Yellowstone wolves can wander far
By MIKE STARK
Of The Gazette Staff
The identification of a sheep-killing predator in Eastern Montana is still unknown, but wolf biologists say it wouldn’t be unusual for a wolf from the Yellowstone National Park ecosystem to wander that far.
The latest evidence: A Yellowstone wolf that wandered more than 300 miles from home last spring before getting hit by a vehicle just east of Sturgis, S.D. DNA testing confirmed that the wolf came from the Yellowstone area, according to preliminary results last summer and a final report issued in late December.
Similar genetic testing is being conducted on the animal that was shot Nov. 2 in Garfield County.
The predator, blamed for killing more than 100 sheep over several months, was initially thought to be a wolf until federal agents shot it and examined it closely. The animal’s reddish coat, along with its relatively good teeth and claws, raised doubts about whether it was one of the 1,200 or so wolves living in and around Yellowstone.
DNA tests on the animal at University of California-Los Angeles and the National Fish and Wildlife Forensics Laboratory in Ashland, Ore., should shed light on its origins.
No one dismisses the possibility that the creature could be a wolf from the Yellowstone area. Wanderers, usually young males, can travel hundreds of miles in a single trek.
In the past several years, two wolves have turned up in Washington state, at least three in Oregon, two in Utah and one or two in Colorado, all from Yellowstone or central Idaho.
“These long-distance movements aren’t that unusual,” said Ed Bangs, wolf recovery coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. “Wolves do it all the time.”
On April 10, a 115-pound wolf was found dead on a road outside Sturgis. It looked to be healthy and had deer hair in its stomach, Bangs said. By rough estimate, the wolf had traveled 320 miles or more before it was hit and killed.
If the animal that was shot in Garfield County was a wolf, it would have had to wander less than 200 miles to get from the Yellowstone ecosystem to the area around Fort Peck, Jordan and Circle.
“It wouldn’t surprise me at all” if the wolf came from Yellowstone, Bangs said. “We’ll just have to see.”