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Wolf trapped in Utah returned to Wyoming
Wildlife advocates object to relocation.

By Rebecca Huntington

A federal biologist returned a wolf to the Yellowstone region early Tuesday after picking up the 2-year-old male in northern Utah where the wolf had been caught in a coyote trap.

The young male is the first wolf to be captured in Utah since wolves were reintroduced to Yellowstone National Park and central Idaho in 1995 and 1996, according to federal officials.

The radio-collared wolf ventured to Morgan, Utah, from Yellowstone, where he was a member of the Druid Peak Pack, which lives in Lamar Valley, said Mike Jimenez, federal wolf recovery leader for Wyoming.

Jimenez happened to be passing through Utah when he received a report of the wolf, which was captured Saturday, he said. So he picked the wolf up Monday and released it Tuesday morning just south of Yellowstone, he said.

"It's not a big deal," Jimenez said about the wandering wolf. Young wolves typically disperse long distances, he said.

But wolf reintroduction advocates are objecting to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's decision to relocate the wolf.

"We've begged them to just leave the wolf alone," said Suzanne Laverty, Northwest field representative for Defenders of Wildlife.

Tracks and sightings suggest another wolf was also in the area, she said. Since this is the time of year when wolves begin bonding as pairs, the move may have broken up a breeding pair, she said. "We feel like they just didn't consider the implications."

Jimenez agreed another wolf may have been in the area, but he said officials had no information to determine whether it was a potential mate.

Jimenez said the wolf was caught in a rural valley near Ogden full of small ranches, people, pets and livestock.

"It's definitely not a good place for wolves where this thing showed up," Jimenez said.

Moreover, he said, the service is focusing wolf recovery efforts in the Rocky Mountains in the legally designated recovery area, which covers Wyoming, Idaho and Montana.

"We don't have a wolf recovery program in Utah so we're not encouraging wolf recovery in areas where we don't have a program," he said.

Laverty is critical of the service for not preparing a plan to handle wolves dispersing to states outside the three-state recovery area.

"They should have anticipated that this was going to happen, and they should have been ready to allow wolves to stay there," she said.

Jimenez said wolves that turn up outside the recovery area will be handled on a case-by-case basis.

"We're not setting a precedent one way or another," he said. But he added that if the wolves attack livestock they will be removed.

The wolf captured Saturday, however, had not been linked to livestock attacks, he said.

This is not the first wolf sighting in Utah. Wolves had been reported earlier this year in the hills south of Logan, Utah, about 30 miles from where this wolf was caught.

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