Hokkaido wolf

The Hokkaido wolf (Canis lupus hattai), also known as the Ezo wolf (Japanese: エゾオオカミ（蝦夷狼）ー Hepburn: Ezo Ōkami) and in Russia as the Sakhalin wolf,[3] is a subspecies of gray wolf that once inhabited coastal north-east Asia. Its nearest relatives were the wolves of North America rather than Asia. It was exterminated in Hokkaidō during the Meiji Restoration period, when American-style agricultural reforms incorporated the use of strychnine-laced baits to kill livestock predators.[4] Some taxonomists believe that it still survives on Sakhalin island[citation needed]. It was one of two subspecies that were once found in the Japanese archipelago, the other being the Japanese wolf.