Jack Rabe

The wolf pack sort of chased it off, and there was one wolf in particular that ran it off, one of the adult females from the Junction Butte pack. And this wolf was just chasing this subadult grizzly bear for like a football field, you know, 100 yards. And then there's this moment where the grizzly bear realizes, wait, I'm a grizzly bear, why am I running away from you? And then it stops, turns, looks at the wolf, and then all of a sudden the wolf's like, oh no, you realized. And then the bear starts chasing the wolf back out of their site.

Emmy Reed, Host

Wolves, cougars, and bears. Oh my. The Greater Yellowstone ecosystem is home to many large carnivores and omnivores, making it unlike anywhere else on Earth. So what happens when these masses of teeth, fur, and claws meet on the landscape? Welcome back to the Voices of Greater Yellowstone Podcast, where we share the stories and science of the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem. I'm your host, Emmy Reed. While it's a rare sight in Yellowstone, watching two large predators encounter each other is one of the most exciting and intense experiences you could have. When an enormous male grizzly bear comes across a pack of wolves in their kill, who will be victorious? Will the grizzly bear muscle his way in and steal the prize? Or will the pack band together and successfully drive him off? We'll cover these tense dynamics, plus the more symbiotic ones, on this episode. Joining us today is Jack Raby, a research associate with the Yellowstone Wolf, Cougar and Elk Project, and Fulbright Scholar collaborating with the Scandinavian Wolf Project. He studies community ecology through the lens of carnivore competition and predation dynamics. Jack received his PhD from the University of Minnesota in 2025 studying Yellowstone's carnivores. Prior to his nine years working in Yellowstone, Jack studied grouse, deer, coyotes, and bobcats in southeastern Ohio and worked on the Farallon Islands off the coast of San Francisco, monitoring breeding seabirds and invasive plants. We'll chat about what happens when grizzly bears, wolves, cougars, and more species interact, answer a few listener questions, and ask him the age-old question of what is the cutest wildlife offspring found in the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem. Alright, let's sink our teeth into the episode. So, Jack, tell me about your ideal day out studying wildlife in Yellowstone National Park.

Jack Rabe

Yeah, so funny enough, now that I've been working in Yellowstone for almost 10 years, a lot of my life now is actually based in the office, analyzing data, working on the computer, writing papers. So it's pretty rare that I get to get out in the field and really follow these animals around. But when I do, my ideal day would definitely be going out and tracking wolves and cougars in the park. And we do it kind of differently depending on which species we're following. So for wolves, because they're a little easier to see, they're out in these open valleys, we can actually follow these radio-collared wolves. And these collars emit a beep. And when we hear that beep, it kind of works like a car radio. We can drive around, listen for that different collar. And when we get closer, that beep gets louder and louder. And there's something special about you know driving into like Lamar Valley, and then hearing that beep come into your frequency, your receiver, and then you can spot up, pull out a scope, uh, and start looking for that animal. And once you see it, you know, it's a pretty special moment. Uh, and then you can sit with them and watch their behaviors, watch them hunt, watch them interact with other pack members or other packs or other wildlife. And that's really special. And then for cougars, because they're very elusive, we usually have to go out and follow them to places that they've already been to. So that'll usually mean looking at GPS locations, places where they've spent a lot of time at, and then we'll go out in their footsteps and walk sort of in their feet and follow them and get sort of a glimpse into their lives for these brief windows of time that we're following them. And that's also very special to see what they're eating on a day-to-day basis or where their favorite bed spots are. Um, so that's definitely my my ideal day would be getting out and then tracking wolves and cougars.

Emmy Reed, Host

I bet when when the tracker and the beeps get closer and closer, I can imagine your heart rate starts to mimic it with excitement, like, okay, we're getting close. Something's gonna show up eventually.

Jack Rabe

Yeah, for sure. Or you get the the sadder side where you get into an area and you're hoping that frequency or that beep is gonna get louder and then it kind of stays faint. You're like, oh no, they're tucked behind this ridge, we're not gonna see them today. Um, but yeah, once when it comes in and you kind of know, like, oh, they're right where I think they are, and then you get that spot, uh, it's pretty special for sure.

Emmy Reed, Host

So we're here to chat about the dynamics between large carnivores like wolves and cougars and large omnivores like grizzly bears, black bears, and coyotes. These charismatic megafaunas roam the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem, but I feel like we rarely see many interactions. How often do you come across two of these species connecting?

Jack Rabe

So it's pretty rare that we, you know, are out there physically seeing them interact. When it does happen, it's usually going to be with wolves because wolves are the ones hanging out in those open areas. So you often see coyotes coming into areas, maybe doing an alarm call when wolves are passing through. Maybe a coyote goes in to try and steal some food scraps from a wolf's kill, and then a wolf tries to chase it off. Or bears doing the same thing, coming in, trying to feed on a wolf kill, or maybe an animal dies of natural causes out in the landscape, and then that attracts these other carnivores to those sites where maybe wolves come in, bears come in, and you see them fighting over that. That tends to happen, you know, more maybe late winter when you have a lot of those die-offs, or even this time of year, as we approach the bison rut, you get these uh big male bison that are dying from injuries from other fights with males. And then all of a sudden you have, you know, a one-ton animal that drops dead on the landscape, and then that provides a lot of food for these hungry scavengers, these hungry carnivores and omnivores that are coming into these sites. But you know, even if we're not seeing it happen out on the landscape every day, it's probably happening somewhere in the GYE on a day-to-day basis.

Emmy Reed, Host

Yeah, could you tell me maybe about an encounter you've had with two different species and what was that like?

Jack Rabe

One of the special encounters that I remember uh was back in August of 2023, and again, it was at one of these bison um rut sites where a bison had had died from an injury from another male, and it attracted the Junction Butte wolf pack. So this whole pack of you know 10 plus wolves coming into this bison carcass, multiple grizzly bears. I think there were three or four grizzly bears at this site, and some of them were of different ages. There was a subadult male grizzly that was only maybe three, uh a little smaller, got pushed around by these other bigger male grizzlies that kind of once they came in, it's like, okay, our time feeding is over. We're gonna just have to wait till this other male leaves. Um, but one specific thing that happened, which was really funny, is when that subadult was on this kill, the wolf pack sort of chased it off. And there was one wolf in particular that ran it off, one of the adult females from the Junction Butte pack. And this wolf was just chasing this subadult grizzly bear for like a football field, you know, 100 yards. And then there's this moment where the grizzly bear realizes, wait, I'm a grizzly bear, why am I running away from you? And then it stops, turns, looks at the wolf, and then all of a sudden the wolf's like, oh no, you realized. And then the bear starts chasing the wolf back out of the site. So it's this really funny moment where it's like, oh, this bear has this awareness, like, oh wait, I'm bigger than you, I can chase you off. And then, of course, that bear went back and started feeding on the kale, and the the wolves went and bedded down and kind of had to wait for that bear to leave. But a really funny kind of game of cat and mouse almost.

