COLORADO
WOLF & WILDLIFE CENTER NOVEMBER 2018
Judge blocks wolf protection rollback BY HOLLY KAYS
CERTIFIED BY THE
A captive red wolf stands with her pup. Wildlands Network photo
The Colorado Wolf and Wildlife Center is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization certified by the Association of Zoos & Aquariums (AZA). Look for this logo whenever you visit a zoo or aquarium as your assurance that you are supporting a facility dedicated to providing excellent care for animals, a great experience for you, and a better future for all living things. The contents of the material we include in our newsletter does not necessarily reflect the views of Colorado Wolf and Wildlife Center. We collect information from sources that are from other organizations, the web, news feeds, and/or other sources. We choose articles that are in the related field of education and conservation.
To subscribe to our newsletter, visit our website at
wolfeducation.org and sign up on the newsletter page.
A federal judge found that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service violated the Endangered Species Act and the National Environmental Protection Act when it rolled back protections for the world’s only wild population of red wolves. U.S. District Court Chief Judge Terrence W. Boyle, in the Eastern District of North Carolina, found that, “taken together, these actions (of the USFWS) go beyond the agency’s discretion and operate to violate [the USFWS’] mandate to recover this species in the wild.” He made permanent a Sept. 29, 2016, order preventing the Fish and Wildlife Service from capturing and killing red wolves and authorizing private landowners to do the same. In September 2016, the USFWS announced that red wolves would be removed from the majority of the five-county area of eastern North Carolina where they’d been reintroduced. The move followed nearly two years of evaluating the feasibility of reintroduction efforts, and a lawsuit in which environmental groups claimed the USFWS was not doing enough to protect the wolves. Reintroduction was once attempted in the Smokies, but failed. A five-year red wolf status review, released April 24, showed that only about 40 red wolves are left in the wild with only three known breeding pairs remaining. In June, the Fish and Wildlife Service proposed a new
| 2 | COLORADO WOLF AND WILDLIFE CENTER
rule that would restrict the protected red wolf population to one national wildlife refuge and a bombing range in eastern North Carolina, repealing any restrictions on killing red wolves wandering outside that area. “Support for red wolf protection has been overwhelming,” said Jason Rylander, senior staff attorney for Defenders of Wildlife. “But the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has ignored public support and moved forward with a proposal that will doom the species to extinction. Today’s decision by the court to protect red wolves from being shot and killed offers a glimmer of hope for species recovery and new energy to make this program successful once again.” The Fish and Wildlife Service’s June proposal drew 108,124 written comments, with nearly all of them — 99.9 percent — favoring strong federal protections for the animals. That figure comes from an analysis by the Wildlands Network, Wolf Conservation Center, Center for Biological Diversity, Defenders of Wildlife and Animal Welfare Institute, all of which have strongly favored additional protections. Of the 2,923 comments submitted by North Carolinians, 2,898 were in favor of red wolf protections, the analysis said. In the current five-county red wolf recovery areas in eastern North Carolina, 75 out of 95 submitted comments — 78.9 percent — were prowolf.
TOP LEFT: The wolves love the snow and often roll in it to cool off and just for fun, Na’vi is no exception. TOP RIGHT: After being paired up, Makuee and Keyni are nearly inseparable. They play constantly and often do the ‘Wolf Tango’ as we at the Center have taken to calling there dances. RIGHT: Wolves have the most expressive faces, you can just feel so many emotions in those gorgeous eyes. Keyni is quite suspicious.
