They’re coming!
Link is to story about wolves in Indiana and Nebraska.
I do think that the delisting of wolves in the Midwest was a bad idea.
They have been dispersing out of the core Midwest are (Michigan UP, northern Minnesota, northern Wisconsin) into North Dakota and South Dakota for some time now. A few stragglers have been found in Iowa and Illinois and a few have even been killed in those states. One was recently killed in central Illinois near Peoria.
But I found it amazing that wolves have actually shown up in Indiana and Nebraska. One was found dead in a farmer’s field somewhere in Indiana (In the east-central part of the state, not too far from Indianapolis!) and a hunter in Nebraska (actually in the center of the state) shot and killed one, which is a violation of the Endangered Species Act (ESA), and he could face a big fine for that mistake, as he was dumb enough to turn the animal in to authorities. Incredibly enough, 12 years ago, a wolf was shot dead in northeastern Missouri!
There have also been a few wolves shot in Maine in recent decades, and I believe one was sighted in eastern Massachusetts. They are definitely believed to exist in Colorado, as one was recently photographed there.
Coyotes have now dispersed across the entire eastern US and I believe they are now found in all 50 states. The problem is that it is not so easy to tell a coyote from a wolf in the world. It’s perfectly legal to hunt coyotes in the East. Hunting wolves? Not necessarily. A hunter mistaking a wolf for a coyote could find himself with a hefty fine.
The deer population is exploding across much of the eastern US, and it has turned into a huge problem. The presence of a traditional predator, the wolf, might go a long way towards correcting that problem.
