These Endangered Wolves Have a Sweet Tooth—and It Might Make Them Rare Carnivorous Pollinators

Most flowering plants need pollinators, relying on bees, bats, birds and more to help them produce seeds and fruits. Sometimes, in rarer cases, a small carnivore puts themself up for the job. Now, scientists say the Ethiopian wolf, the world’s rarest wild dog, might be the first known large carnivore to pollinate, as the canines lick red hot poker flowers to get their sweet fix.

In a new study published in Ecology last week, a team of researchers studying the endangered Ethiopian wolves captured the blossom-licking behavior on camera. The wolves, feeding on the flowers’ sweet nectar, might act as pollinators because of the remnants of pollen on their muzzles.

“The wolves lick the flowers like ice cream cones,” says lead author Sandra Lai, an ecologist at Oxford University in England, to the New York Times’ Elizabeth Anne Brown. She adds that watching the wolves is like a scene from a storybook.

The new images leave “no doubt” that the wolves drink nectar, as Tom Gable, a biologist at the University of Minnesota who studies wolf diets but was not involved with the study, adds to the publication.

Fewer than 500 Ethiopian wolves remain in the wild, with agriculture and diseases taking a toll on their population. They live among the Ethiopian highlands and feed on smaller mammals, such as giant mole rats and common grass rats. Though they tend to form packs, the canines are usually solitary hunters.

Researchers studying these animals had previously seen them licking nectar. To document this behavior, they followed six different wolves over four days in May and June 2023. It usually went like this: The wolf approached the flower stalk and licked the flowers at the bottom, focusing on those that were more mature and contained the most nectar.

Ethiopian Wolf Licks Nectar from Ethiopian Red Hot Poker Flowers

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For large carnivores, “nectar-feeding is very unusual, due to the lack of physical adaptations, such as a long tongue or specialized snout,” Lai tells New Scientist’s Graeme Green. Most flowers are also too fragile or have too little nectar to attract large animals, she explains.

“To the best of our knowledge,” the authors write in the paper, “the observations we report here highlight the Ethiopian wolf as the only large carnivorous predator documented consuming nectar.”

Some wolves had more of a sweet tooth than others: Though all six drank nectar, one female wolf visited 30 blooms in a single feeding session. The behavior also appeared to be widespread, spanning wolves from different packs. They might have learned it from other wolves, the researchers write in the study.

The nectar of the Ethiopian red hot poker appears to be very sweet. Claudio Sillero, founder and director of the Ethiopian Wolf Conservation Program, or EWCP, says he has tried the nectar himself—and that it was “pleasantly sweet,” according to a statement from Oxford University.

“When I later saw the wolves doing the same, I knew they were enjoying themselves, tapping into this unusual source of energy,” adds Sillero, who is also a co-author of the study.

The researchers suggest the nectar isn’t a meaningful source of nutrition and instead might be a sweet treat for the wolves. Lai tells the New York Times that monitors with the EWCP report the animals “go for the flowers as a little treat after hunting their meat meal.”

Notably, the researchers warn that merely drinking nectar does not mean the wolves are effective pollinators. Lai and her team are hoping to confirm actual pollination by wolves, though that is harder to do, as it involves answering more questions, such as determining the pollen load on the wolves’ muzzles and whether their visits actually lead to fruiting.

For her part, Lai is interested in the social learning aspect of this behavior, she tells New Scientist—the researchers have even seen adults bringing their young to the flower fields.

More conservation work will be needed to protect the wolves and flowers, as well as the natural habitats that support them, researchers say. The EWCP aims to help conserve the highlands of Ethiopia for its people and wildlife.

And in regard to the wolves and flowers, this unique interaction can’t be seen anywhere else in the world, Lai tells the New York Times. “That’s worth preserving,” she says.

Alexa Robles-Gil | | READ MORE

Alexa Robles-Gil is a bilingual science journalist based in New York City. Her work has appeared in the Guardian, Undark, Inside Climate News and more.