Alaska Teacher Killed By Wolves Send Hunters To Local Town

By: Kara Gilmour
Staff Writer
Published: Mar 20, 2010

Officials are still investigating the Alaska teacher killed by wolves incident earlier this week. Candice Berner was attack on a jogging path about a mile away from her home.

Alaska teacher killed by wolves is something rare, especially when it happened on a jogging path. Officials spent most of the week searching for the animals. Weather conditions made it impossible to track the predators near Chignik Lake.

Candice Berner, 32, was attacked about one mile from her home. Residents discovered her body on March 8. An autopsy concluded that at least two or three predators were involved in the attack.

During the initial investigation, there were no fresh wolf tracks in the area. However, local residents reported sightings of wolves in and near the town. Local hunters began patrolling for the predators.

Berner was an educator and originally from Slippery Rock, Pennsylvania. She moved to Alaska last August and was an avid runner. Lab tests concluded that the animals did not have rabies.

Officials from the Peninsula School District said she left work at the end of the day to go for a run. A group of snow machiners found her a short time later. Her gloves were in the road and Berner's body had been dragged off the road down a hill.

Attacks Rare In Populated Areas

There were numerous wolf encounters in the Fairbanks North Star Borough and Anchorage during November and December 2007. The animals were reported to be attacking and preying on pet dogs. The predators live throughout Alaska, however they are not commonly seen in residential areas.

Wild Animals Group In Packs

Occasionally, single wolves are found in the wild, though packs are more common. Lone adults are typically old specimens driven from their pack or young adults in search of new territory. Wolf packs in the northern hemisphere tend not to be as compact or unified.

Normally, the pack consists of a male, a female, and their offspring, essentially making the pack a nuclear family. The size of the pack can change over time and is controlled by several factors. Packs can contain between 2 and 20, but 8 is a more typical size.

An unusually large pack consisting of 36 wolves was reported in 1967 in Alaska. These animals will usually remain with their parents until the age of two years. Young from the previous season will support their parents in nursing pups of a later year.

Wolf cubs are very submissive to their parents, and remain so after reaching sexual maturity. On occasion in captivity, subordinate adults may rise up and challenge the dominant pair; such revolts may result in daughters killing mothers and sons killing fathers. Wolves that act unusual, such as epileptic pups or thrashing adults crippled by a trap or a gunshot, are usually put down by other members of their own pack.

Human Prey

Some wolf packs in Alaska and Western Canada have been observed to feed on salmon. Humans are rarely, but occasionally preyed upon. Wolves will typically avoid a potential prey item which does not conform to what they experienced during their lives.

Generally, the greater the discrepancy to what the animals are accustomed to, the greater their resistance to exploring it. This is only increased should the new prey act bold, assertive, and fearless. Nevertheless, even if there is no food shortage, wolves will explore alternative prey if they continually come into close contact with it and habituate themselves.