Emmy Reed, Host

Yeah, and amazing that you could almost like see the thought process of like, wait a minute, what am I doing? Yeah. So we've got a couple species to cover today, but let's start with wolves, um, one of the species that you study in the park. I want to take us a little bit back to the beginning, though, and talk about how the removal of wolves from Yellowstone affected other predators in the park for a while.

Jack Rabe

Yeah, so it's it's a pretty complicated story because back in the late 1800s, the early 1900s, our perception of large carnivores was very different from what it is today. It was a lot of fear-mongering, a lot of worry for our safety, but also a lot of competition. You know, we were another competitor out in the landscape. It was the market hunting era. We were our livelihoods were based on the fur trade or selling meat or killing elk. Uh, and we were competing with wolves for that resource. So, my job a hundred years ago might have been to learn enough about wolves or these other carnivores to eradicate them from Yellowstone instead of protect them. And we did a very good job of that by the 1920s, 1930s. Wolves were functionally uh eradicated from the system and had only really remained in the lower 48 states, near the Great Lakes and northern Minnesota. But in Yellowstone, once that top predator was gone, which had an important regulating effect on other prey in the system, primarily elk, uh it shifted to a very human-dominated uh management approach where to keep elk numbers in check, you had to do a lot of translocation. You know, thousands and thousands of elk were being herded into these pens, relocated to other sites in the world to start their own herds, or just called. The park would kill a lot of elk to keep those numbers down. And in the 1960s, we decided, okay, we're gonna let the park sort of manage itself, but there weren't any large predators out there to help manage it by itself. So elk numbers skyrocketed up to you know 20,000 individuals. You had these massive die-offs every year where elk were starving. Uh so once we brought wolves back, I think we started to learn the importance and the role that these large carnivores played in ecosystems in the 70s with the Endangered Species Act. Finally, once they were able to be reintroduced in 1995, um their numbers quickly rose, and then we were able to sort of establish one of those many regulating factors. You know, wolves aren't the only player in the system. There's these other carnivores that we're going to talk about, and humans that are all helping now to maintain this healthy balance in the ecosystem. Um, and wolves are just one of those predators that were restored.

Emmy Reed, Host

Was there any correlation found with like how grizzly bears behaved or how cougars behaved? And, you know, when that introduction came back, did we see a difference in behavior or you know, what they hunted or how they hunted?

Jack Rabe

Definitely. And one of the major shifts we saw with cougars, and we'll get into why that is, is that cougars actually moved from using, you know, they weren't really using open uh and flat areas per se, but they moved more into very rugged, densely forested habitat. Really, we think in a way to avoid encounters with wolves once they were restored out of the landscape. Uh as for grizzly bears, they probably benefited in some ways from wolves because you now had a pretty stable source of food where wolves are making kills every few days, and all of a sudden you have bears that can come in and find these kills, and then they have a great opportunity to get some meat. Especially, say, in those later summer fall months when bears are really looking to put on weight before hibernation, and then when they come out of hibernation and they're very hungry, all of a sudden you've got wolves making kills that can provide a good uh source of food for them.

Emmy Reed, Host

I recently saw a video online that, you know, kind of made the rounds, at least with people who are interested in Yellowstone wildlife, where it was a pack of wolves and they were trying to drive off a sow grizzly bear and her yearling cub. It didn't really look like there was a kill nearby, but maybe there totally was, and it just wasn't in the shot. But do you have any thoughts about, you know, what could happen in this interaction or other interactions where grizzly bears and wolves were interacting, but there's no kill involved.

Jack Rabe

Yeah, I think I know which event you were talking about, and I think this is from the Whoppity Lake Pack down in Hayden Valley. And I believe this was near a den site where this sow grizzly with her cub was sort of passing through the area. And maybe she knew, maybe she didn't know that there was a wolf den in the area, but uh, I believe she passed through that area and then the wolf pack encountered her and sort of chased her off, tried to get at the cub. Uh, and that's pretty common that we see that around wolf dens. You know, pups are in a very vulnerable stage during those first few months of their lives. So oftentimes we'll see, you know, people passing through those areas uh or other carnivores that could pose a threat, or at least the wolves perceive that as a threat to their to their pups, that you might have them sort of trying to run off uh those other predators like a grizzly bear. And that's one of the reasons we don't really see grizzlies with cubs going into wolf kill sites or other things because they have that small cub with them that is at risk and vulnerable of being attacked or killed by wolves. We usually see if a grizzly bear is coming into a wolf kill, it's almost always a big male grizzly that can easily fend off those wolves and doesn't have really that safety risk tied to it. So I think they were probably just trying to escort that that bear out of the area. Yeah.

Emmy Reed, Host

That makes sense. They're they're so incredibly territorial. And that's interesting because I often think of them being more territorial with other wolf packs. I mean, I've heard the stories of how brutal that can be, but I never really thought about them doing that with other species. And I guess, you know, with the relationship, they can always see a grizzly bear as a threat no matter what. Um has there ever been a recorded wolves killing a grizzly bear cub?

Jack Rabe

Yeah, so it was quite a few years ago. Um, one of my colleagues, Jeremy Sundraj, I think was 11 years old at the time. So this is, you know, maybe 20 years ago. And it was his first visit to Yellowstone, and he was sitting there, I think at Slough Creek, looking back, and and one of the wolf packs had found a grizzly sow with multiple cubs, and they came in and did successfully kill the cubs. And I remember him thinking, you know, his I think his sister was crying next to him. He's like, Oh, that was one of the coolest things I've ever seen. So no surprise that he then came to work for us many years later. Um, but it does, it's very rare that it does happen. You know, usually those uh female grizzlies are pretty savvy, they know where wolves like to hang out, they tend to avoid those areas, but every once in a while you do have those those rare cases where a wolf pack might uh run into a grizzly bear with cubs and and they just can't escape. We might see it, you know, periodically with black bears too, which is why we hardly ever see black bears scavenging off wolf kills because there is that risk. They're smaller, they're not able to defend themselves quite as well as a large grizzly bear. So yeah, it definitely happens, but I'd say it's it's quite rare.

