Watch a Wild Pack of Wolves Chase a Grizzly Bear Up a Tree in Yellowstone!

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Yellowstone National Park never fails to impress when it comes to drama, especially in the high-stakes encounters between apex predators. When two of the park’s top predators fight over a recent kill, you might think a grizzly would easily take the prize, but a pack of wolves won’t give up their dinner so easily!

The Competition Between Bears and Wolves

In Yellowstone, grizzly bears and wolves live pretty close together, and their territories often overlap. As you can imagine, this leads to some serious fights over food. Bears, being the ultimate opportunists, eat everything from berries to insects. But during calving season, they target newborn elk, deer, and sheep — the same prey the wolves are hunting at that time. However, this takes a lot of work and energy, and bears often skip the hunting part and steal the wolves’ kills for themselves.

Hunting as a Pack

Wolves and grizzly bears have entirely different hunting strategies. Grizzlies hunt alone, while wolves are all about teamwork and hunt together in tightly-knit packs. A wolf is a formidable hunter on its own due to its agility and incredible senses of smell, hearing, and sight. But to take down an animal far bigger than themselves, wolves rely on strategic pack tactics.

For large game like moose, caribou, or elk, the wolf pack will spread out and surround their prey, harassing it from all sides. The wolves know each member of their pack and can read and respond to their cues with precision. While such a coordinated attack is a powerful strategy, it’s also quite risky — one wrong move and a wolf could get kicked or gored. Wolves aren’t always successful, but when they do make a kill, they need to make sure there’s enough to go around, which can be extra difficult when a bear tries to steal it away.

Grizzly Bear vs. Wolf Pack

Despite their stark size difference, grizzly bears and wolves are pretty evenly matched. Grizzly bears are much larger and far more powerful, using brute strength and massive claws to defend themselves. Wolves are smaller, but they have strength in numbers. Even the strongest grizzly will struggle against a pack of wolves surrounding it on all sides. Wolf packs are remarkably coordinated in their teams, maneuvering with impressive speed and agility.

A larger wolf pack can deter a hungry bear. But if it’s a smaller pack, the wolves usually back off and wait for leftovers. Wolves are strategic hunters and won’t risk injury unless they have a clear advantage.

As you can see in this YouTube video, a pack of wolves can chase a younger, smaller grizzly away, though they had to do so twice — which shows you just how tough grizzlies are. But in this case, the wolf pack’s coordinated efforts and united front protected their hard-earned meal from the bear’s attempted thievery.