Wolves and Cannibalism

          Wolves are known as lonely animals. However, wolves usually go hunting in groups but they do not settle in a specific place. Mainly, this territorial dispersion is to avoid being close to another herd of wolves. Wolves are social animals, living in groups or herds. Within each group, there will be an internal hierarchy that directs the behavior of its members. Nonetheless, this hierarchy is not determined by the size or strength of a wolf. Actually, the hierarchy is based on the personality and attitude of the members of the herd. Even though wolves are territorial animals and use vocalizations and their urine to mark the territory they defend, they do not fight for a territory unless it is for a food source.  When those fights happen, wolves show their most cruel behavior, cannibalism. It has been shown that the cannibalism is a common behavior for wolves. Nevertheless, during territorial fights is not the only situation in which wolves eat their opponents of other herds. Researchers have found out that wolves eat a member of their own herd when it is sick or just about to die. Taking into account that wolves need a huge amount of food because of the conditions in which they live (particularly the weather), the proximate cause of this cannibalism behavior is to take advantage of every single opportunity to eat. On the other hand, due to the fact that wolves are considered as apex predators, the only limitation the species has to increase its  population is the amount of food they can get. Hence, it can be said that the ultimate cause of this behavior is to preserve the species.