Northern Minnesota Wolf Skull Morphometrics Lack Correlation to Geographic Range
There has been a vast amount of research done on wolves, Canis spp., around the world. Previous research has showed that wolf morphology, in both crania and post crania, correlates to their environment. However, the evolutionary history of the Gray Wolf, Canis lupus, has yet to reach consensus. This paper uses distance measurements on wolf skulls from the northern half of Minnesota, categorized by gender and sorted into four geographical groups based on landcover ecosystems. One-way ANOVAs were run between the four landcover groups and each of the 12 measurements taken between the cranium and mandible. There were no statistically significant results to show that wolf skulls from this region had a correlation to their respective geographic ranges.