Colorado's New Wolves: Why Was This Pack Decimated?

Source: Patrice Schoefolt/Pexels

A brief history of Colorado’s repatriation, reintroduction project:

On December 18, 2023, five wolves were released into the mountains of Colorado, and five more were released over the following three days. Because the people of Colorado voted directly to authorize this reintroduction, opponents began referring to it pejoratively as "ballot box biology." In reality, it's "ballot box morality.' I was invited to the initial release because of my longtime interest in rewilding nature and because of the social behavior of wolves, coyotes, and domestic dogs that I have researched. I also was interested in observing personality differences among the first group of wolves who were released.

After four years of planning before the wolves were released, Colorado's wolf reintroduction program was supposed to set a new benchmark for how to manage a wolf reintroduction successfully.¹ Instead, it raises serious questions about human-animal relationships and the ability of wildlife agencies to remain impartial in the face of mounting pressure from special interest groups.

An ill-fated plan to capture and relocate the Copper Creek pack

Like many people across Colorado and around the world, I’ve been eagerly waiting to learn more about Colorado Parks and Wildlife’s (CPW) operation to capture and relocate the six individuals comprising what has come to be called the Copper Creek pack—a tightly knit family group consisting of a mother, a father, and their four children. Unfortunately, the pack set up a home on a ranch where there were easy-to-kill food animals. Because they were not welcomed, CPW decided to trap and relocate them.

Adding to the turmoil is the fact that the pack established their den on the property of a rancher who wanted them dead, but who was previously denied a chronic depredation permit because he did little to deter the wolves from preying on his sheep, and perhaps even encouraged it by leaving unburied carcasses in an exposed "kill pit". (See Defenders Denounces CPW’s Decision to Relocate Colorado’s First Wolf Pack.)²

CPW finally went public about their operation after a wolf had been caught and the entire project was cloaked in inexcusable secrecy for its duration. Their efforts were a major failure.³ Most unfortunately, when CPW finally released details about their avoidable and ill-fated plan, it was disclosed that the father had died after he had been captured using a leg-hold trap. He previously had a wounded and infected leg and according to CPW, "it is unlikely the wolf would have survived much longer in the wild." Of course, they don't know this; and the male was likely stressed having been trapped and taken away from the family he was trying to care for. This could have contributed to his demise.

The Copper Creek wolves were presented with the choice of pursuing their natural prey—deer and elk—or herds of unguarded sheep and cows—the equivalent of “room service.” Understandably, ranchers were upset about this, but it's puzzling why they left unburied carcasses in an exposed kill pit and refused help from CPW and the Colorado Department of Agriculture.

The current situation for the trapped and relocated wolves

The Copper Creek Pack has now gone from a mom, a dad, and four healthy pups to a family forcibly removed from their rightful den at the behest of ranchers, and relocated to an undisclosed sanctuary minus one very important individual—the father—who died four days after being captured. Surely this is not what Coloradans had in mind when they voted to bring wolves back to Colorado. Anyone paying attention to what we know about wolf behavior and how CPW's operation would work out knew it was ill-advised and ill-fated.

In what will no doubt be remembered as a contest between the majority of Coloradans who voted for wolves to be brought back and the ranchers who opposed it, Round 1 goes to the ranchers who complained, not the voters, and most definitely not the wolves who defied the odds and managed to start a new family in the first year after reintroduction.

These sentient, social, intelligent, and emotional beings continue to be pawns in an anthropocentric program. We need to consider things from their point of view—what they are feeling about what's happening to them—and who they truly are. As one of my colleagues puts it, they've done what we wanted them to do, form a family group, a cohesive group pack, and make more of themselves. Some people want to punish them—kill them—for pushing the repatriation program forward. This punishes them for who they are and who Coloradans wanted to return to their native home.

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Coda: Overcoming a mindset of human exceptionalism

Defying science, ethics, and common sense CPW decimated the first family group of wolves seen in Colorado in around 80 years and there's little to no reason to think things will change in the future. Colorado's ambitious and enormous project has received global attention, but it raises numerous questions that must be considered in different sorts of situations in which humans trespass into the lives of other animals. It's essential to remember that it's not all about us.