Emmy Reed, Host

How do wolves and coyotes interact?

Jack Rabe

Wolves in in many ways are very competitively dominant, as we would say, to coyotes, largely because of their size, and wolves again live in very large packs, especially in Yellowstone, where you have an average pack size of over 10. And a lot of times where we see these interactions happening are at uh wolf kill sites or maybe a carcass site, where coyotes, especially in the winter months when their primary food resources might be a little harder to access, they might come in and try and scavenge off of these kills. And a wolf sees that uh coyote trying to do that and chases them off. And sometimes they're successful in catching them, other times they're not. Back when wolves were reintroduced, we saw a lot more of that uh intraspecific killing, as we would say, killing or interspecific killing, killing another competitor. Uh, and that's because coyotes probably hadn't adapted yet to wolves back on the landscape. So we estimated that coyote numbers might have dropped by as much as 40 to 50 percent in those early years after wolves were reintroduced. And now we think we've seen this, you know, coyotes are very adaptable, they live in all sorts of landscapes, human-dominated landscapes. They learn how to adapt to those threats, and we think they've rebounded a little bit and now are pretty savvy at navigating that landscape, uh, you know, maybe even following wolves close behind them to wait for opportunities to scavenge off of the kill. And now we usually see them, you know, waiting until the wolves go and bend down and they're sort of snoozing, and then a coyote comes in, it's like this is the perfect opportunity. I can sit here, get a scrap, run away with it, maybe carry a leg assembly off or a scapula, uh, and then get a nice, nice meal out of it.

Emmy Reed, Host

So maybe for our people listening who have been to the park but realize honestly how hard it is to tell wolves and coyotes apart. Do you have any defining characteristics um that you would share with our listeners so that they can better identify these two CCs?

Jack Rabe

Definitely. So one of the big things you're gonna see is size right off the bat. So a coyote, on average in Yellowstone, is probably only gonna be about 30 to 35 pounds. Your smallest wolf is probably gonna be about 80 pounds. So a coyote might come up to your knee, uh, even shorter, maybe, whereas a wolf might come all the way up to your hip or even higher, depending on how tall you are. So they're very large, uh almost German shepherd plus sized uh animal. Another thing is large packs. A lot of our wolves will be traveling in packs, and about 50% of our wolves in Yellowstone are black as opposed to gray. So that can be another helpful indicator. But if you're seeing a gray wolf, it can be a little more challenging. So you can look at the ears, you know, wolves are going to have a blockier face, facial structure. Their ears are gonna be a little smaller, proportional to their head size, whereas coyotes might have longer, pointier ears, uh maybe a more tapered snout than what a wolf has, where they have that very blocky head, very broad shoulders.

Emmy Reed, Host

One of what something that helps me out sometimes is like the way that they uh kind of jog across the landscape, is I noticed that coyotes are kind of this like little staccato, like bouncy. And uh my dog, so I have a dog who's sitting behind me right now. Um she's very coyote-shaped and she kind of bounces like one. So if I see one out there and it looks like her, I'm like, yeah, for can even a mile away, I'm like, yeah, clocked, that's a that's a coyote. But I feel like wolves maybe like they lope a little more. I think they there's still some bounce, but I found that that's helpful, especially from a distance, trying to figure out who's who.

Jack Rabe

Yeah, more of a regal presence as they're they're moving through the landscape. They're very they're very confident about where they're going and who they are.

Emmy Reed, Host

Coyotes are a little goofy or they're just kind of like bopping around looking for for something to jump on. Um, I I tremendously love seeing both in the park. They're they're two of my favorites. Another species that you study are cougars. And so, like most large carnivores found in this ecosystem, um, or I would say more specifically in the park, uh, cougars were eliminated due to predator control. And so, you know, we know a lot about wolves and how their absence affected the park. But is there, you know, any data that shows how the absence of cougars for a while affected the park?

Jack Rabe

Yeah, I would say cougars had probably similar um effects on regulating prey. A lot of times we're really just talking about, you know, the wolf effect, how wolves changed rivers, this and that. But a lot of times we neglect to mention these other large carnivores that are out there, like cougars, like grizzly bears. And cougars per capita per individual are more successful and efficient hunters than wolves. They kill ungulates, so hooved animals like elk or deer, at probably three times the rate that wolves are killing these same prey per individual. So they might even have a bigger impact than wolves do on helping regulate uh, say, elk numbers or deer numbers. Cougars are also more efficient hunters. So instead of killing mostly weaker individuals, older individuals like wolves do, cougars are more able to kill across the age and body condition spectrum, where we'll see a cougar able to take down a four, five, six year old elk. They're still more likely to kill those older ones or the smaller, more vulnerable young elk, but they're going to be able to successfully take down a prime aged adult elk where we hardly ever see that for wolves. But again, Cougars were able to sort of recover to the park in part because of how elusive they are. They were able to come back on their own without a formal reintroduction effort, like we did for wolves. And a lot of that is due to, again, our shifting views, and as we learn more about the roles that these animals play. But really, the Houndsmen Association, the people that were going out with their trained hounds to chase cougars, were some of the key conservation figures and helping cougars re-establish across the American West and back into Yellowstone in the 1970s and early 80s. So again, houndsmen had this long cultural tie to cougars as an animal they could chase with their hounds. Sometimes it was to hunt and kill them, but other times they just wanted to get out with their dogs. And to be able to chase cougars with their dogs, you have to have cougars out in the landscape. So they actually wanted that population to grow and become healthy in the Rockies and in the areas around Yellowstone National Park. So they pushed for better regulations, better management as a game species across the West. That was successful. And because of those changing regulations, cougars were able to push back into the park on their own in the 1970s, again, before wolves were even reintroduced. And that's kind of when we started studying them in the late 80s, early 90s.

Emmy Reed, Host

What does a cougar usually do when it encounters another large species, like a wolf or a grizzly bear?

Jack Rabe

So unfortunately for cougars, they're kind of the small kid on the playground. They get pushed around by all these other large carnivores that are out there. Again, one-on-one, a cougar is almost always going to win against a wolf. But in Yellowstone, you're hardly ever running into a single wolf if you're a cougar. You're almost always encountering a wolf pack, which might have four or five wolves, or more commonly, 10 plus, if not 20 to even 30 wolves. And if you're running into 20 to 30 wolves as a cougar, you have really no chance. Same for a large grizzly bear or even a black bear. They're at what we would say competitively subordinate to these other dominant carnivores that are out on the landscape. So if they were able, we're in a case where they're running into a wolf pack or a grizzly bear or a black bear, their first thing is to tucktail and run before they even know they're really there, or escape up into a tree. And that's often what we'll see, especially if a wolf pack comes into an area and the cougar doesn't have time to escape. They're sort of found right there at the site. The cougar will run up into a tree, and we'll see these cases with GPS data where a cougar is on top of wolf locations where a cougar was probably feeding on its kill, and a wolf pack picked up that scent, found the kill, and then the cougar's just sitting in this tree above the wolf pack, waiting for those wolves to just finish eating the meal and abandon the site.

