America's Most Famous Gray Wolf May Be a Dad

OR7 is the most famous wolf in the United States—he even has his own upcoming biopic. Born to the Imnaha pack in 2009, this radio-collared loner split from his Oregon-based family in September 2011 and has since wandered thousands of miles, grabbing headlines when he crossed the California border, where he became the first confirmed gray wolf to have set paw in the state since 1924.

Now, the Oregon Fish and Wildlife Office announced that OR7—or “Journey,” as he has been nicknamed—may finally have found what he has spent three long years looking for: a nice lady wolf with whom to start a family.

In early May, cameras set up by the US Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) took a number of photos of a black-furred female wolf in the Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest. OR7 has been cooling his heels in the same territory, so the two animals are certainly aware of each other, and have probably already hooked up.

“This information is not definitive, but it is likely that this new wolf and OR7 have paired up,” said John Stephenson, [a FWS wolf biologist, in a statement](http://www.fws.gov/oregonfwo/ExternalAffairs/News/2014/NR FINAL wolf or7 release.pdf). “More localized GPS collar data from OR7 is an indicator that they may have denned. If that is correct, they would be rearing pups at this time of year.”

This would make OR7 and his mate the first breeding pair in the Cascade Range since the [early twentieth century](http://www.fws.gov/oregonfwo/ExternalAffairs/News/2014/NR FINAL wolf or7 release.pdf). We probably won't know for sure until June, because biologists want to give the couple the privacy that all new parents deserve. But whether they've successfully bred or not, OR7's trek to find a mate is apparently over, which is great news for advocacy groups hoping to reintroduce the animals back into their old stomping grounds.

“OR7 is the first known breeding attempt in western Oregon and an important start towards our conservation objective in the western portion of the state,” Michelle Dennehy of the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife told me. “It also indicates that there are wolves in the Cascades. Prior to this, the only evidence of wolves in Cascades (besides OR7) was one wolf track found on the eastern side of Mount Hood in December 2013.”

As of December 2013, Oregon had a wolf population of 64, but the vast majority of them occupy the northeastern corner of the state. “It’s entirely possible other wolves have made it to the southern Oregon Cascades,” Dennehy said. “But OR7 and its mate are the only known wolves to do so.”

Without anthropomorphizing the pair too much, you have too admit it is kind of irresistible that OR7 ended up with another restless wolf, far from her own pack. He could've been a bachelor for many more years to come, or worse, been stuck with a male in his territory. But instead he's crossed paths with some oddball female, whose own background is murky.

“We don’t know where the female wolf came from,” Dennehy told me. “We have seven packs in the northeast corner of Oregon so she may have come from there. Idaho and Washington state also have wolf populations so she could have come from out of state. DNA samples can help us determine where the wolf came from.”

The female's scat might give biologists the necessary genetic information, or it could be collected from her body if she is ever collared like OR7.

Gray wolves were effectively eradicated from the continental US by 1950, in response to concerns over livestock safety. Their absence has seriously upset many ecosystems, reducing overall biodiversity. Though many farmers still object to the reintroduction of wolves, OR7 and his mate are protected under the Endangered Species Act. They may well be the progenitors of a restored, healthy wolf population in the decades to come.