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Researchers have captured video footage of wild wolves in British Columbia pulling crab pots out of the sea to eat the bait inside, the first evidence of the animals' possible use of tools.
A report published on Monday In the scientific journal Ecology and Evolution, researchers Kyle Artel and Paul Paquet say they placed cameras on the beach, aimed at crab traps of the Heiltsuk First Nation, to find out what keeps damaging them.
The traps, set near Bella Bella on British Columbia's central coast, were used to control the invasive European green crab, and some were persistent in deeper waters, leading researchers to believe the damage that began in 2023 was caused by marine mammals.
“We thought, 'Well, why the hell is this being done, right?' said Artell, a researcher at the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry who was involved in the Heiltsuk Nation's green crab response efforts.
“It can’t be a bear, a wolf. They are not going to dive to get to the trap. So what gets the traps?”
This video footage from researchers Kyle Artel and Paul Paquet shows sea wolves in central British Columbia retrieving crab pots in what researchers say may be the species' first use of tools.
Their assumptions were wrong.
A day after installing the cameras last May, researchers captured footage of a sea wolf emerging from the water with a buoy hanging from its mouth.
The footage then shows the wolf dropping the buoy on the beach, picking up the exposed fishing line and pulling on it until the crab pot came out of the water.
The wolf then picked up the trap in its mouth, carried it to shallow water and ate the bait inside.
“We had to pick our jaws off the floor,” Artell said.
“We know they're very, very smart, but it didn't occur to us that, oh, maybe a wolf would swim up to the deeper traps and bring the buoy closer to shore, pulling on the line like a human would.”
Cameras then captured a second sea wolf pulling a crab pot in a similar manner earlier this year, leading researchers to speculate that other wolves in the local pack may have been learning from each other.
Sea wolves are a subspecies of gray wolves known for their marine diet.
As for how the behavior started, Artel said researchers can only speculate.
“Ultimately we don't know, but the two most likely explanations we think are that wolves started doing this with traps that were open at low tide because it's really easy,” Artell said.
“Perhaps there was a gradual learning process that started with the trap completely on shore, ending with traps partially submerged, and then tying the line to the trap, and then the buoy to the line… That would make a lot of sense, and that's how we often learn.”
Researchers say several cameras across British Columbia are now dedicated to crab pots 24/7 to monitor the behavior of sea dogs in the area, while “work is underway” to prevent too much damage to the pots that could interfere with invasive crab research.
“There are some really special things going on here and we want to know more about it. What else is happening on the ground? What else can these wolves teach us? learn more about wolves here,” Artel said.
“This is really just the tip of the iceberg.”
Mark Bekoff, professor emeritus of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Colorado Boulder, said the paper was exciting, pointing to groundbreaking research by the likes of Jane Goodall in the use of tools by other mammals, such as chimpanzees.
“It just adds another element to the fact that wolves are incredibly smart. They are extremely adaptive animals,” Bekoff, who was not involved in the study, told CBC News.
