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Wolf Management

Watch, Record, Report.

Every one to three years (depending on region) state and federal agencies survey and monitor gray wolf populations. These reports summarize the best available information on the status of gray wolves in specific regions in the United States.

Alaska

Alaska is home to the largest population of gray wolves in the United States. Wolves occur throughout their historic range in Alaska and are found in diverse habitats, from the rainforests of the coastal southeast to the arctic tundra in the north. The state’s wolf population is healthy and stable, and Alaskan wolves have never been listed as endangered or threatened. Sustenance for Alaskan wolves is provided by more than a million moose, caribou, and Sitka black-tailed deer. Wolf hunting and trapping is not allowed within those portions of National Parks that existed prior to 1980—parts of Denali, Katmai, and Glacier Bay National Parks. Other small areas in Alaska are closed to harvests for various reasons.

  • Alaska latest estimate: 7,000 to 11,000 wolves

Past Stats:

  • 2013 estimate: 7,700 to 11,200 wolves. This number is slightly higher than the 2010 estimate.

Pacific West

Historically, gray wolves were common throughout much of Washington, Oregon, and northern California, but wolf numbers began to decline as human populations increased in the latter half of the 1800s. By the 1930s, Wolves were believed to have been extirpated from the Pacific West. Wolves began to recolonize Washington and Oregon via dispersal from the northern Rocky Mountains and Canadian provinces in 2008. At the end of 2017, the combined minimum population estimate for wolves in both states was 252 wolves.

Gray wolves in Oregon were delisted from endangered status under the Oregon State Endangered Species Act on November 9, 2015, but continue to be a protected species in the state. Wolves in the Western Management Zone are federally protected as endangered under the federal Endangered Species Act. At the end of 2017, Oregon’s wolf population was estimated to be 124 wolves in twenty wolf groups, with at least twelve packs of four or more wolves.

Gray wolves across Washington are listed as endangered by the state, but wolves only occur in central and eastern portions of Washington. Federally, wolves in the eastern third of Washington have been delisted, but remain listed as endangered across the remainder of the state. There are three recovery zones in the state: Eastern Washington, Northern Cascades, and Southern Cascades/Northwest Coast. The minimum estimated wolf population in Washington increased by approximately six percent from 2016 to 2017 with 122 known wolves in twenty-two packs, including at least fourteen breeding pairs.

Gray wolves are federally listed as endangered in California. In the fall of 2011, a lone wolf from Oregon entered northern California, where wolves had been absent since 1924. California listed the gray wolf as a state endangered species in 2014, and in December 2016 the state developed a plan for the expansion of wolves from Oregon to California. An adult pair and five pups were detected by trail camera in northern California in August 2015, and a new adult pair with three pups was detected in 2017. In 2018, wolf OR-54, a two-year-old female, traveled 175 miles south from Oregon to Nevada County, California, the most southerly movement of a wolf into the state.

  • California 2019: 9 known wolves in 1 pack, and 3-4 lone wolves
  • Oregon 2018: 137 wolves in 25 wolf groups, a 10.4% increase from 2017
  • Washington 2018: 126 wolves in 27 packs, a 2% increase from 2017

Past Stats:

  • California 2018: 6 known wolves in 1 pack, and 2-3 lone wolves
  • Oregon 2017: 124 wolves in 20 wolf groups, a 10.7% increase from 2016
  • Washington 2017: 122 wolves in 22 packs, a 6% increase from 2016
  • California 2015: 7 wolves in 1 pack
  • Oregon 2015: 110 wolves in 12 packs, a 36% increase from 2014
  • Washington 2015: 90 wolves in 8 packs, a 24% increase from 2014
  • Western Oregon in 2014: 5 wolves in 2 packs, with 1 breeding pair.
  • Western Washington in 2014: 12 wolves in 3 wolf packs, 1 breeding pair.

Northern Rocky Mountains

By the 1930s, the gray wolf had been extirpated from the western United States. Wolves received legal protection in the northern Rocky Mountains under the 1973 Endangered Species Act. Subsequently, wolves from Canada occasionally dispersed south, and in 1986, they began to recolonize northwestern Montana in Glacier National Park. In 1995 and 1996, sixty-six wolves from southwestern Canada were reintroduced into Yellowstone National Park and central Idaho. In 2011, wolves in Montana and Idaho were delisted and managed under state authority, which allowed the hunting of wolves. In 2012, wolves were delisted in Wyoming but were federally relisted in 2014. In 2017, Wyoming wolves were again removed from the endangered species list on April 25, and in the fall of 2017 the hunting of wolves was allowed in northwestern Wyoming.

As wolves are delisted, states have transitioned from minimum wolf counts—which report only the number of animals detected, to population estimates—an attempt to estimate all wolves on the landscape at the end of the year. Such population estimates often have broad confidence intervals that include minimum counts on the lower end. Idaho and Montana have transitioned to population estimates along with minimum counts, while Wyoming continues to conduct minimum counts.

