Carcass of wolf-like animal investigated
By Rebecca Huntington
Jackson Hole News&Guide
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is trying to determine the species of a
wolf-like animal before launching an investigation into its death, an
investigator said Monday.
Biologist collected the slightly decayed carcass Oct. 2 northwest of
Pinedale. It had characteristics that made investigators question whether
the animal was a wolf or a wolf hybrid, the service’s resident law
enforcement agent in charge for Wyoming, Dominic Domenici, said Monday.
“We’re still trying to determine if it is a wolf,” Domenici said. The
carcass has been sent to a forensics lab for analysis and results should
be available soon.
The animal’s killing would be a federal crime if it proves to be a wolf –
a species protected under the Endangered Species Act. Domenici said he
could not release the cause of death because of the potential for an
investigation.
Meanwhile, the Fish and Wildlife Service ordered the killing Oct. 4 of a
third wolf in the Green River Wolf Pack to stop cattle depredations. The
service has incrementally removed wolves from the Green River Pack,
beginning with the alpha male, shot by agents last spring.
Livestock depredations stopped until the alpha female hooked up with a
male dispersed from the Teton Pack, said Mike Jimenez, Wyoming wolf
recovery co-ordinator for the service.
The alpha female and her new partner began killing cattle, and the service
responded by killing that male. The wolves share a national forest
allotment with the Upper Green River Cattlemen’s Association, which grazes
livestock on Union Pass east of Jackson.
Cattle depredations resumed again so federal agents shot a third wolf last
month.
The gray wolf had been spotted on cattle carcasses with the female and
turned out to be one of her pups, Jimenez said. Some of her other pups
have disap-peared but were not killed by the service, he said.
“We don’t go in and mow them all down,” Jimenez said, responding to claims
the service had removed the entire pack.
So far, the Green River Pack has racked up 10 confirmed cattle kills this
year and five, including one sheep, the previous year, he said. Ranchers
put more riders on the allotment to try to prevent depredations, but the
killings continued, he said.
Jimenez expects depredations to stop now both because of the control
action and because cattle have been moved off the allotment.
Jimenez saw the alpha female Saturday with one pup – down from five
counted in the spring – and a new male partner.
This time, she has paired up with a 7-year-old from the Nez Perce Pack in
Yellowstone National Park. The male was born in 1996 in northwestern
Montana. He was among a double litter of pups relocated to Yellowstone
after the adult wolves in his pack were destroyed for killing livestock in
Montana.
Another double litter of pups discovered near Daniel this summer has been
keeping out of trouble this fall, said Jimenez, who on Saturday counted 17
wolves in that pack. The pack, however, already has eight confirmed
livestock kills on its record.