Emmy Reed, Host

Yeah, classic cat move to run up the tree real quick. Do other species often steal a cougar's kill because they're just kind of one guy trying to protect whatever they've taken down?

Jack Rabe

Definitely. We see the most common uh competitor that finds and steals cougar kills, at least in the summertime, is bears. You know, we're talking in Yellowstone, especially on the northern range where we do most of our research on the cougar population. There's probably 300 plus black bears roaming the landscape, and they have very high densities, especially in forested areas where the cougars are hanging out. There's also another 70 to 100 grizzly bears using that same area. So we're talking a lot of bears with really strong senses of smell that are very food-driven walking around in cougar country. So we see about a third of cougar kills are being found by bears, and you know, maybe a third of that number are actually being stolen. You know, that bear's finding it when the cougar's actively feeding on that kill. And they kick that cougar off and the cougar runs and goes out to try and make a new kill and start the process all over again. But luckily, they've got their own ways of trying to mitigate that risk of having a competitor like a wolf or a bear finding that kill.

Emmy Reed, Host

Yeah, are there any creative ways that they can hide their kills?

Jack Rabe

So, one thing is cougars will do, just like your uh cats at home, are using litter boxes to cover up their urine, their scat, they're trying to mask the presence that they were there. Cats are elusive, they like to not be found by other critters out in the landscape. Cougars are the same way. So, one thing they do as soon as they make a kill, one of the telltale signs that it's a cougar kill is that it's cached and buried under snow, under dirt, under a tree, massed with a bunch of woody branches and debris. Uh, and then what they'll do is they'll feed on it, bury it, go bed away from the kill site where it's not as dangerous to be there in case a wolf or bear finds that kill. Uh, and then when they're ready to feed him, they'll feed again, they'll cut uh take it off, uh, clean up the kill, start feeding again, uh, and then maybe have another couple hours bouts of feeding, bury it, and then start the process over again, and then just go back and forth feeding, caching, sleeping, usually for about four to five days, depending on how big the kill is. But one thing we've seen that's really fascinating after wolves recovered and elk numbers started to sort of decline from that really high, unhealthy 20,000 down to a stable six to eight thousand, is that we've seen cougars shift to killing other prey that are out in the landscape. So back before wolves were reintroduced and during the early days of reintroduction, roughly 75% of cougar diet was elk. Now that's less than 50%, and about 40% of their diet is deer. So we think, you know, some of this could be a numbers thing where there's fewer elk on the landscape, so they're killing more deer, but there could be some active selection there where they're actually trying to kill deer that are smaller, easier to hide, they don't take as long to feed, so it's less risky of a pre of a prey species to kill because it's not as likely to be found by these other carnivores that are out on the landscape. So we've seen a decline in how often they're actually losing their kills to wolves and bears because now they're killing smaller prey like deer that aren't as easily found. So we think there could be some active mitigation there where they're using more rugged, densely forested areas to escape these other carnivores and maybe even killing different prey to reduce that risk of run-ins with wolves and bears.

Emmy Reed, Host

Wow, I had no idea that cougars were once taken out elk. That must have been a sight to see back in the day. Um another species that we want to chat about, um, a very iconic species found here in the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem is the grizzly bear, not a carnivore, much more um onnivorous, you know, eating meat, but also eating, I feel like anything it can really find. But similar to wolves, um grizzly bears were absent from a lot of the ecosystem. And so again, what did their removal and recovery lead to with, you know, um how other carnivores and omnivores lived and interacted with each other?

Jack Rabe

Bears, especially grizzly bears, had a very unique story in Yellowstone that in many ways was similar to wolves and cougars, but also different in some key ways. So at the time, back in the 1920s and 30s, when we were going through these removal efforts for wolves, bears, cougars, bears were still at actually favored by the superintendent at the time. So they wanted to keep at least some bears around in the park for tourism. So we still had grizzly bears and black bears in Yellowstone continuously up till now, but they were functionally extinct from the ecosystem because they had almost fully become reliant on human food uh sources. So they had set out these trash dumps, and you could have people, you know, come in and watch black bears and grizzly bears feeding on these trash piles for decades. And of course, you know, especially for black bears, there were upwards of almost 45 to 50 attacks every year from mostly black bears, but sometimes grizzly bears on the public. I can't even fathom if that was happening today, what the response would be. Um, but because of that, you know, bears had really just become uh uh trash animals. They were coming into these sites, feeding on trash piles, whatever was put out, baited sites for bears to come in and people could watch. So they weren't really eating any natural resources, natural food sources. Uh up until the 1970s, uh there was a series of attacks, I think in 1967 in August, up in Glacier National Park, where people were attacked and killed by grizzly bears, and it was likely tied to these trash jumps. That sort of kick-started a shift in management. We're like, okay, maybe this is a really bad idea to be feeding these bears that are really dangerous to people, especially once they become, you know, start associating people with food. Uh, and after that, it took uh quite a while, you know, maybe a decade or two, to sort of get the habits of that old generation of bears out uh and sort of get them back and weaned off of human resources and back into mostly consuming natural food. And that was probably around the mid-80s that we really started to see grizzly bears and even black bears functionally restored to the ecosystem where they're really focusing on uh natural food sources. And again, they're have very really varied diets where they might eat hundreds of different food sources in the in the ecosystem, from grasses, sedges to to elk calves to bison calves. And I think you know, grizzly bears especially are very efficient predators, uh, particularly of elk calves during that first month to two months of an elk's life. Grizzly bears alone are probably killing more elk calves in that first month than wolves, cougars, coyotes combined across that entire first year of an elk calves' life. So they're also a very important regulating factor here in the ecosystem. And once that was restored and grizzly bear numbers recovered to about threefold what they were in the 80s, uh now we're at a place where again we have this uh large carnivore community and omnivore community that is now helping maintain this balance within the ecosystem where we've seen a lot of these populations really stabilize, whatever sort of stabilizing means and in ecology and what time scales we're talking about.

