A new, more sophisticated method for analyzing sound recordings of wild wolf howls can, with absolute accuracy, tell individual wolves apart-and may even help save the old dog, according to a new paper in the journal Bioacoustics.

Study leader Holly Root-Gutteridge and colleagues at Nottingham Trent University in the U.K., working with recordings of wild wolves mostly from Algonquin Provincial Park (map) in Ontario, Canada, also found the technique can distinguish a single animal from a chorus of howlers with 97.4 percent accuracy. The team had previously used the method with captive wolves, but this is the first time it's worked with wild wolf songs and all the ambient sounds that go with them.

Specifically, the team's more thorough