Colorado Parks and Wildlife says two wolves introduced to the state from British Columbia that were shot and killed in Wyoming and a third that was found dead in Rocky Mountain National Park were “unfortunate events” this spring in the agency’s efforts to establish a self-sustaining wolf population. Yet the deaths in no way “indicate failure for the state’s wolf reintroduction plan.”
That’s because “mortalities within wolf management are part of the game,” and why Colorado’s plan dictates that the agency release 10 to 15 wolves a year for three years “to establish a big enough population to deal with mortality,” according to Eric Odell, CPW’s wolf conservation program manager.
Odell was speaking to the Parks and Wildlife Commission at its meeting May 7 in Denver. It was just after the two-year anniversary of the commission’s approval of the wolf management plan on May 3, 2023.
A gray wolf sits in a temporary pen awaiting transport to Colorado during capture operations in British Columbia in January 2025. (Colorado Parks and Wildlife)He said he’d been “stepping back, reflecting on and thinking about” the progress the agency has made, the lessons it has learned, the ways it has improved and the work it has done since.
He didn’t mention three wolves that were killed in 2024, bringing the total number of mortalities since reintroduction to six.
Instead, he focused on the potential arrival of new puppies, a wolf on an extremely long journey and the highly anticipated deployment of range riders for nonlethal wolf conflict mitigation by CPW and the Colorado Department of Agriculture.
A look back
Three years before the wolf management plan was approved, 51% of largely urban Coloradans voted for reintroduction and 49% largely rural residents didn’t.
Much debating and planning ensued until 10 wolves from Oregon were released in Grand and Summit counties in December 2023 and another 15 from British Columbia were set loose in Eagle and Pitkin counties in January. Both releases have been plagued by issues concerning ranchers.
“Colorado’s wolf introduction program has not gone well,” Tim Ritschard, head of the Middle Park Stockgrowers Association, told CPW commissioners in November. “There’ve been 24 confirmed depredations between three counties. There are more deaths and missing livestock that are suspected or were suspected to be wolf-related. Montana has 70 times more wolves, and I’ve seen similar death counts.”
Ritschard was speaking on behalf of dozens of ranchers, 26 counties and several other stakeholders in demanding CPW pause wolf reintroduction until it met a list of stipulations the coalition created to help ranchers deal with their new reality.
In the months since, CPW has addressed many of these concerns, distributed tens of thousands of dollars in nonlethal deterrents and paid two ranchers $350,000 in compensation for livestock lost to wolf attacks.
But some believe the petition could be successful, because it was footnoted in the $43.9 billion state budget that Gov. Jared Polis signed for the next fiscal year.
Reintroduction could also stop completely if a recently approved ballot initiative calling for an end to it by Dec. 31, 2026, gains enough signatures to be on the 2026 ballot.
And U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert is backing a bill to remove wolves from the endangered species list, which could potentially, one day, impact Colorado wolves.
Neither of the first two challenges came up at the meeting.
As for delisting, Odell said, “Our plan was very intentionally written so that regardless of the federal status, management is still the same. Wolves are both federally listed and state listed, so if they do become federally delisted for any reason, they still remain state listed and take of wolves outside of a few very, very precise circumstances remains illegal and not allowable.”
“One, to two, to three, to four” breeding pairs … perhaps
At the commissioners’ meeting, Odell addressed the “anomaly” of having 24 wolves currently equipped with GPS- and VHF-enabled collars that let the agency see where the wolves go, where they’re spending their time and where they could be denning.
Springtime is denning season for wolves, which breed in February and have a two-month gestation period.
Odell said CPW was monitoring “one, to two, to three, to four pairs,” and when the agency loses contact with a female, it could mean she’s underground or digging a den.
He said the agency hasn’t confirmed any of these potentialities, and “it’s going to take some time to do so.”
“We don’t have numbers of pups, if there are pups, because they’ll be underground for weeks or months,” he added. So if, and when, the agency has the opportunity to see them “depends on a variety of different things,” like access. Wolves like to den in thick timber, for instance.
But later in the meeting, Brian Dreher, assistant director of CPW’s terrestrial wildlife branch, said range riders, which CPW and the Colorado Department of Agriculture are deploying as another nonlethal conflict mitigation tool for ranchers, “are being deployed near denning sites,” before correcting himself and saying “potential denning sites.”
Colorado Parks and Wildlife monthly wolf activity map for April 2025 shows the journey of a lone female wolf through the southern part of the state. (Colorado Parks and Wildlife photo)Odell said with CPW’s wolf management plan calling for three to five years of releases, they will likely do another year of releases but haven’t had any discussion on where the next wolves are coming from or where they’ll be going.
When the agency does make those decisions, they’ll ensure “the local communities, the legislators, the decision makers, will be kept in the loop and kept informed throughout that process,” he added.
And he said the watershed maps the agency publishes once a month are intended to keep the public in the loop about current wolves’ movements.
In April, there were some pretty interesting movements, he said.
“You can see a large swath,” in the shape of a smile, spanning the lower southern quarter of the state, through Mesa, Delta, Montrose and Gunnison counties, for instance.
“That is the movement of one individual animal,” he said. “It’s a female wolf that came from British Columbia. Since her release in late January, she’s gone nearly 1,700 miles. From a linear distance, that’s essentially walking from Denver to Washington, D.C. Or looking for a more regional approach, it’s Denver to Albuquerque to Phoenix and back to Denver.”
Colorado outdoorsman Mike Usalavage posted a video on social media Aug. 17 of wolf pups playing in a rain puddle and wrestling on a dirt road in an undisclosed location. (Courtesy Mike Usalavage via Colorado Parks and Wildlife)Map viewers will “see a lot of watersheds along the Front Range,” he added.
“Ralston Creek is one and it goes into downtown Denver. We do not have wolves in highly metropolitan urbanized areas,” Odell emphasized. “That’s just a function of an animal having been in the very far western portion of that watershed. A GPS point was collected there, and that lights up the entirety of the watershed.”
But Odell wanted to be sure the public knows local staff are talking with producers and landowners “in their districts, in their areas, and making them aware of when we do have wolves that are localizing and spending a fair bit of time” there.
Enter the range rider
Toward the end of the update, discussion turned to 11 newly hired range riders, “prioritized to mitigate and minimize the impacts of wolves on livestock by assisting livestock producers voluntarily,” said Dreher.
Some were deployed in early April to Eagle, Routt, and Rio Blanco counties, and others will help in Garfield, Summit, Grand and Moffat counties when needed.
And all of the producers they’ve helped so far “have expressed extreme gratitude for having our riders out there, and are especially grateful for the speed in which we’ve been able to deploy them,” Dreher said.
Colorado is one of three states in the country to have a range rider program, along with Washington and Arizona. The riders will work up to 22 days per month throughout the five-month on-range season.
The program is funded through Born to Be Wild license plate revenue. CPW estimates it will cost roughly $500,000 this year, which includes a budget for materials, training and range rider contracts.
To date, the plates have raised approximately $819,000, Dreher said.
CPW is exploring other ways for the funds to help in conflict minimization efforts.
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