  • Montana 2017:  minimum count of 633 wolves in 124 packs, a 33% increase from 2016. Estimated population is close to 900 wolves
  • Idaho 2016:  81 wolf packs (Idaho only did pack counts in 2016), although the minimum count was 786 wolves in 2015
  • Wyoming 2016: minimum of 286 wolves in 46 packs (20 qualified as breeding pairs), a 21.3% decline from 2017

Past Stats:

  • Montana 2017: 633 wolves in 124 packs, 33% increase from 2016. Estimated population is close to 900 wolves
  • Idaho 2016: 81 wolf packs (pack counts only in 2016), 786 wolves in 2015
  • Wyoming 2016: 347 wolves in 53 packs (23 qualified as breeding pairs), 16% decline from 2016
  • Montana 2015: 536 wolves, 126 packs (32 breeding pairs) 3% decline from 2014
  • Idaho 2015: 786 wolves, 108 packs (33 breeding pairs) 2% increase from 2014
  • Wyoming 2015: 383 wolves, 48 packs, (30 breeding pairs) 15% increase from 2014
  • Montana 2014: 554 adults and pups in 134 packs, with 34 qualified as breeding pairs. This is slightly less than 2012.
  • Idaho 2014: 770 wolves in 195 documented packs, with 26 qualified as breeding pairs. This number is slightly more than 2013.
  • Wyoming 2014: 333 wolves in 44 packs, with 25 breeding pairs. This is slightly higher than the 2013 count.
  • Eastern Washington 2014: 56 wolves in 13 packs, with 4 breeding pairs. Statewide 52 wolves in 13 packs.
  • Eastern Oregon 2014: 70 wolves in 13 packs, with 8 breeding pairs. This is an increase over 2013. In 2014, the Oregon population marks the third year that the conservation population objective (four breeding pairs in eastern Oregon), as defined in the Oregon Wolf Conservation and Management Plan, was achieved.
  • Utah 2014: No packs were documented.

Southwest

The Mexican gray wolf (Canis lupus baileyi) once roamed portions of Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and Mexico. But, as EuroAmerican settlement intensified across the Southwest in the early 1900s, wolves increasingly came into conflict with livestock. Because of these conflicts, extermination campaigns were waged, and by the 1970s, Mexican wolves was eliminated from the United States and Mexico. The last seven wild Mexican wolves in Mexico were captured between 1977 and 1980 and placed in captive breeding facilities. The Mexican wolf was placed on the federal Endangered Species list in 1976 and is the rarest sub-species of gray wolf in North America.

Reintroductions of Mexican Gray Wolves to the wild began in 1998, and focused on the Blue Range Wolf Recovery Area of eastern Arizona and western New Mexico. The wolf reintroduction and dispersal area was greatly expanded in 2015. The United States population has grown to at least 114 Mexican wolves in the wild, with an additional thirty wolves in Mexico. On November 2017, the US Fish and Wildlife Service established a new recovery plan for Mexican wolves with the goal of 320 or more wolves in the United States and 200 or more in Mexico over a period of at least eight years.

  • New Mexico in 2017:  67 wolves in 32 packs, 12% increase in the Mexican gray wolf population
  • Arizona in 2017: 64 wolves in 32 packs
  • Mexico in 2017: estimated 30 wolves in the wild

Past Stats:

  • New Mexico in 2015:  37 wolves (19 packs in 2014) 13% decline from 2014
  • Arizona in 2015:  50 wolves (14 packs in 2014) 12% decline from 2014
  • Mexico in 2015:  19 wolves in the wild
  • New Mexico in 2014: 53 wolves in 19 packs.
  • Arizona in 2014:  56 wolves in 14 packs.

Southeast

The red wolf (Canis rufus) is one of the world’s most endangered canids. Once common throughout the eastern and south central United States, red wolves were decimated by the early 1900s because of intense controls and loss of habitat. The red wolf was designated a federally endangered species in 1967, and again under the 1973 Endangered Species Act. In 1973, the US Fish and Wildlife Service began efforts to locate and capture as many red wolves as possible. Of these, fourteen became the founders of a captive breeding program. In 1980, the USFWS declared red wolves extinct in the wild. By 1987, enough red wolves had been bred in captivity to begin a restoration program. Four pairs of red wolves were reintroduced into the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge in northeastern North Carolina. Today, roughly thirty-five red wolves roam in eastern North Carolina as a non-essential, experimental population (NEP), and more than 200 red wolves are maintained in captive breeding facilities across the United States.

