The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) has released a report on the necropsy of a wolf found dead in Grand County on Sept. 10.

“On September 10, 2024, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service became aware of a deceased gray wolf in Grand County, Colorado,” the USFWS said in a statement Thursday.

Colorado Parks and Wildlife said in September they received a “mortality signal” from the wolf’s collar on Sept. 9 and confirmed it on Sept. 10.

The wolf, known as 2307-OR was a male that was part of a group of five wolves from Wallowa County, Oregon. Two of those five became a mating pair and produced four pups this spring. 

Regarding the Grand County wolf, “necropsy results indicate that the wolf died from injuries consistent with a fight, likely involving another wolf. The examination revealed trauma typical of wounds caused by wolves and other canids and preliminary analysis of hair samples collected from the scene further supports the involvement of another wolf. Although the wolf had an old, healed gunshot wound to its rear leg, it was in good nutritional condition at the time of death.”

The Grand County wolf was the third to die from the 10 wolves released in Grand and Summit counties last December. That includes the male of a mating pair that was captured along with the rest of the Copper Creek pack but was in poor health from injuries unrelated to its capture and died a few days later. A necropsy is also planned for that wolf.

The first of the 10 wolves to die was reported in Larimer County on April 18. That wolf likely died from an attack from a mountain lion, based on a necropsy performed by USFWS.

Currently, the state has seven wolves left from the original 10 from Oregon, plus at least four pups from the mating pair. Two other wolves have been in Jackson County for several years, and migrated into the county from Wyoming.

Wolves have killed dozens of livestock in Colorado in the past several years. Those numbers escalated this year with the release of the Oregon wolves, who came from packs with a history of killing livestock. That’s despite the Colorado wolf plan stating that Colorado would not bring in wolves with that kind of history.

The release of the wolves was botched by communication failures by Colorado Parks and Wildlife and the governor’s office, which failed to notify local government officials and ranchers that wolves were being released in their counties.

It’s led to a deterioration in the relationship between CPW and ranchers, elected officials and a multitude of stockgrower and county organizations, including Colorado Counties Inc.,  which have pleaded with the agency to delay the next release of wolves, to be brought to Colorado from British Columbia, until the state does a better job of resolving wolf-livestock conflicts.

Next week, Tim Ritschard, president of the Middle Park Stockgrowers, will present a petition to the Colorado Parks and Wildlife Commission that seeks a delay in introducing the next group of wolves. That petition came from 26 organizations, primarily livestock producers.

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It seeks rules changes in two major areas:

• The wolf management program must be designed to resolve conflicts with livestock producers, including allowing for lethal measures for “chronically depredating” wolves, although CPW has so far failed to come up with a definition of “chronically depredating.” The program must also come up with a coherent policy on non-lethal measures, rather than just telling producers they have to self-fund and implement all existing measures before CPW would consider lethal control of a chronically depredating wolf.
• The wolf program must be designed not to imposes any land, water or resource use restrictions on private landowners. The petition said CPW has told producers they should not longer move cattle onto leased lands because it baits wolves, or that producers should change their traditional ranching operations to avoid wolf depredations.

The commission will meet on Nov. 14 to discuss the petition and rules changes.