A multi-agency wildlife team has captured and collared seven of the 20 Mexican gray wolf pups that were cross-fostered from captivity into wild dens in Arizona and New Mexico earlier this year. (New Mexico Department Of Game And Fish)
Wildlife officials from New Mexico and Arizona have captured and placed radio collars on seven Mexican gray wolf pups that were cross-fostered from captivity into wild packs earlier this year.
The seven collared pups mark a record for the endangered animal’s reintroduction program, although one of the pups was found dead earlier this month.
The team cross-fostered a total of 20 wolf pups from captivity in the spring. Pups were released into the wild from zoos and wildlife centers in both states.
John Oakleaf, the Mexican wolf field projects coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, said the record is an “extraordinary accomplishment.”
“We have documented survival in four out of the seven packs that received cross-fostered pups this year, and there could still be more,” Oakleaf said.
Fish and Wildlife and Game and Fish officials take the pups from captivity and place them into wild dens, where the wild wolves raise them as their own.
Last year, the team collared two out of 12 total captive-to-wild cross-fostered pups. In 2018, that number was three out of eight wolf pups.
Michael Robinson of the Center for Biological Diversity suggested that the team should return to releasing adult wolf pairs to increase genetic diversity.
Robinson’s group is part of a coalition that does not believe public lands ranchers should have access to telemetry receivers that show the general location of wolves based on radio collar signals.
“A real simple way to improve the survival rate of all wolves in the wild, not just cross-fostered ones, is to stop giving any individual who does not work for the government or is not engaged in legitimate scientific research the tools to strip wolves of their ability to stay hidden,” he said.
The officials have no plans to release adult wolves or packs into the wild in 2021, according to a Mexican Wolf Interagency Field Team planning document.
Instead, the team plans to continue the cross-fostering strategy.
“Our goal is to cross-foster as many pups as logistically feasible, up to 12 in the Arizona portion,” the document reads.
The team estimates that pups released from captivity into the wild have a 50 percent survival rate in their first year of life, the same as their wild-born counterparts.
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