In an effort to reduce conflicts between California’s growing gray wolf population and rural residents, particularly ranchers, who say the animals are killing their livestock, state wildlife officials on Thursday unveiled an online map that tracks wolves and provides their locations to the public.
The map, released by biologists at the state Department of Fish and Wildlife, shows the location of 14 wolves in California that have GPS collars.
Many of the other wolves in the state — whose total population has grown from about 7 in 2019 to between 50 and 70 today — often congregate in packs with the GPS-collared animals.
The map is updated daily, and shows hexagons of about 2,500 to 3,000 acres each, where a collared wolf is roaming. On Thursday afternoon, wolf locations were shown mostly in far Northern California, in Siskiyou, Lassen, Shasta and Plumas counties, with another location in the Southern Sierra, in Tulare County near Sequoia National Forest.
State wildlife officials say the goal is to give ranchers a real-time tool to take steps to protect their livestock if wolves are in the area, such as moving the herds, posting range riders on horseback, or using lights, loud noises, or other methods to chase wolves away.
The state isn’t providing the exact location to protect the wolves from poachers or others looking to harm them.
“California’s rural livestock producers living near wolves have faced real challenges as the wolf population grows in California. This is one more tool in our shared toolkit to protect their herds from wolf-livestock conflict,” said Chuck Bonham, director of the state Department of Fish and Wildlife. “We will continue to partner with ranchers and communities to navigate a positive path forward.”
Last month, Bonham’s department announced that wolf population numbers have increased enough that they plan to relax rules that have set strict protections on the high-profile species.
The changes, when finalized by the end of this year, will allow ranchers and other rural property owners to obtain permits to use more aggressive methods to chase gray wolves away from livestock — including firing rubber bullets or bean bags to scare them away, and using ATVs, motorcycles or other equipment to chase them from herds of cattle or sheep.
The new rules won’t allow wolves to be shot or hunted however, since they are still listed in California under the state and federal endangered species acts, and it is illegal to kill a wolf unless in defense of a human life.
Wolves roamed California for thousands of years, like grizzly bears and mountain lions. But their interactions with ranchers, and fears of rural residents, caused them to be wiped out a century ago. The last wild wolf in California was shot in 1924 in Lassen County.
The first wolf returned to the state after an 87-year absence in 2011, when a young male walked across the border from Oregon.
Wolves are now found in nine of California’s 58 counties, in seven packs from the Oregon border to the mountains around Lake Tahoe, and in the Southern Sierra near Bakersfield. State biologists estimate that California north of Interstate 80 could support between 371 and 497 wolves, based on populations around the Rocky Mountains and Great Lakes.
Environmental groups were generally supportive but cautious on Thursday.
“Coexistence sometimes requires trying new things. So I’m excited that Californians can use this map to learn more about how our wolves move through the state,” said Amaroq Weiss, a senior wolf advocate at the Center for Biological Diversity. “I’m hopeful that livestock operators will responsibly use the map to head off conflict. I appreciate that the state stands ready to pull the plug immediately if anyone abuses this new system to harm wolves.”
Environmentalists note the state pays ranchers for cattle killed by wolves, and that there have been no cases of a wolf killing a person in the lower 48 states in more than 100 years.
State officials are not posting the locations of collared female wolves having pups, or of wolves that leave California and roam into other states like Oregon or Washington, where there are fewer protections.
Ranchers, who have urged the state to help them limit livestock conflicts, welcomed California’s new map.
“Knowledge is power, and this mapping tool will empower ranchers throughout wolf territory to better understand where wolves might threaten their livestock, enabling them to increase human presence and adjust their herd management as necessary to deter wolf attacks,” said Kirk Wilbur, vice president of the California Cattlemen’s Association.