Two collared grey wolves have died in western Colorado since Memorial Day weekend, including one in the Roaring Fork Valley. A male yearling, identified as #2405, was lethally removed by Colorado Parks and Wildlife on May 29 due to suspected cattle predation. The wolf was part of the Copper Creek pack– captured last summer in Grand County. The mother and four of five pups were kept in captivity until January when they were released into Pitkin County.
According to CPW, on May 17, one calf was injured, one died on May 23, another died and one was injured on May 24 and a cow and calf were injured on May 25. Wolf collar data indicated a wolf from the Copper Creek Pack was in the area during all events. The Colorado Cattlemen's Association said the animals were attacked at the Crystal River Ranch south of Carbondale and the Lost Marbles Ranch and McCabe Ranch in Old Snowmass.
Tom Harrington, CCA president manages the Crystal River Ranch. He told KDNK that he found out Thursday, May 22 that a range rider was dispatched to the ranch’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) allotment. This usually means a wolf is in the area, but Harrington had received no wolf alerts from CPW. “I didn’t know anything was in the area,” he said.
Wolf collars record the animals’ positions every four hours. Once four locations are recorded, data is transmitted to CPW.
“So, at best, it’s four hours old and some of it is 16 hours old,” Harrington said, adding that the local wildlife manager did not get information until Friday morning. “He had no way of knowing because he couldn't access the data. It didn't download to him.”
The information arrived too late to save a calf.
Harrington said this is a weak point in the CPW system. “We have the luxury of these collars and the ability to at least have some information but it's not working for everybody,” he said. “Even when it does, depending on the area, they don't share it well.”
Harrington doesn’t applaud the death of #2405 but he said it’s appropriate since there were three predation events caused by the same wolf or wolves within 30 days. He added that things could be better. “I believe that if we had taken a pause last year to be better prepared, have the non-lethal [co-existence methods] in place, better communication from the very top of the administration all the way down, that perhaps we wouldn't have had dead livestock and now a dead wolf,” he said.
Delia Malone, local ecologist and board president of Colorado Wild, told KDNK pretty much the same thing. “It was a needless combination of mistakes primarily due to the lack of CPW communicating with the ranching community,” she said. “This was not the wolf's fault. This wolf pack was set up for failure and this was a needless loss of livestock.”
Another wolf, #2407, died on May 31 in the northwest corner of the state. No necropsy has been released.
