Two more calves killed

by Cat Urbigkit

Although Sublette County apparently doesn't have any radio-collared wolves, there have been two livestock depredation incidents in the last week that were confirmed wolf kills.

Mike Jimenez of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said in an interview Wednesday that there was a calf confirmed as a wolf kill in the Upper Green on Monday. Although federal officials killed a wolf in the area last week, Monday's kill was fresh enough to indicate that another wolf was involved, although no other wolves have yet been found.

Jimenez said when federal wildlife officials flew last week, they flew with a list of radio-collar frequencies of missing wolves from Yellowstone National Park, but none of the animals were found.

"We'll keep looking," Jimenez said, adding that at this point, his agency hasn't even been receiving reports from the public of people seeing wolves. Anyone seeing wolves is encouraged to report the observation to FWS at 307-332-7789.

There was also a confirmed calf kill last week near Daniel, Jimenez said. Although there are sporadic reports of numerous wolves in the area, none are wearing collars and thus far, FWS has been unable to catch any to put collars on them. In one incident last week, two wolves reportedly chased a livestock herding dog back to his cowboy.

There have already been eight wolves killed by federal officials in Sublette County this year due to livestock depredations.