Wolf Taken to Isle Royale National Park This Fall Dies The Other Three Wolves are Doing Well November 14, 2018 The Associated Press TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. – A gray wolf relocated this fall from the Minnesota mainland to Isle Royale National Park has died. The male wolf was among four taken to the Lake Superior island park from the Grand Portage Chippewa reservation. It’s part of a multi-year effort to rebuild the Isle Royale wolf population, which has fallen sharply in recent years. Officials said recently that the male wolf’s collar had
been sending false mortality signals since it was released on the island, despite evidence the animal was alive and on the move. But late last month, the collar indicated the wolf was no longer roaming. Crews tracked him down and found his body. The cause of death wasn’t immediately clear. A necropsy was planned. Officials say other three relocated wolves are doing well. COLORADO WOLF AND WILDLIFE CENTER | 3 |
WOLF TANGO
The story of our newest couple
| 4 | COLORADO WOLF AND WILDLIFE CENTER
CWWC is very happy to announce the successful pairing of two of our wolves, Keyni (Keen-eye) and Makuee (Ma-ku-ee). They appear to be very much in love and are getting along extremely well. Unfortunately, the story of how they became a couple starts off on a sad note. A few months ago we lost one of our beloved wolves, Sakara, who passed away suddenly of a gastric torsion at the age of 11. She had lived at CWWC, with her brother Kekoa (Keyco-a), for her entire life and when she passed away he became very sad (his howl became much deeper, quite melancholy, and would even crack occasionally). Darlene, the founder of CWWC, knew that she needed to find Kekoa a new companion and immediately reached out to other wolf sanctuaries throughout the country in search of a suitable mate. She successfully located a 5 year old timber wolf named Makuee, who was living at Seacrest Wolf Preserve in Florida, and it seemed like she would make a good companion for him. After letting Kekoa mourn for a couple of months, Darlene (and a couple staff members), made a cross country road trip to Florida, picked up Makuee, and brought her back to Colorado. She arrived on September 15th of this year and we put her in the enclosure next to Kekoa. The day she showed up, Kekoa was very excited and was pushing at his side of the fence to try and meet her (there is approximately a 4 foot gap between the fences of the enclosures to prevent a face to face meeting too early in the introduction process). We took this as a positive sign and after a few days we opened up one of the two hallway gates that separated their enclosures so they could meet nose to nose through the remaining gate. Unfortunately, once that gate was open, we saw no real interest from Kekoa or Makuee to meet and both appeared pretty much indifferent to each other. After a week or two of them living side by side, we decided to try and introduce them face to face in hopes that they would show more interest without a fence separating them. To our disappointment that meeting did not go well. Makuee approached Kekoa within the first 30 seconds of him entering her enclosure and he immediately growled at her very loudly and clearly to let her know that he did not want to meet her. Makuee backed away, but was clearly not dissuaded. She tried to approach him three more times, and each time he growled in the same manner. At this point, it was clear that Kekoa did not want to meet Makuee and did not want her as a companion. Fortunately we had another eligible bachelor at the center, Keyni. He had been living with the center’s two artic wolf brothers, Raksha (Rock-shaw) and Isha (E-sa), but they had both recently moved out to live with their new girlfriends, Chakra (Shock-ra) and Orenda (O-wren-da), with each couple getting
their own enclosures. This left Keyni alone, sad, and looking for a new companion (he loves to play and has frequently had play dates in the past with staff members’ dogs!). As a result of this, we decided to move Kekoa to another enclosure and Keyni to Kekoa’s enclosure so we could see if he and Makuee might make a good couple. We started the introduction between Keyni and Makuee by having staff members spend time with each wolf, as near to the fence separating their enclosures as possible. The staff members then switched enclosures and spent time with the other wolf in the hopes that this would help the socialization process by letting the wolves smell each other on the staff members hands and clothing. After about a week of this, we opened up one of the hallway gates between the enclosures so the two could meet nose to nose through the remaining gate. Keyni seemed interested, but unfortunately, when we would get them close to each other by the gate, Makuee frequently growled and sometimes barred her teeth. She seemed to do this only when staff members were socializing with her, so we were hoping that this was more jealousy behavior for attention and not true aggression, but really weren’t sure. At this point we were not real positive about the outcome of them becoming a pair so we decided to try a new approach. We started by conducting pen rotations between the two. Fortunately the enclosures are set up so we could rotate them back and forth without actually having them meet face to face. This started out with day excursions to each other’s side, followed by overnight stays, which gave them the opportunity to learn each other’s unique scent/smell as well as the others’ enclosure space, and hopefully make their final introduction more comfortable. After about a week of this we started to see them going nose to nose at the hallway gate and saw Makuee pawing at the gate frequently when Keyni was near. This was an encouraging sign and then, after about another week, we saw them nose to nose at the gate in the puppy play stance for the first time. This made all of us very happy and optimistic that they would become a great pair. We continued to see them in puppy play stance over the next several days and it became quite clear they were ready to meet. Finally, on November 5th, we opened the remaining gate that separated them, and Makuee immediately crossed over to say hi to Keyni. At this point they started to dance/play with each other in what Darlene instantly and appropriately named the “Wolf Tango”. This was a perfect description as that is exactly what they appeared to be doing. They are now living together full time and are doing great! They make an extremely cute couple and are still seen “doing the tango” on a daily basis! COLORADO WOLF AND WILDLIFE CENTER | 5 |
Can we learn to live with wolves again?
