Editing Arctic wolf (section)

==Taxonomy==
[[File:Map indicating the Queen Elizabeth (or Parry) Islands, northern Canada.png|thumb|left|Queen Elizabeth Islands, northern Canada]]
[[File:Mapchart.JPG|thumb|left|Queen Elizabeth Islands region (QEI) divided into five major areas by apparent importance to arctic-island wolves.<ref>{{Cite journal|title = Wolf-sightings on the Canadian Arctic Islands|last = Miller|first = Frank|date = 1995|journal =  Arctic |doi = 10.14430/arctic1253|volume=48|issue = 4|doi-access = free}}</ref><ref name=":0">{{cite journal |title=Movement Patterns of Barren-Ground Wolves in the Central Canadian Arctic |last=Walton |first=Lyle |date=2001 |journal=Journal of Mammalogy |doi= 10.1093/jmammal/82.3.867|volume=82 |issue=3 |pages=867–876}}</ref>]]

In 1935, the British zoologist [[Reginald Pocock]] attributed the subspecies name ''Canis lupus arctos'' (Arctic wolf) to a specimen from Melville Island in the [[Queen Elizabeth Islands]], Canada. He wrote that similar wolves could be found on Ellesmere Island. He also attributed the name ''Canis lupus orion'' to a [[Greenland wolf]] specimen from [[Cape York (Greenland)|Cape York]], northwest Greenland.<ref name=pocock1935/> Both wolves are recognized as separate subspecies of ''Canis lupus'' in the taxonomic authority ''[[Mammal Species of the World]]'' (2005).<ref name=wozencraft2005/>

A study by Chambers ''et al''. (2012) using [[Autosome|autosomal]] [[microsatellite]] DNA and [[Mitochondrial DNA]] data indicate that the Arctic wolf has no unique [[haplotype]]s which suggests that its colonization of the Arctic Archipelago from the North American mainland was relatively recent, and thus not sufficient to warrant subspecies status.<ref name=Chambers>{{cite journal |title=An account of the taxonomy of North American wolves from morphological and genetic analyses |vauthors=Chambers SM, Fain SR, Fazio B, Amaral M |year=2012 |journal=North American Fauna |volume=77 |pages=1–67|doi=10.3996/nafa.77.0001|doi-access=free }}</ref> During a meeting assembled in 2014 by the [[National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis]] of the [[United States Fish and Wildlife Service]], one speaker, Robert K. Wayne, mentioned he disagreed with the conclusion that a subspecies had to be genetically distinct, believing that different subspecies could slowly grade into each other - suggesting that although it was impossible to determine if an individual wolf was one subspecies or the next using DNA, the population of Arctic wolves as a whole could be distinguished by the looking at the proportions of [[single-nucleotide polymorphism]]s (SNP): i.e. Arctic wolves could be distinguished by having three wolves in the putative population with a specific SNP, whereas another subspecies could be distinguished by having 20 wolves with that SNP. Wayne furthermore stated that he believed the [[habitat]] in which the wolf happened to be found was a good enough characteristic to distinguish a subspecies.<ref>[http://www.fws.gov/home/wolfrecovery/pdf/Final_Review_of_Proposed_rule_regarding_wolves2014.pdf#47 Review of Proposed Rule Regarding Status of the Wolf Under the Endangered Species Act] p. 47</ref>