Colorado Parks and Wildlife’s commission will convene a special meeting on Monday, July 7, to discuss the status and potential fate of the Copper Creek wolf pack. 

The pack, which has been embroiled in controversy and conflict since the pack formed and had pups last spring, was tied to multiple livestock attacks and deaths in Pitkin County in late May. After Parks and Wildlife confirmed the pack was connected to four livestock attacks in eight days, and that ranchers had taken steps to mitigate the conflict, officials killed one of Copper Creek’s male yearlings on May 29. 

The pack was removed from Grand County last year after being tied to livestock attacks and relocated to a sanctuary. The pack’s adult male died in captivity — days after its capture due to a gunshot wound — and was reportedly the wolf responsible for the depredations. The male wolf came from the Wenaha Pack in Oregon, which was reportedly involved in depredations two months before its relocation to Colorado. The pack’s adult female and four yearlings were released back into the wild in January.

At the June commissioner meeting, Jeff Davis, director of Parks and Wildlife, said the killing of the yearling is meant to “alter the social structure and social behavior of the pack itself,” and is recommended by the agency’s wolf management plan. 

“We’re trying to be incremental and strategic in our movements before we jump all the way to: all of them are bad animals,” Davis said. 

“Some of these animals are literally six weeks old,” he added, alluding to the fact that the pack has grown since the five pack members were rereleased in January. 

Following the removal of the yearling, the agency has said it is closely monitoring the pack and will “react promptly” if the pack exhibits these behaviors again, Davis said. 

While Pitkin County ranchers have claimed three further incidents and attacks on livestock since the male was killed, the agency said that there was insufficient evidence to tie the losses to wolves. 

On Tuesday, in an interview with the Aspen Times, Tom Harrington, president of the Colorado Cattlemen’s Association, said ranchers in the Old Snowmass area have seen direct impacts from the pack since they were released in January, including in the weeks following Parks and Wildlife’s killing of the yearling.

“These producers are having to literally live with their animals in order to try to protect them,” Harrington said. “The two ranches up in that area, since that yearling was removed, they’ve continued to have impacts. The wolves are still in their cattle daily.”

“They’re still having depredations,” he added, referring to the three incidents Parks and Wildlife deemed were inconclusive. 

Harrington manages a ranch in Carbondale where one of the Copper Creek pack members killed a cow in May. 

The upcoming special meeting was scheduled at the request of Parks and Wildlife commissioners at their June 12 meeting, following a request from local ranchers and elected officials for the state agency to take more action regarding the wolves in the pack. 

Initially, Tai Jacober, a Parks and Wildlife commissioner and Carbondale rancher, motioned for the agency to remove the pack from the wild and send them back to a sanctuary — a request that several ranchers and officials had made of the agency. 

“I think that we need to be accountable for a mistake that we’ve made by putting this depredating pack back on the landscape and make a quick, fast discussion about how to move forward with clearly, unfortunately, a bad pack of animals,” Jacober said. 

However, following concerns from some of the commissioners that they lacked the information to make any decisions, Jacober retracted the motion and initiated a vote to hold a more robust discussion about the pack in the special session. 

“I also feel that something does need to be done,” said Commissioner Eden Vardy, who is based in Aspen. “The level of public testimony, the level of tension in the community, is visceral, and I think we need to do something. What that something is, I don’t feel like I’m equipped to answer right now, given what else has been mentioned and the lack of information that we have at hand.” 

For the special meeting, commissioners asked staff for additional information about the pack size, health and behavioral changes since the yearling’s removal. They also sought more information on which pack members were involved in depredations, what level of involvement the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service would have in the pack’s removal (as gray wolves are federally protected in Colorado) and more. 

Harrington said he hopes that Parks and Wildlife concludes that the pack needs to be removed from the landscape. 

“Whether they are lethally removed or they’re captured and put in a sanctuary forever to never be back on the landscape to impact livestock,” he said. “Either way, that’s what needs to happen to solve this problem. For them to keep protecting these wolves that have chosen to prey on livestock, to me, I just don’t understand it.” 

The pack’s removal is the only thing that will give ranchers relief, Harrington added.

“It’s not sustainable what they’re doing, they can’t live with their animals around the clock,” he said. “Their animals are at a high-stress level.”

This high stress on the cattle will trickle down to impacts on weight and breeding, Harrington said. 

The meeting will be held virtually and live-streamed on the agency’s YouTube page from 12:30 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. on July 7.