In Colorado, we have 12 streams named Wolf Creek, yet officially, we have no wolves in our state. A reprint of a rare book helps to explain the loss of Colorado’s wolves. Arthur Carhart’s book, “The Last Stand of the Pack” (1929), describes in grim detail the struggle to pursue and kill the last Colorado wolves ranging in the wild in the 1920s. Across the West, the same predator mania continued. The frontier had officially ended in 1890, and the last vestiges of wilderness had to be cleansed of their large predators, especially the feared, gray timber wolves, which may once have numbered in the thousands in Colorado. “The Last Stand of the Pack” is now back in print, published by the University Press of Colorado in a critical edition edited by me and Tom Wolf. All of Carhart’s original words are there, and we added new essays on the eco-possibilities of wolf re-introduction. The Bureau of Biological Survey claimed to have killed Colorado’s last wolf in 1935. Scholar Michael Robinson believed the date was 1945 in Conejos County. Either way, it has been decades since Colorado’s mountains have heard the full-throated howls of a wolf pack on a moonlit night, but that may be changing. Single wolves are returning to their former habitat and a breeding pair may meet in the next decade. With raw words, sparing no blood, Carhart described the last wolves killed in Colorado. This was nature writing at its best. Carhart made clear the economic losses suffered by ranchers and their visceral animosity toward wolves. Always on the run, harassing livestock because of the depletion in game, the last wolves had names like Old Lefty from Eagle County, the Phantom Wolf near Fruita, the Greenhorn Wolf south of Pueblo, the Unaweep Wolf from Unaweep Canyon, Big Foot at DeBeque, Old Whitey near Trinidad and Rags the Digger at Cathedral Bluffs in Rio Blanco County. Wolves harassed livestock because wild game populations had dramatically dropped. Most of Colorado’s elk had been shot and killed by market hunters, who were paid 10 cents a pound for elk, deer and antelope. Today’s elk herds evolved from elk transplanted from Montana and Wyoming. The state’s elk herds are doing fine, but there are rising fears of chronic wasting disease. How to combat the disease? Introduce gray wolves to cull the weak, the young and the sick. Wolves can help restore our Colorado ecosystems. As a deer and elk hunter, I want wolves back. | 6 | COLORADO WOLF AND WILDLIFE CENTER
No one knows how wolves will fit into the Colorado landscape, but many of us are waiting to find out. A survey conducted by Colorado State University found that 73 percent of Coloradans, most living on the Front Range, support wolves in Colorado, and 20 percent do not. Obviously, that 20 percent includes ranchers who have a different perspective, but that’s all the more reason to begin a dialogue on wolves. So if wolves are coming back to Colorado, coming down from Yellowstone National Park only to be killed along Interstate 70, why not help them out? Why not reintroduce wolves? Three times, the Colorado Parks and Wildlife Commission has passed resolutions opposing reintroduction of wolves to the state. They did it in 1982, 1989 and 2016. Perhaps it’s time to revisit that important decision. If wolves arrive on their own, we’ll have to live with where they appear. If wolves are introduced, there can be more flexibility on where they live and certainly more planning. Wolf reintroduction into Colorado will take time and patience. Folks who would never normally speak to each other – because they wear different hats, different footwear, drive different vehicles and support different causes – will have to sit at the same table and share their values, their thoughts, their hopes for their families, as well as their future. With 5.5 million people, Colorado is essentially an urban state with suburban sprawl on the Front Range and less than 250,000 people on the Western Slope where wolves would be introduced. Why not restore our full complement? We’ll probably never have grizzly bears back in Colorado. They take too much territory and live at elevations that we do, but wolves – I think we could adjust. I think we could learn to accommodate ourselves to another top-tier predator besides ourselves. But I admit, as a Colorado wildlife biologist told me, “More hearts have to be won.” Wolves are part of our Western wildlife heritage. Learning to live again with them in the Rocky Mountains may be one of our most important 21st-century lessons in ecology and humility. We killed wolves with poisons, traps and guns. Arthur Carhart came to realize the pervasive power of industrialized death. A year after publishing “The Last Stand of the Pack,” Carhart questioned co-author Stanley P. Young whether exterminating wolves “to please squawking stockmen” could be justified. “Isn’t it a just consideration that the cats and wolves and coyotes have a damn sight better basic right to live in the hills and