Emmy Reed, Host

So the Grid Yellowstone ecosystem and Yellowstone are one of the few places in the lower 48 where grizzly bears and black bears, you know, live alongside each other. Um, it's you you kind of see the grizzly bear is much larger, much stronger. Um, you know, the black bears maybe can hold their own, but I'm not too sure if they're always gonna win. But what do what do their interactions or dynamics look like? How do they affect and influence each other?

Jack Rabe

Yeah, so black bears and grizzly bears are both, you know, really strong generalists, omnivores. They both consume very similar diets. Some of the key differences that you see are really driven by their anatomy. You can look at a grizzly bear and start to say, okay, I can realize what you eat based on your shoulder hump. You know, they have these really strong shoulder back muscles, which are built for digging. They have longer claws, uh, so they're they're consuming a lot of roots, flipping over boulders, logs to access invertebrates, ants, army cutworm moths, um, but also they're great for tearing into carcasses that are out in the landscape. They're really strong scavengers. Whereas black bears, again, don't have some of those really strong anatomical features. So while they will, you know, eat fish, eat elk calves, deer fawns, have these very similar diets to grizzly bears, they're definitely more driven by a lot of the grasses, the foraging of these you know berries or flowers out of the landscape. So we tend to see you know black bears maybe segregating away from where grizzly bears are hanging out because again, grizzly bears are much larger, so they'll competitively exclude black bears from areas. I'd say in areas with really high grizzly bear density, a lot of times when you run into a black bear, it's a large male black bear because it's able to sort of coexist with grizzly bears. But a female with young, really vulnerable cubs, we tend to see them hanging out near the road corridor in these open meadows near forested areas where they have good escape terrain where they can get up into a tree for safety. They're really uh great climbers, and that's maybe another adaptation of living with these other dominant carnivores. But also they might be hanging out in these forested meadow areas near the road corridor because it offers a sort of shield, a human shield from other carnivores like grizzly bears or wolves that maybe aren't as comfortable approaching the road or hanging out near people. So we see this sort of exclusion from where grizzly bears are hanging out, and a lot of black bears are down in the more forested areas. And grizzly bears will use that habitat too, but they're definitely more likely to be in those mountainous um meadow grassland systems.

Emmy Reed, Host

Grizzly bears are kind of the top dog in that relationship. Do you ever see grizzly bears you know predating on black bears? I imagine they may go after cubs. Are, you know, are the adults ever of interest to them?

Jack Rabe

Yeah, I haven't seen it at all. I think it's a very rare occurrence because I think black bears do a pretty good job of avoiding grizzly bears and in those encounters. But I'm sure it does happen on the landscape. I think cubs probably more often are the ones getting killed. Um, and if it is, it's probably more competition driven rather than you know a grizzly bear seeing a black bear as a food source as prey. It's probably more, you know, you're a competitor on the landscape. I want to kill you and get you off the landscape.

Emmy Reed, Host

Yeah. I wonder if they like recognize each other as like fellow bears in a way, and if that influences anything at all.

Jack Rabe

Yeah, I mean, there are cases too, and um some of the, especially during the the era of uh, you know, Yellowstone cutthroat numbers before some of the lake trout um invasion happened and dropped those numbers. Uh, you'd have these massive uh spawning grounds where cutthroat would move up these intermittent streams jutting off of Yellowstone Lake. And I know there it was pretty common that you'd have, you know, mostly grizzly bears, but also male black bears coming into these same sites and fishing for for trout and catching them alongside grizzly bears. So there is maybe some uh allowance of one another and and ability to coexist there. But again, I think it's almost always going to be these really big male black bears that are maybe even similar in size to some of the grizzlies that they can hold their own there.

Emmy Reed, Host

Yeah, definitely when when the food is plentiful, a lot less reason to be hostile with each other. For sure. So we can't forget some of our smaller Greater Yellowstone residents. Um, are there any interesting relationships between any species like red foxes, river otters, badgers, coyotes, ermines, or any of the other smaller guys that you think is interesting or unique?

Jack Rabe

So one thing we found is you know, this we have this hierarchy of carnivores where you have, you know, the top apex carnivores like a wolf, then you have these misocarnivores or middle carnivores, which are your coyotes, your foxes, and then you get down into the even smaller mammals like the weasels. But one thing we actually see is this you know, similar to a trophic cascade, where you think of effects of wolves on elk releasing aspen and helping restore the ecosystem, or now we've kind of talked more about how these other carnivores are playing similar roles and even humans. Um, we see some of these similar things playing out within the canid guild, where because wolves are able to sort of suppress coyotes a little bit, coyotes aren't as capable of suppressing foxes because coyote numbers are reduced. So we might see some release where in that next chain down, where because wolves are limiting coyotes, coyotes look at foxes the same way wolves are looking at coyotes. So if you suppress the coyotes a little bit and regulate them, maybe that enables foxes to rebound and exist or coexist in the system. So we definitely see some of those similar interactions that wolves have with coyotes playing out with coyotes and foxes. Um now we have a we think pretty healthy numbers of all three of those. And foxes again are pretty strong scavengers, uh, and they have more overlap in habitat with cougars. So we actually see uh similar relationship playing out where you know coyotes are going in and scavenging off wolf kills, and then foxes are commonly going in and finding cougar kills and scavenging off them. And sometimes we'll find cougars killing coyotes or foxes that are coming into their site and they'll actually fully consume them. So there's that added risk with cougars that they don't experience with wolves, um, whereas cougars are kind of viewing coyotes and foxes as not only a competitor, but also prey. So they have to avoid cougars in both of those capacities. Then another kind of cool one that's been talked about is the coyote-badger interactions that was super rare, and I've still I've missed it a couple times in the park where they've seen those associations. But that's one of those cases where we think coyotes and badgers are kind of associating because they're both seeking the same small mammals, the ground squirrels, pocket gophers, and they can both sort of use their independent skills to potentially get prey more easily. And we don't know how you know symbiotic that is, are they both always benefiting from one another? Uh, or is one generally you know more dominant and kind of getting most of the rewards out of that association? But it does seem like it works fairly well. And sometimes we do see you know coyotes maybe following badges around because it helps them access small rodents. So that's that's probably my favorite one, I'd say.

Emmy Reed, Host

That's one of my dream sightings. I mean, anywhere, especially in the park. And I feel like the place where I've seen both of them is that little um area before you hit the Lamar Valley. Um, is it called Little America? I think.

Jack Rabe

Yep.

Emmy Reed, Host

Yes, okay. Um, because I've seen badgers there, I've seen coyotes there, and I'm like, yes, it's a matter of time. They gotta get together and help each other out at some point.

