The gray wolf, Canis lupus, is a keystone predator that currently occupies only a fraction of its former range. Wolves are wide-ranging animals, not easily confined to a single state, and their management should be on a national level.
Wolf populations facilitate trophic cascades that benefit many species in their range; for example, relieving ungulate browsing pressure, which allows revegetation, which allows populations of small animals and songbirds to thrive.
Despite the benefits of wolves, they face unrelenting pressure from hunters, trappers and livestock owners. Wolf hunting disrupts the social structure of wolf packs and leads to unnaturally-skewed age distributions in wolf populations, preventing the social transmission of information that is present in established packs.