Wolverines are wide-ranging scavengers and predators of northern wilderness areas facing habitat loss and persecution. Their welfare in both wild and captive settings presents distinct challenges.
Wolverines represent a case where welfare in captivity is almost impossible to achieve at meaningful levels. Their enormous territory requirements, sensitivity to human presence, and complex ecological needs make them fundamentally unsuited to captive conditions. In the wild, their welfare is threatened by fur trapping, which causes injury and prolonged suffering before death, and by climate change eliminating the snowpack they depend on. Conservation of wolverines requires protecting large roadless wilderness areas and reducing trapping pressure.