Around April 15th this year at least three new pups were added to the Lassen Pack, the sole remaining gray wolf pack in California. California Department of Fish and Wildlife announced that a trail camera in Lassen or Plumas county had filmed them in a remote location, playing and practicing their wolf song (begins around 1:00 in the video below).
Camera data indicated that a minimum of five adult and yearling wolves were traveling together during the winter. The Lassen pack breeding female, LAS01F, whelped around April 15, and a minimum of three pups have been detected. At this time, it is estimated that the Lassen pack consists of a minimum of two to three adults/yearlings and three pups. CDFW and USDA WildlifeServices spent nine days in late June trapping to radio collar wolves in the Lassen Pack. Efforts have so far been unsuccessful.
Adult gray wolf drinking from water guzzler in Lassen National Forest, August 2018.
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Two years ago, I wrote about the Lassen Pack first season: California's second wolf pack generates conservation thrill and rancher ire. The pack’s female was first spotted by a trail camera in August 2015, reports CDFW.
In February 2016, biologists first encountered the tracks of what appeared to be two wolves traveling together, and the two wolves were then regularly detected during the following summer and fall. Genetic testing indicated the male wolf (CA08M) was born into the Rogue Pack in 2014.
The female wolf is not closely related to known Oregon wolves. It is suspected she dispersed from another part of the broader northern Rocky Mountain wolf population, and she has been found to have half-siblings in the Wyoming wolf population. The female was fitted with a GPS tracking collar in late June 2017 and CDFW monitors her whereabouts.
In 2017, the pair produced at least four pups, and three were known to be alive in March 2018. The pair produced another litter in April 2018, and five pups were observed in midsummer. At that time the pack included at least two yearlings from the 2017 litter.
In September 2018, an uncollared female yearling wolf was found dead in Lassen County. The carcass was examined, observed to be in a state of advanced decomposition, and a cause of death could not be determined. The death remains under investigation by CDFW’s law enforcement division. CDFW reminds the public that killing a wolf is a potential crime and subject to serious penalties including imprisonment. CDFW takes very seriously any threats to this recovering wolf population and investigates fully any possible criminal activity.
My February 2018 story Rogue Wolf Girl Looking for Hot California Lover introduces OR-54, a young female from Oregon’s Rogue Pack who first entered California in Siskiyou County in January 2018. Later that summer, she was seen wandering around Tahoe (Newest gray wolf visiting California checked out Tahoe).
OR-54 at the time she was trapped and radio-collared in Oregon, October 2017.
CDFW has continued to document her in the state through the tracking collar placed on OR-54 in Oregon in 2017.
During the [first] quarter [of 2019], OR-54 traveled a minimum distance of 1,116 miles, visiting portions of Butte, Lassen, Nevada, Plumas, Shasta, Sierra, and Siskiyou counties. Since first leaving her natal pack on January 23, 2018, she has covered a minimum distance of 6,644 miles at an average of 13 miles/day. On April 2, CDFW investigated the carcass of a one-month old calf in Siskiyou County that was located while monitoring cluster point locations from OR-54’s GPS collar
Two additional black wolves (gray wolves with black fur) traveling alone in two different locations in Lassen County were spotted with monitoring cameras this past winter.
Adult black wolf running in Lassen National Forest, August 2018.
Adult dark gray wolf in Lassen National Forest, August 2018.
Since October 2017, uncollared individual black wolves have been documented by private trail cameras, tracks, and scat in Siskiyou, Modoc, Lassen, and Plumas counties. While it is difficult to ascertain how many different wolves are represented in trail camera photos, CDFW believes there are at least two individuals. One black wolf in particular has been periodically observed within the Lassen Pack’s territory. Although it is not known to be a member of the Lassen pack, it has been seen both with members of the pack and alone within the pack’s territory. Genetic analysis of scats collected near areas where this animal has been observed suggests the animal is a male that is closely related to wolves in northeastern Oregon’s former Meacham Pack.
The first wolf pack in California (Shasta Pack) has not been seen since their first season as a pack (2015).
The pack was regularly detected from August through November 2015 and consisted of a minimum of six wolves in late November 2015. The Shasta Pack was observed feeding on a calf carcass in mid-November 2015, and subsequent investigation determined the wolves had likely killed the calf. There were no verified detections of the pack between late November 2015 and early May 2016, until a yearling male (CA07M) was detected by trail cameras, tracks, and scat near two pup-rearing sites used by the pack in 2015. In November 2016, CA07M (verified through genetic analysis of scat) was observed in northwestern Nevada. CDFW believes the pack no longer exists. Some evidence suggests at least one wolf was roaming within and near theShasta Pack territory in the summer and fall of 2017.
Four of the five members of the Shasta Pack grey wolves in Shasta County CA.
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