Colorado has implemented a statewide suspension on the issue of 30-day trapping permits. The decision coincides with the Colorado Parks and Wildlife’s announcement that a female gray wolf died in May “due to an apparent secondary trauma from a lawful foothold trap used for coyote control.”
Another gray wolf died in April due to wounds from an apparent mountain lion attack in Rocky Mountain National Park, which was confirmed in the same statement. Both females were from the batch of wolves transplanted from British Columbia to Colorado in January. Overall, CPW noted that wolf survival is within normal margins, where the average lifespan of a gray wolf is roughly 3 to 4 years.
The trapper who discovered the wolf in their trap notified CPW on May 14. State wildlife officials responded and released the wolf from the trap, according to CPW’s Wednesday press release, but the wolf’s GPS collar transmitted a mortality signal the next day.
Colorado law generally prohibits the use of foothold traps, but an exception allows landowners of livestock operations or their workers to use these traps for 30 days if there’s enough evidence to support the need. This trap had been approved and properly permitted, and neither USFWS nor CPW plan to “take further law enforcement action” against the trapper.
Even so, the agency has implemented a statewide suspension on its practice of issuing 30-day permits “that allow taking coyotes or other terrestrial species using foothold/leghold traps, instant-kill body-gripping design traps, or snares and will provide additional guidance as soon as possible.”
While the investigations into both wolf mortalities are now complete, the cause of death for a third gray wolf in northwest Colorado is pending a necropsy. The GPS collar on that wolf, a male, threw a mortality signal on May 31.
After the death of another wolf on June 2 — one that was euthanized for chronic livestock depredation — there are an estimated 22 collared wolves in Colorado, according to the Coloradoan. A total population estimate is unclear, since CPW officials have reported sightings of several wolf pups this summer.
“Reproduction is the goal,” Brenna Cassidy, CPW wolf monitoring and data coordinator told KOAA. “We can bring wolves in, we can translocate wolves, but we need them to reproduce naturally in Colorado.”
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The Coloradoan reports the Copper Creek Pack alone is responsible for eight calf kills in Pitkin County this year and also for most of the 18 depredations in Grand County last year.
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