Michelle McNiel
The Wenatchee World

WENATCHEE, Wash. — A female wolf that biologists thought made up half of Wenatchee’s fledgling wolf pack has rejoined her old pack near Cle Elum, leaving doubt that the local one still exists. “Even though we identified them as the Wenatchee Pack last year, right now we have no indication that they’re still here,” said David Volson, a wildlife biologist for the state Department of Fish and Wildlife in Wenatchee. 

He said he believes that a wolf captured on a remote camera south of Wenatchee earlier this year was just passing through the area and not a resident.

Even so, Volson said he and other state biologists will continue monitoring areas around the city for tracks and other evidence of wolves for another year before determing whether there is a Wenatchee pack anymore.

The state got its first hard evidence of the existence of a wolf pack in Chelan County in March 2013 when two wolves were photographed by a remote camera on a ranch in Pitcher Canyon, south of Wenatchee.

The two wolves were officially named the Wenatchee Pack by the state wildlife agency. They became the state’s 10th official pack.

State biologists believed one of the wolves was the same female seen in the Entiat Valley a month earlier. That female wolf had previously been documented as a member of the Teanaway Pack near Cle Elum when she was captured and tagged in 2011, Volson said.

Biologists were never able to confirm that the female in the Wenatchee Pack was the Teanaway wolf, but Volson said the coloring was the same and biologists suspected it was her. That wolf was captured this winter in a survey of wolves in the Teanaway pack. “It just shows the variable nature of these animals,” Volson said. “They have a very fluid social structure.” 

He said that because wolf populations are still rebuilding in Washington, it’s still unknown where they will establish packs. “We’re just waiting to see where they settle out in the long run,” he added.
He said it’s still possible that there is a resident wolf pack in Chelan County, but it could be anywhere between Mission Ridge and U.S. Highway 97, or in the Colockum area.“Right now, our suspicion is that the occurance of that pack last year was probably animals moving through the area and trying to figure out what’s available for territory, range, habitat,” he said. 

He added, “We think we have a lot of unoccupied habitat where a pack could establish. But there is no evidence at this point that wolves are occupying it.”

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