About 3 weeks ago, a friend of mine was doing a little scouting in the Crescent Junction area with his hunting partners on quads when they saw a decent sized wolf cross the road about a 100 yards ahead of them. It jumped a fence and ran into a field and by the time they got to the gate in the fence to enter the field to get a better look, it had crossed the field and was gone.

How many of you have seen any as far southwest as HWY58/HWY97 junction?

(And because Oregon has a law that you cannot have a loaded firearm, even a loaded magazine on an ATV, they missed an opportunity to TCOB)

I am curious as the ODFW says there are no wolves this far southwest....

These guys hunt coyotes in this area and my friend said this was definetly NOT a coyote.
It was at least twice as big as any coyote they have ever seen.

---Mike

quote:

I am curious as the ODFW says there are no wolves this far southwest....

I would bet that not only will you find wolves there but also Southeast Oregon and Northeast California.

Jim I know the ODFW rarely tells the whole truth, just wondering if anybody has actually SEEN one this far southwest...

A friend of mine saw one on Santiam Pass near Hoodoo over 10 years ago. I've seen the tracks here in Bend and as far south as Wickiup for...well, I can't remember exactly what year but over 5 years ago. ODFW just confirmed they are here in Bend this year. Those in the know, knew years ago they were here. Once it's confirmed, you've got a pack or two.

Cresent?, that's a two day walk for a wolf. My guess is they're down around KFalls if not in California by now.

I've yet to see one face to face but I I'm sure it'll happen given the amount of time I spend in the woods.

Don't doubt what they saw, it was no coyote.

I think it's possible that there are hybrids out there as well. People buy wolf hybrids for pets and then realize that they are not the typical dog or they just get loose on their own. The hybrids I've met over the years would have no problem surviving and thriving in the woods.

Wildlife officials to discuss predators, sage grouse and hunter orange
By Kate Ramsayer / The Bulletin
Published: September 29. 2010 4:00AM PST

Hayley Elshire was running near the Phil’s Trail complex on a cold and rainy Saturday a couple weeks ago, when she and her friend spotted two large animals about 150 feet away.

“I first thought they were small to midsized deer,” said Elshire, of Bend, but “the more we looked, we realized it wasn’t deer.”

Instead, Elshire and her friend identified the pair as wolves.

“They were just huge,” she said. “That was just the one thing that made me know for sure it wasn’t a coyote or a fox or something. ... The way they walk, and the profile of their ears and their nose, to me is what a wolf looks like.”

As sightings of wolves continue to add up and packs form in Northeast Oregon, wildlife officials say that it’s likely wolves have at least passed through the Central Oregon area.

“There’s pretty strong evidence that we’ve had wolves moving through the area periodically,” said John Stephenson, Oregon’s wolf coordinator with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. “I think there’s some chance that there’s individuals staying in the area. We don’t have any evidence to suggest there’s a pack.”

Wolf management in Oregon will be one of the topics at the Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission meeting Thursday in Bend.

Stephenson said he gets a couple of reports of wolf sightings a month, and some are more likely to be actual wolves than others.

Wild wolves would not typically live in an area like Phil’s Trail, close to a highly populated area, Stephenson said. But a little over a month ago he received a report from people who spotted what they thought was a wolf along the Cascade Lakes Highway, near Widgi Creek Golf Club.

“Maybe something’s running around,” he said. “I’d be surprised if there are wild wolves hanging around close to town, but it seems like something.”

Last winter brought a couple good clues pointing to wolf presence in the area, he said. In mid-December, biologists tracked what looked like wolf prints south of Wickiup Reservoir. And then someone with the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Wildlife Services followed tracks near Hampton Butte for 20 miles.

“You don’t see many domestic dogs covering 20 miles overnight,” Stephenson said. “So we feel like that was a pretty strong sighting.”

People have been reporting wolf sightings in Central Oregon for decades, said Corey Heath, wildlife biologist with the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife — even before wild wolves returned to the state. Those sightings were probably of pet wolves or wolf hybrids, which either escaped or were let go, he said.

Now, however, wolves introduced into Idaho have migrated to Oregon, with two packs confirmed in the northeastern part of the state. And that makes it more likely that gray wolves would keep heading west toward Central Oregon, Heath said.

“There may be a few individuals pioneering around now,” he said.

But biologists need to do DNA tests to confirm that wild wolves are in the area, he said — and they haven’t found any carcasses, or trapped animals to do that yet.

In Northeastern Oregon, where wolves have been radio-collared and tracked, the question for wildlife officials is now how to help prevent wolves from killing livestock.

At the Fish and Wildlife Commission meeting, commissioners will consider adopting changes to the state’s wolf management plan — taking into consideration the handful of calves killed by wolves this spring, said Russ Morgan, wolf coordinator with the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife.

“We’ve learned quite a lot in the last six months from the depredations in Oregon, and so really it’s about applying what we’ve learned,” he said.

The proposed changes to the plan are pretty small, he said, and include things like issuing permits to harass wolves to the person who is operating the ranch, rather than the landowner.

Other possible changes include requiring state Fish and Wildlife biologists to confirm that a wolf killed livestock, instead of allowing people with the federal Wildlife Services to determine that — a change that was suggested after some controversy over the issue this year, Morgan said.

Sage grouse and hunter orange

At Thursday’s meeting, the commission will also discuss sage grouse habitat, and what kind of development buffers the agency should recommend to protect the birds. Staffers have been gathering information from different groups about the balance between preserving habitat and allowing construction of facilities such as wind farms, and will present what they have heard, said Rick Hargrave, spokesman with the agency.

The commissioners will also decide whether hunters should be required to wear orange hats or clothing for safety, Hargrave said. Oregon is one of 10 states that doesn’t have “hunter orange” requirements, he said. The commission will decide whether to keep it that way, require hunters younger than 18 to wear two orange items, or require all hunters to wear either an orange vest or hat.

The agency has already received a lot of comments about the issue, he said, and will take additional public comments on that issue and the other agenda items at the Thursday meeting.

http://www.opb.org/programs/ofg/segments/view/1626

And this was in 2007...now we have another predator to contend with.

Oh, I don't doubt what they saw...between the guys they have shot dozens of coyotes.

Flippy: I spoke with a hunter last fall whose party saw a wolf cross a road in the Miller Lake area near Chemult. I would not be at all surprised if they are confirmed soon in the elk woods around Diamond and Crater Lake. Lots of chow for them there and few roads.

I grew up in K Falls and hunted all over. My father and I called in a Wolf near Crater Lake and that was probably twenty five years ago. There is no doubt they are around. They have been. Thing is the reintroduction was with Alaskan wolves when they should have just allowed the few around to be protected and things would have been fine.

Thanks guys....kinda what I was thinking...