Never Cry Wolf: The Amazing True Story of Life Among Arctic Wolves

“We have doomed the wolf not for what it is but for what we deliberately and mistakenly perceive it to be: the mythologically epitome of a savage, ruthless killer—which is, in reality, not more than the reflected image of ourselves. We made it the scapewolf for our own sins.

As 1993 draws on, it is clear that a massive and concerted effort is being made by the sport killers to apply a final solution to the wolf problem. The last refuge of the species—the forest, mountains, and tundra of the North—is to be swept clean of this plague.”

This passage from the beginning of the book was penned by Farley 30 years after the initial publication of Never Cry Wolf. He condemns the hypocrisy, inaction, and incompetence of Canadian federal officials by restating his beliefs that, while wolves risk extermination from human beings, they pose no threat to people and that hunters, trappers, and firearm enthusiasts intentionally desire to eliminate wolves altogether to eliminate their competition for game animals, particularly deer. His expression, “final solution,” is a veiled reference to the name of the Nazi program in the 1940s to exterminate all Jewish people.

“As you may have possibly heard, my predecessor supplied the Minister with an explanation of the situation in which it was his contention that there were fewer deer because the hunters had increased to the point where they outnumbered the deer about five to one. The minister, in all good faith, read this fallacious statement in the House of Commons, and he was promptly shouted down by the members howling liar and wolf lover.”

Here, Farley’s supervisor tells him the fate of another conservationist who tried to suggest that wolves were not responsible for the loss of 75% of the great northern caribou herds and that, in fact, hunters cause the precipitous drop. The supervisor’s underlying message to Farley is that, if he wants to remain in the good graces of those above his rank and keep his position, he should conduct his study in such a way that it supports the prejudice of the hunter/trapper lobby, regardless of whether it is factual. Thus, from the beginning, Farley confronts a hindrance to his study of