Wolf Case

I received a request to find the article and offical report on the last wolf harvested in Maine. As I mentioned we had watched this animal and one other for over a year prior to it being taken. I am having the offical IFW report that I obtained under the freedom of informatin act scanned. But below is one of the articles published by the BDN regarding the 81 pound confirmed wolf.

Signs Suggest a Return Of Timber Wolf to Maine
Published: December 22, 1996 BDN
ELLSWORTH, Me., Dec. 21 — The caller told the game warden, Debbie Palman, that he had killed a very large coyote, but when Mrs. Palman saw the animal she knew right away that it was something else.

The big chest, long body, large head and the weight -- almost 82 pounds, more than twice that of the average coyote -- and other markings appeared to identify the animal as a timber wolf or a wolf hybrid.

Its presence on remote timber land several miles north of here in a sparsely populated part of northeastern Maine has fueled speculation about whether timber wolves are migrating down from Canada, more than a century after they disappeared from the state.

If genetic tests under way at the United States Fish and Wildlife Service's forensic laboratory in Oregon determine that the animal is a timber wolf, generally known as the gray wolf, it will be the second one killed in Maine in recent years. In 1993, a bear hunter in northwestern Maine shot what tests later identified as a female wolf.
Wildlife biologists plan to conduct tracking surveys this winter to look for more signs of the animals.

Game wardens have also asked hunters to look carefully before shooting anything that appears to be a coyote. ''If our department had suspected there might be wolves in Hancock County,'' Mrs. Palman said, ''we could have done a better job educating hunters and trappers.''

Gray wolves are on the Federal endangered species list in the 48 contiguous states except in Minnesota, where they are listed as threatened. Killing an endangered wolf is punishable by a year in jail and a fine of up to $100,000.

About 75 miles, including farmland and the St. Lawrence River, separate Maine from the nearest wolf packs in the Laurentian Highlands of Quebec, said Craig McLaughlin, a biologist with the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife. Although icebreakers keep the St. Lawrence open in the winter, it can freeze over at times, which would allow a small group of wolves to cross.

Wolves feed on moose, deer and beavers -- all of which Maine has in abundance, said Daniel Harrison, an associate professor of wildlife economy at the University of Maine in Orono, who has studied both wolves and coyotes.

Private groups are already actively promoting the restoration of the wolf's population. One of them is Defenders of Wildlife, an organization based in Washington that spearheaded the successful campaign to reintroduce gray wolves into Yellowstone National Park, has advocated their reintroduction into New York's Adirondacks and parts of New Hampshire and Maine.

While the program in the West has angered ranchers who fear for their livestock, the idea of bringing wolves back to Maine has been opposed by hunters who do not want more competition for game. Some hunters seem to feel differently about wolves that arrive on their own.

Phil Phillips, a gunsmith at Willy's Gun Shop in Ellsworth, where the wolflike animal was killed, said he had never seen a wolf but would not be surprised to learn that the elusive creatures were here. ''It wouldn't be so bad to have a few around,'' he said. ''It might be kind of neat.''