Eight years ago, a young male wolverine from Idaho surprisingly showed up near Truckee in California’s Sierra Nevada range. Wolverines had been absent there for 80 years. Discover profiled the animal in March 2014, in the article “Where’s Buddy?”
“Buddy” was the nickname given by wildlife biologist Amanda Shufelberger, who works for Sierra Pacific Industries, a lumber company. Young wolverines migrate to empty territories to find mates and start new populations. Buddy set up shop on a snowy mountaintop owned by the timber company.
It turned into an odd kind of love triangle. Each winter, Shufelberger kept tabs on Buddy with motion-sensitive trail cameras, which she set near trees baited with raw chicken. She never saw him during the summer or, for that matter, in the flesh. Also, she never recorded a female wolverine.
The media ran stories about “the lonely wolverine.” People felt sorry for Buddy. He grew middle-aged, ...
