Black Wolf of the Family

Black coat color is fairly common in domestic dogs but relatively rare in their close relatives, wolves and coyotes. Anderson et al. (published online 5 February; see the cover) analyzed the K locus associated with black coat color in dogs, wolves, and coyotes and document the introgression of a domesticated allele into a wild species. The KB allele leads to a dominant black coat in dogs, wolves, and coyotes. Against the common flow of genes from wild to domesticated animals, the KB mutation originally occurred in dogs and later introgressed into wolves and coyotes by hybridization. Furthermore, the relatively high frequency of black wolves in Yellowstone probably reflects positive selection for the KB allele in the wild.

Where did the Yellowstone wolves come from originally?  This could give some clues as to the amount of "dog" dna in the pack. 

I would think as the pack ages, the color would be less and less common as it is more noticable in the snow for younger wolves, leading to more problems with other predators (like Sarah Palin).

Gray wolf removal from endangered list will stand

 


U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
President Obama has let stand a Bush administration regulation that removed the gray wolf from the endangered species list.
Interior Secretary Ken Salazar reasserts Bush-era findings that the animal is no longer endangered in the Upper Midwest, Idaho and Montana but is still endangered in Wyoming.
By Jim Tankersley
March 7, 2009

Reporting from Washington -- After reversing President Bush on a pack of environmental rules in its first month, the Obama administration let one of Bush's last-minute changes stand Friday: removal of the gray wolf from the endangered species list in the Upper Midwest, Idaho and Montana.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, announcing the decision at a news conference, said the finding by the Fish and Wildlife Service under Bush was "a supportable one. . . . Scientists have concluded that recovery has occurred."
 

Wolf In Dog's Clothing? Black Wolves May Be First 'Genetically Modified' Predators

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/02/090205142137.htm

It's a rare instance of domestic animals — in this case, probably the dogs of the earliest Native Americans — contributing to the genetic variability of their wild counterparts in a way that affects both the recipients' appearance and survival.

(continued)
 

Barsh's laboratory, which has spent years studying genes affecting coat color and other biological pathways in mammals, discovered in 2007 that the gene responsible for black fur in dogs, called beta-defensin, belongs to a family of genes previously believed to be involved in fighting infection. One version of the gene produces light or yellow-colored dogs and wolves; a mutant version missing three nucleotides produces black animals.

She also showed that the gene is dominant, meaning that an animal with only one copy of the gene would still have a black coat. Ten of fourteen pups of a mating between a black wolf and a gray wolf carried the gene and were black.

She and her collaborators used a variety of genetic tests to determine that the mutation was likely introduced into wolves by dogs sometime in the last 10,000 to 15,000 years, about the same time the first Americans were migrating across the Bering land bridge. These humans were probably accompanied by dogs, some of which carried the black-coat mutation estimated to have arisen about 50,000 years ago.