Wolves Restore Balance to Yellowstone
COOPER: Earlier this week, I was pretty far away from the city life you see behind me. I was out in the woods on the hunt for a killer at Yellowstone National Park, on the lookout for gray wolves as part of our "Planet in Peril" series. Now the wolves were once near extinction. They're now back at the park and thriving. And while they're killing other animals, they're also bringing new life to the ecosystem. Take a look.</s>COOPER (voice-over): When you're watching for wolves in Yellowstone Park, there's a lot of running, hiding and waiting.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK, copy that.</s>COOPER: When you finally see them, if you're lucky enough to see them, they're usually eating something. In this case, a bison.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's the alpha male.</s>COOPER: The pack will feed on this bison for about 48 hours, and other animals will also enjoy the kill. And that simple fact represents a real change in Yellowstone. (on camera) The reintroduction of gray wolves to Yellowstone Park began in 1995. A total of 41 wolves were brought back here. Their numbers have increased steadily since then, and they've had a major impact on the ecosystem. (voice-over) Doug Smith is the leader of the Wolf Restoration Project in Yellowstone. He takes me to the site of another wolf kill.</s>DOUG SMITH, LEADER, WOLF RESTORATION PROJECT: This kill is one week exactly.</s>COOPER (on camera): After the wolves are done -- after the wolves kill the elk and they eat a certain percentage of it, and then they leave and other creatures come?</s>SMITH: Correct. Actually, sometimes simultaneously. The ravens and the magpies arrive instantly. They're right here. Sometimes the wolves at one end, the ravens at the other end. And then the wolves feed and they can eat up to 20 pounds in one meal. They gorge themselves and typically move off. And then other animals come in. Coyotes, black bears, maybe even a grizzly bear.</s>COOPER (voice-over): And it's not just the animals. The ripple effect extends to the park's plant life, too. (on camera) This is a stand of willows.</s>SMITH: Yes, it is. And this stand has grown up in the last ten years since wolves were reintroduced.</s>COOPER: So why is it that introducing wolves would have an impact on trees or on bushes?</s>SMITH: What we think is happening is that wolves pose a risk of predation to elk. And elk eat willows. And so having wolves back on the landscape after being absent for 70 years has changed elk behavior.</s>COOPER: Because of the wolves now, the elks have less time to graze, and also there are fewer of them. So the willows are growing. What impact do the willows have?</s>SMITH: Right now, Anderson, I'm sitting, listening to numerous songbirds in this stand of willow. There's a flycatcher there. I've heard a warbler, some sparrows. They're all using this stand of willows, for this type of habitat is very important to some songbirds.</s>COOPER (voice-over): And the cascade continues. Doug says the reintroduction has increased the beaver population in one part of the park ten times over, and beaver dams create ponds, which support water foul and native trout and so on and so on. A single species reintroduced. A dramatic effect on Yellowstone's more than two million acres. Back at the bison kill, with the sun setting, there's a report of a battle between a bear and a wolf. (on camera) This is exactly what you had hoped for all along with the reintroduction, would be this kind of active natural cycle?</s>SMITH: Yes, absolutely. Wolves fighting with black bears is natural. And eating bison carcasses is natural. And it restores Yellowstone to what it used to be.</s>COOPER: Remarkable place. Up next, the tallest man in the world meets the shortest, a primordial dwarf. Enriched uranium and ramen noodles? All of them put together, believe it or not. Posh and Becks in L.A. A lot ahead.</s>COOPER (voice-over): He's got the legs; she's got the Spice. Beckham and Spice, the newest British invasion, right here, right now. Also tonight, the picture of a perfect citizen. She voted. She ran for office. She won. Then this.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It was heartbreaking. My whole world after that day, everything was just torn apart. I didn't know what to do anymore.</s>COOPER: How a secret from her distant past, that she didn't even know, turned her American dream into a nightmare. Next on 360.