Jack Rabe

Yeah, I I've had the same thought. I've seen so many badgers and so many coyotes in Little America and never together. And just two or three weeks ago, I was driving through that stretch and saw a coyote and pulled off to talk with someone about it. They said, Oh, you you just missed it, the classic, you know, you pull in the Yellowstone. You just missed the greatest sighting ever. Uh, and it there was a badger in the area, and they were walking together and associating. Um, so it's incredible. I still haven't seen it, but yeah, definitely my favorite miso carnivore small carnivore interaction or association.

Emmy Reed, Host

Yeah, I feel like just one day I'm just gonna have to go and just sit down there for and like not move. This is the this is the only goal for the day. I'm gonna be like called to Lamar because I'm sure like, you know, the the pack of wolves is fighting 10 grizzly bears over in in the Lamar Valley, but I gotta stay right here because I know at some point there's there's gonna be some some coyote badger magic for sure. Is alright if we hop into some listener questions?

Jack Rabe

Yeah, love to.

Emmy Reed, Host

Perfect. I've got two of them for you. Jennifer from Washington asks, considering the cycles of snowshoe hair to lynx population, how does the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem see population fluctuation or trend between carnivores and omnivores? How closely do they trend each other in increasing or decreasing? Understandably, one year and maybe even five years is not enough time to see trending, but what is the appropriate time frame to measure to determine if there is concern?

Jack Rabe

Yeah, thanks, Jennifer. That's a really great question. So in Yellowstone, you have, at least for a temperate ecosystem, a pretty complex carnivore community and prey community. So where we tend to see the cycling where One predator maybe very closely follows or maybe lags behind the population cycling and fluctuations of a prey species. It's usually in these scenarios where you have one predator who's very dependent and reliant on one prey species, like a lynx hare association. And Yellowstone, again, because we have this benefit of a really diverse and abundant prey community, that's able to support a diverse and abundant carnivore community. And because of that, you don't see a lot of cycling or shifting. You maybe see more stable populations or oscillating, sort of independent of one another, I'd say within the carnivores. Because again, bears are known to consume over 200 different food sources. So maybe elk numbers drop one year, they might have the flexibility to shift to other food sources. So you don't see as much of that tracking or trend matching in population numbers. Same thing for wolves. If elk numbers are down, maybe they can shift to bison or cougars can shift to deer. So Yellowstone, again, because it benefits from having this diverse community and abundant prey, you see, I'd say more stable dynamics that are kind of independent of one another, where you know, right now we've seen very stable wolf, cougar, bear numbers, elk numbers haven't changed much in the last five to ten years. We think deer numbers are probably pretty similar, maybe even climbing, but we don't we don't know. We're hoping to figure that out in the coming years. Um yeah, I'd say we see less of that tracking. But again, ecosystems, as you pointed out, take a long time to play out and change over very slow time frames compared to what we generally think. Um what we think is stable right now in the last 10 years could turn out to be vastly different than what we see these populations doing 50 years from now. Um yeah, very good question.

Emmy Reed, Host

Next up, John from Idaho asks, have you ever seen bears and wolves working together? I'm assuming in a positive relationship.

Jack Rabe

Another good question. Uh I wish we saw some of those associations associations like we see with, say, coyotes and badgers, where you know, maybe you have a wolf and bear, wolf pack and bears traveling together to find opportunities to hunt. Uh, unfortunately, I don't know that I've ever seen any positive associations or working together because they're pretty fierce competitors. What I'd say we get the closest to is probably a mutual tolerance of one another, where sometimes I've seen a wolf and bear feeding on a large kill at the same time and sort of tolerating each other's presence and acknowledging, hey, there's plenty of food to go around. Um, I'll allow you to feed on the other end of this bison carcass while I eat over here. But usually, even those cases, it's very short-lived. And we see those bears either chasing the wolves off or the wolves trying to chase or at least annoy the bear enough that it abandons the kill. A bear, a grizzly bear, especially, is almost always gonna win an interaction uh with wolves, even if it's a pack of 20. But a lot of times those wolves might be able to pester and annoy that bear enough that the bear's like, it's not worth it. I constantly have to chase these wolves off. I can't sit and feed on this kill, so I'm just gonna walk away and leave it for the wolves. Um, but yeah, I'd say we never see these really negative interactions. They tend to tolerate each other okay. Uh, wolves will just sort of wait after and wait until the bear leaves and then come in and get their fill. Um, but yeah, I definitely haven't seen any positive associations or working together in any sense.

Emmy Reed, Host

I'm glad that wolves have identified being annoying as a solid strategy. Like I think I've seen that in effect across all species in some ways.

Jack Rabe

It works really well.

Emmy Reed, Host

Yeah. Um, I want to go back to your work in the park. Um, you study two what seem similar but also very different species, wolves and cougars. And I want to start with wolves first. Can you tell me a bit about what does collaring look like? I mean, that sounds like such a crazy adventure to, you know, be able to get on the ground with these wolves and collar them so that we're able to track their movements and understand them better.

Jack Rabe

Yeah, so unlike most places where uh a lot of wolf capturing and collaring happens through trapping, if you go across most of the west, especially in very mountainous areas, densely forested areas across the other mountain states, you're usually trapping wolves. In Yellowstone, because we have this rare landscape that's very open, uh, we get a lot of snow, we're actually able to bring in a helicopter and fly in in mid to late winter once there's deep snow that can slow down a wolf pack. Temperatures are cooler, so you don't have to worry about wolves overheating as much. Uh, we can bring a helicopter in, dart the wolves with a net gun or a dart gun, hit them with a drug that basically immobilizes them for an hour, and then we'll get dropped off after we successfully dart a wolf from that helicopter, and then we'll spend maybe an hour working with that wolf to put a collar on it, take blood samples, hair samples. You can pull a whisker and run uh radioisotope analysis to look at their diet through time for the lifespan of that whisker, you know, growing and on that animal. Um, body measurements, so you can imagine trying to heave a hundred-plus pound wolf over your head to get an accurate weight while you're trudging through three foot deep snow. Uh, it can be challenging. But yeah, well, when we have that wolf down for that hour, it's a very stressful moment because we're we care deeply about these animals' health, their safety. The last thing we want is for anything negative to happen to that individual. And we've gotten very good at making sure it's a very stable process for that individual. But, you know, while we're intruding on this animal's life for that hour or two, we want to try and collect as much as we can so maybe we don't have to do that again, and that animal can live the rest of its days in peace without being chased by a helicopter. Um, so we'll take as much as we can, and then within about an hour, hour and a half, that animal naturally metabolizes that drug that sort of immobilized it, and then it'll start to get up and walk off, and then maybe sleep sleep the rest of the day, uh, recover its energy, and then usually by the next day, that wolf has rejoined the pack and is traveling with it uh and and is behaving normally.

