese farmers. With the establishment of horse and cattle farms of Hokkaido Wolf was viewed as a threat to livestock. After American consulting poisoned baits were designed to reduce the wolf population with strychnine. Another reason for the extinction may have been the extreme decline in stocks of Sikahirsches.

Both the Honshū Wolf and the Hokkaidō Wolf is rather assigned a benevolent role in Japanese mythology. Comparable to the Roman legend of Romulus and Remus were said to also be the clan leader Fujiwara no Hidehira that he had been raised by wolves.