James Shaw holds a dead wolf killed near Thatcher in Las Animas County. This was one of the last wolves killed on Colorado’s eastern plains. Courtesy Western History Collections, Denver Public Library
have use of that part of the world as their own than the domestic livestock of the stockmen?” he asserted. Carhart, father of the wilderness idea, wanted wild creatures in wild places. What would Carhart think of wolves returning to Colorado? As a wilderness advocate, a “wilderness prophet” in the words of author Tom Wolf, Carhart surely would have seen the connection between wild landscapes and canis lupus. As a hunter and a sportsman interested in healthy big-game populations, he probably could have come to learn what Lewis and Clark understood and what Aldo Leopold tried to teach – that wolves have their place. I hunt wildlife, and I agree – wolves belong. At the Durango Wolf Symposium on Nov. 29-30, guest speakers will includ Michael Philips, executive director of the Turner Endangered Species Fund, and Carter Niemeyer, a retired U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services employee who personally went to Canada to bring wolves to Yellowstone. They will host other experts, including local rancher Tom Compton, who believes, “The development of sound public policy requires careful consideration of all aspects of an issue, paying particular attention to the potential for unintended consequences.” Northern Rockies rancher Joe Engelhart manages a large cattle operation where there are active predators. He will give a talk called “Ranching with Wolves and Other Predators: A True-Life Story.” “There is nothing to be learned or gained from a dead wolf, but we can learn a great deal about sharing the land-
scape with them by first being willing to understand them,” he says. University of Colorado-Denver professor Diana Tomback will speak at the symposia. She argues, “There are compelling practical reasons for restoring the gray wolf to Colorado. The ‘balance of nature’ is not just a poetic catch phrase; it refers to a real ecological state.” I tell my FLC students that wolves are coming home to Colorado. Hopefully, in my lifetime; certainly, in theirs. We need them back. We need to hear their howls on moonlit nights deep in the Weminuche Wilderness or high on the Flattops on Colorado’s Western Slope. Gray shadows should leave paw prints in snow beneath dark trees. Maybe wolves will even return to their old haunts where Carhart wrote about them in Unaweep Canyon, on the Book Cliffs, along Huerfano Creek, beside the Purgatoire. Wolf recovery in Colorado will be a grand experiment. I wish Arthur Carhart were alive to write about it. He’d love to record the cycle of ecological change and humans foregoing hubris for humility. “The Last Stand of the Pack” is a valuable historical account. Now in the 21st century, we should turn a new page and allow a top-tier predator to bring balance back to our ecosystems. Andrew Gulliford is a professor of history and environmental studies at Fort Lewis College. Reach him at andy@agulliford.com. https://durangoherald.com/articles/249912 COLORADO WOLF AND WILDLIFE CENTER | 7 |
ADOPTION CORNER
ADOPTION CORNER
Available from TCRAS · Teller County Regional Animal Shelter
Available from San Luis Valley Animal Welfare Society slvaws.org · 719.587.woof (9663) · Non-Profit NO-KILL Shelter
tcrascolorado.com · 719.686.7707 · NO-KILL shelter in Divide, Colorado
HOPE
Hope was adopted few weeks ago but is now heartbroken. Her owner of only one week was deployed. He cried having to bring her back with us and she has been very sad since then. When she was with him, she climbed over the fence to be with him when he walked out of the yard. She is spayed, about 2 years old. Our heart breaks for her. She gets along with other dogs.
Knox
5 y 10 m 23 d Male/Neutered Red Terrier, American Pit Bull/Mix Look at this handsome dog. He is looking for a home where he can be the center of attention and learn go on hikes. He knows to “Go to his House” to tell him to sit and wait to eat. He is an awesome greeter by dancing with his front feet. He will need a home who is up for a challenge and can continue to work with him on manners. Come and visit this amazing dog.
Goodwill AGE: 4 y 1 m 20 d Female/Spayed Tan/Black Siamese/Mix
Hi, I’m Goodwill! They don’t just call me good will because I’m friendly. I was actually found wondering around a Goodwill. Imagine that! I’m a laid back, gentle girl who isn’t a kitten anymore, but I still have plenty of love to give. If you want an adorable furry friend with a back story that can start conversations, I’m the one!!
| 8 | COLORADO WOLF AND WILDLIFE CENTER
SNOW
We named him Snow. Young husky mix. Appeared at someone’s home near Walsenburg. Very sweet, mellow, about 45 pounds.
SLVAWS ADOPTION FAIR Every Saturday 10am-4pm at the Petco in Colorado Springs at 5020 N. Nevada COLORADO WOLF AND WILDLIFE CENTER | 9 |
The Turkey Toss was a big success. Thank you to all who joined us!
| 10 | COLORADO WOLF AND WILDLIFE CENTER