Emmy Reed, Host

Yeah. And what about cougars? How is it different to track them and and get them collared so you can keep an eye on them?

Jack Rabe

Yeah, so cougars is a very different strategy for capturing and collaring them, but I'd say equally stressful and uh demanding. So for cougars, we sort of capitalize on that co-evolutionary history with wolves. You know, they spent hundreds of thousands of years learning to live and coexist with wolves, and we talked about the different ways that they adapt to that risk of wolves. You know, they'll use more rugged, uh densely forested areas that they can escape into. Uh, they'll run up and into trees if a wolf pat comes in and steals their kill. Uh so one thing we'll do is we'll call our trained houndsman, our partner, that brings his dogs down once we've say gotten a camera hit and we see uh an uncollared cougar that we want to capture, has just passed through one of our trail cameras, or we were out hiking and we found a fresh set of cougar tracks that looks like an adult we want to capture that we know isn't an individual we already have tagged. We'll call our houndsman, he'll bring the dogs down, and then the first thing we do is we loose those dogs on that track, and then they take off following that scent trail and those tracks from that cougar. And they're very efficient at it. Usually within a half hour, hour, um, those dogs have caught up to that cougar, and that cougar's first instinct because it hears dogs barking and thinks, oh no, there's wolves here, is to run up into a tree because they don't have the stamina, the endurance that dogs or wolves do, but they can climb up into a tree successfully. So once we get there, usually we'll have the the hounds at the tree baying up uh with the cougar in the top of the tree. And then if that cougar is in a live tree, a stable position in that tree, it's secure, it's not likely to fall out of that tree. We will dart that cougar while it's in the tree. Uh and the beauty of the sort of drug concoction that we use is it doesn't sedate the animal or put them to sleep. It just immobilizes their muscles and they sort of lose motor function. So if they're in a secure position, kind of perched on a couple log uh branches or limbs, uh, they might even become more secure in that tree because their muscles tense up around the branch or limb that they're they're hanging on. So if they're in that secure position, we'll dart them, and then after about 10 minutes, some lucky soul, usually me, gets to climb up into the tree uh with spurs on my boots to sort of successfully climb up into that tree easily, get up to that cougar, put a rope and hobble around its back legs, and then safely lower it down, belay it down with a rope and harness down to the ground, and then we can fully sedate that animal, do the same process of working it up, and then after about an hour, we'll release that animal and it's off and on its way.

Emmy Reed, Host

And I really um, I mean, even just from your answers, uh I appreciate the care that you put into these, you know, these sessions, because I'm sure it's a very intense experience for you guys, an intense experience for the animal. But, you know, getting the data from these animals and being able to fit them with a collar if necessary is so important to, you know, just the long-term study and eventual protection of these animals and making sure they, you know, can continue to thrive on this landscape.

Jack Rabe

For sure. And it's it's something we're very aware of. Obviously, you know, it's it's tough for these animals to go out and put a collar on them. It's invasive. Uh, and we're trying to move forward in different ways where we can be less invasive. So back in the the 80s and early 90s, before technology really advanced, we were collaring upwards of 80, 90 percent of the cougar population. So almost every cougar was getting chased by hounds up into trees, placed with a GPS collar around its neck. And right now we're moving forward with other approaches to monitor the population. We're setting up camera traps, we were doing non-invasive genetic studies where you can basically go out, find a set of cougar tracks, and follow it back in time to a place where that cougar took a nap or left behind some scat, and we can collect hair or scat and get DNA hits off of those samples and say this scat or hair was from this individual cougar or from this cougar, and you can actually estimate the population from those non-invasive approaches. We're doing similar things with the wolf population where we're doing a bioacoustic study to try and see if we can estimate wolf numbers or look at social interactions between or within packs just by monitoring their vocalizations. So we're trying to push forward as technology improves in other non-invasive ways where we don't have to rely as much on collaring. So that's something we're very tuned into. But again, unfortunately, a lot of the really detailed science that we're doing, like predation monitoring, how they impact prey populations like elk or deer, the most effective way to do that is to still follow these individuals with GPS trackers. And until that goes away, we're we're gonna have to continue to do that to get that really fine-scale data that can be used for management and conservation of the species moving forward.

Emmy Reed, Host

Yeah, it's science is always evolving, new techniques emerge. It's cool to hear all the all the new things that you guys are exploring. In your professional opinion, what is the cutest carnivore or omnivore offspring found in the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem? We need you to help us settle this debate, this ongoing debate.

Jack Rabe

Oh man, that might be the toughest question we've dealt with today. Um I might be biased. I'm definitely biased, but I think my favorite offspring is probably a cougar kitten. I mean, they're just so adorable. They have this like spot, these spots, these bright blue eyes, and they're just like this tiny ball of fur. Um, and then seeing them, you know, on trail cameras, trying to follow in mom's footsteps, trudging through deep snow or making little like chitters or screeches, trying to figure out where mom's at. Uh, it's just so adorable every time we see one. And because they're so elusive, you hardly ever get to see it. So when you do, it's a really special uh thing. So, yeah, that's in my professional biased opinion, I have to go with the cougar kitten.

Emmy Reed, Host

Yes, it's I agree. I think it's one of the toughest questions we ask on this podcast. Um, but I also like coyotes. Um, their little guys are so cute, and I've they often den close to the road. So sometimes you can find a spot where you can still be far enough to observe those little guys. And man, they're they're rather cute too. They look like little dingos or something. I don't know. I love them.

Jack Rabe

Yeah, and they have the like nice red ears and that sort of clean reddish coat. Oh, they are super adorable.

Emmy Reed, Host

Yeah, love those guys. What would your advice be to someone who's interested in becoming a biologist in Yellowstone National Park or anywhere?