In April 2018, the US Fish and Wildlife Service published a new Species Status Assessment of the most current scientific information, and a five-year review for the red wolf. The Service will reduce efforts to recover red wolves in eastern North Carolina, as it searches for new sites for reintroductions. North Carolina 2018: 35 red wolves, with 3 known breeding pairs

  • North Carolina 2018: 40 red wolves, with 3 known breeding pairs

Past Stats:

  • North Carolina early 2018: 35 red wolves, with 3 known breeding pairs
  • North Carolina 2015: 45- 60 wolves, in at least 7 breeding packs

Western Great Lakes

By the early 1960s, gray wolves were nearly eradicated from Michigan and Wisconsin, and only a small number existed in northeastern Minnesota along the Ontario border. The Minnesota wolves have since repopulated extensive portions of the state, and they spread across northern Wisconsin and Upper Michigan after they were federally listed as endangered in 1974. Because of improving status, Minnesota wolves were down-listed to threatened in 1978. All wolves in the region were down-listed to threatened between 2003-2005, and delisted between 2007-2009, however lawsuits triggered relisting. Wolves were again delisted on January 27, 2012, and public harvests of wolves occurred in Minnesota and Wisconsin in 2012, 2013, and 2014. In Michigan, a public harvest occurred in 2013.

Wolves were relisted on December 19, 2014, and currently, wolves are listed as federally endangered in Wisconsin and Michigan, and threatened in Minnesota. No public harvests have occurred since 2014, and lethal controls for depredation management have only occurred in Minnesota. Dispersing wolves from this region have been detected in North Dakota, South Dakota, Manitoba, Ontario, Missouri, Illinois, Iowa, Indiana, and Kentucky, as well as portions of southern Minnesota and Wisconsin. In Michigan, all breeding wolf populations are found in the Upper Peninsula with only two confirmed dispersal wolves in Lower Michigan. Wolf population data in Wisconsin are minimum counts; in Michigan, estimates of minimum population; and in Minnesota, estimates of actual population.

  • Michigan 2017: 662 wolves in 139 packs, 7.1% increase from 2016
  • Minnesota 2018: : 2,655 (+/- ~ 700) wolves in 465 packs, a 1.07% decrease from point estimate in 2017
  • Wisconsin 2019: 914 to 978wolves in 243 packs, a 1.0% increase from minimum count in 2018

Past Stats:

  • Minnesota 2017: 2,856 wolves in 508 packs, 25% increase from 2016
  • Wisconsin 2018: 905 to 944 wolves in 238 packs, 2.2% decrease from 2017
  • Michigan 2016: 618 wolves, 125 packs, 3% decline from 2014 estimate
  • Minnesota 2016-2017: 2,856 wolves, 508 packs, 25% increase from 2015-16
  • Wisconsin 2017-2018: 905-944 wolves, 238 packs, 2.2% decrease from 2016-17
  • Michigan in 2014: 636 wolves in 126 packs. This is a slight decrease from 658 wolves in 2013. Another winter track survey will be conducted during the winter of 2015-16. The recent re-listing will reduce the ability of the state to control livestock depredations.
  • Minnesota in 2015, estimated 2,278 wolves in 439 packs. This number is slightly higher than the 2014 count of 2,211. There 200 total known wolf mortalities in 2016 with the main causes being legal killing by state and federal agencies because of risks to human health and safety or depredation of livestock. In 2015 243 total know mortalities were recorded.
  • Wisconsin in 2016, an estimated 925+ wolves in 232 packs. This is an increase of 10 packs from last winter and an increase of 6.8% from 2015. The USDA – Wildlife Services confirmed 92 wolf complaints of the 155 investigated during the monitoring period (April 15th, 2016 to April 14th, 2017). Thirty-seven incidents of wolf depredation to livestock and 11 incidents of wolf threat to livestock were confirmed on 31 different farms during the monitoring period. The number of incidents decreased by 29% from 2015-16 when 52 incidents of depredation to livestock were confirmed. Forty-three incidents of non-livestock depredation and no incidents of non-livestock threats were confirmed during the monitoring period. This included 40 dogs killed and 11 injured while actively engaged in hunting activities, and 4 dogs killed and 1 injured outside of hunting situations.

Northeast

In the thirteen-state Northeast Region, the northern forest ecosystem, there is a 41,000 square-mile area of forest from the Adirondack Mountains of New York east through most of Maine. It contains suitable habitat for gray (Canis lupus) or eastern wolves (Canis lycaon). The original wolf in the area may have been either or both of these species. A couple dispersers have been detected, but no breeding packs have been found. In recent years, there has been a significant educational effort by private conservation groups to develop interest in wolf recovery and to consider options for potential recovery. Any gray wolves in the area would be considered federally endangered.

No Past Stats

Canada

Gray wolves (Canis lupus) occur across eighty-five percent of Canada and estimates place the population at 50,000-60,000. Wolves are harvested in seven Canadian provinces, two territories, and the Nunavut Region. Wolves are only absent in the agricultural portions of southern Canada and the Maritime Provinces. In 2015, the smaller eastern wolf (Canis lycaon) had a minimum population of 236 mature individuals in and around Algonquin Provincial Park in eastern Ontario and adjacent areas of Quebec. The Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC) assessed eastern wolves as threatened in May 2015, but they are listed as a special concern under SARA (Species At Risk Act), the Canadian Endangered Species Act. Eastern wolves were designated as threatened by the Province of Ontario in June 2016.

  • Canada: 50,000-60,000 gray wolves,  500 eastern wolf adults

Past Stats:

  • Canada: 50,000-60,000 gray wolves and 236+ eastern wolves

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