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One of Colorado's reintroduced wolves wandered into Rocky Mountain National Park
One of Colorado's reintroduced wolves wandered into Rocky Mountain National Park this month, marking the first time one has been present in the park since the state released wolves in December.
A collared "spent some time" inside the park in August, according to Colorado Parks and Wildlife's monthly update on wolf locations Wednesday.
The map released Wednesday shows a wolf traveling in watersheds near U.S. 34 in the northwestern corner of the national park. The highway—called Trail Ridge Road inside the park—spans the park from east to west and crosses the high alpine terrain of the Continental Divide.
Rocky Mountain National Park officials expected reintroduced wolves would eventually move into the park, where they previously had been a native species.
At least one wolf also traveled in a watershed along Colorado 14 in the Poudre Canyon south of Red Feather Lakes. All of the state's known wolves remain north of Interstate 70, CPW officials said.
Eleven adult wolves are known to live in Colorado: nine released in December as part of the state's voter-mandated reintroduction program and two remaining from a pack that formed after wolves naturally migrated from Wyoming. The state released 10 wolves in December, but one died this spring, likely killed by a mountain lion.
Two of the reintroduced wolves bred and this spring produced at least three pups, but state wildlife officials on Tuesday announced they would capture and relocate the pack following a string of livestock depredations.
It's unclear where the pack—called the Copper Creek pack—will be moved and whether those wolves will be released into the wild or kept at a sanctuary.
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