Jack Rabe

The first thing I would say is that the wildlife field is a very small, close-knit community. You know, whether you're doing work in Eastern Africa with lions or wolves in Yellowstone or even birds, most people know each other in this in this field. So I'd say definitely focusing on character and being a team player is probably the most important thing. It's it's easy to teach skills, teaching someone how to do a necropsy or hike into the backcountry to follow a wolf, follow a cougar, to count birds. Um but it's hard to teach character and teach that ability and curiosity, working with teams, asking fun questions, exciting questions. So I'd say that's probably the most important thing in this field. And then again, because it's a close-knit community, any opportunity you can to make a connection with another biologist in the field can go a long way. Um, you know, a lot of our jobs that we post in Yellowstone, because Yellowstone is Yellowstone, if we were to post it on a standard job board, you might get thousands of applications that are just impossible for us to sift through. So a lot of it's word of mouth. You know, we reach out to our friends or colleagues and say, hey, who do you have that's really great that you think would be a good fit for our team, for our program? You know, finding opportunities if you're in uh undergrad and college to you know work with a lab, work with a scientist or professor, and just get some volunteer experience even, you know, one one day a week can go a really long way to get your foot in the door, develop some of those skills, and build that network. But as far as degrees go, it's definitely shifting like a lot of science fields where you know the master's is the new bachelor's and the PhD is the new master's. So a lot of people that we bring onto our team have at least a bachelor's degree, a four-year degree in wildlife science, zoology, definitely more that wildlife biology track that gets you some of those field skills is what we most value. And then again, that's going to put you in contact with other people in the field that can be a good reference for you getting a position here. So that's usually that that route that we see people take is getting a bachelor's degree, and then you can do a lot of the field work, which is where I started out. I got my bachelor's degree from the Ohio State University, Go Buckeyes, um, and came out here right after and worked as a field tech for several years, started out doing some work volunteering as a tech, you know, going out hiking hundreds of miles to kill sites of wolves and cougars, and then you know, developed a uh a good connection with the team, showed that I was responsible to you know, maybe move into new roles, moved up to a team or crew lead where then I'm helping lead the field effort to collect some of this data. And then that led to a graduate program where I then got my PhD and finished last year in 2025. Um, so I definitely see if especially if you're wanting to do more research or lead a project, getting at least a master's, if not progressing to a PhD, uh, is really the step you need to take to get into those roles, especially more of an academic position where you're maybe mentoring other students or or starting your own field project.

Emmy Reed, Host

Jack, tell me why you love the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem.

Jack Rabe

Ooh, that's another another heavy hitter. Um, Yellowstone's one of those places that I think hit me at a very early age where, you know, I was that classic kid too, where I was watching, you know, Pokemon or SpongeBob, you know, cartoons on a Saturday morning with a bowl of cereal. But at the same time, I was equally enamored with Nat Geo documentaries. And, you know, I was born the same year wolves were reintroduced to Yellowstone in 1995. So I was sort of growing up as a kid seeing these National Geographic documentaries of you know wolves chasing elk and hearing about what role the wolf recovery played on the ecosystem. And I was taken immediately by that. Uh, and then of course, stepping into my undergrad, I learned all about how trophy cascades work and the important work coming out of Yellowstone. So when I actually had an opportunity to come in yellow and work in Yellowstone in 2017, you know, I had already had this deep appreciation and respect for the system. And you know, I grew up back in Ohio and near Cleveland. So we didn't have you know elk, wolves, bison robbing the landscape. So the first time I laid eyes on those species, you know, on a grizzly bear walking through a meadow or a wolf pack howling, uh, it was it was really special. And I think having a place like Yellowstone where you have this really diverse and abundant community of not only large carnivores, but you know, eight different ungulant species, you know, these prey, bison, pronghorn, elk interacting with each other, feeding in the same grasslands, uh, there's not many places like it out west where you can see all of these species interacting. And it kind of takes you back to what you know these systems were like and maybe where we could be headed uh in terms of conservation moving forward and you know, having a place sort of ground zero for a lot of these major conservation efforts that helped recover species across the globe. You know, a lot of people look to Yellowstone for that. And I think that's it's pretty special to be a part of that story and that legacy working in Yellowstone and being able to go out and in a day see a grizzly bear or see a wolf out there hunting elk or you know, playing with each other, teaching their young how to how to become a bear or become a wolf uh is is just really special.

Emmy Reed, Host

Who is your ultimate conservation or science hero?

Jack Rabe

Okay, so probably two that I'm gonna say. I'm gonna cheat a little bit. Uh one goes back uh again to my childhood watching that geodocumentaries, and this was a pretty surreal moment for me. Was Doug Smith, who helped reintroduce Wolves with Mike Phillips back in 1995. I grew up seeing him on National Geographic Documentaries. And when I first got to Yellowstone, and then he became my boss, that was a very weird moment for me at first of like, I can't believe, I can't believe I'm here. This is crazy. Uh, and then over the years, you know, he grew up in Northeast Ohio, 20 minutes away from where I grew up. So we're both big Buckeye fans, so that helped with you know build a connection with one another there. But again, we both shared this mutual love and appreciation for not only wolves, but again, Yellowstone and all these other species. Um it was pretty special to have you know Doug Smith as now a close friend and mentor who helped shape my trajectory and my career in this field. Uh, someone that I also looked up to when I was a kid before I ever knew him. So Doug is definitely one. Uh, and then the other person would probably be my wife Taylor, um, who has a pretty big presence in terms of science communication. And that's, I think, a big difference in how she um approaches conservation. You know, I do a lot of education and outreach too, but I'm definitely more in the research arm where I'm doing a lot of the boots in the ground data collection, you know, hard statistical analyses and writing code and writing papers. Um, but to see the impact that she's had, you know, also growing up in Northeast Ohio, we went to high school together together. So I've seen her grow through, you know, doing a zoology degree and then coming to Yellowstone, and then seeing her sort of um take a separate trajectory than what I took, and really establishing herself in this field in her own really unique way, and educating, you know, thousands, tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, peop of people every year about wolves, about bears, about these these animals in a place like Yellowstone has been really special to see.

Emmy Reed, Host

Those are two perfect answers. And thank you so much, Jack, for being on the podcast today. Um, we really appreciate all the work you do, and hope you have a good rest of your summer.

Jack Rabe

Yeah, thanks for having me. It was a it was a blast.

Emmy Reed, Host

Thank you so much again to Jack for stopping by the podcast. We appreciate your passion and expertise when it comes to these iconic species. And as much as it pains me to say this, go buckeyes. Interested to learn more about Jack's work in the park? I've included a few links to Yellowstone's research on wolves and cougars in the show notes. If you enjoyed this episode or any of our other shows, please consider rating and reviewing the Voices of Greater Yellowstone podcast on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. It only takes a few moments and it helps us expand our reach and share these stories with new listeners. We appreciate your support. Voices of Greater Yellowstone is a podcast by the Greater Yellowstone Coalition, a conservation nonprofit that works with all people to protect the lands, waters, and wildlife of the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem. As always, thanks for tuning in and we'll see you next time.