Wolves in Oregon: Bigger, badder than before?

As wolves continue to re-establish themselves in Oregon, a debate simmers over whether they are similar to the animals wiped out following state-sponsored hunts that ended in the 1940s. Many ranchers and critics of wolf revival say they’re bigger and nastier than the ones that once roamed the state. Supporters of wolves and those behind their reintroduction say those claims are overblown and are used to vilify the predator. As a rancher near Dayville, about 120 miles east of Bend, Harry Stangel, 66, doesn’t want to see wolf packs return to Central Oregon. He says the wolves are an exotic species. “It’s a Canadian wolf,” he said. “It’s not the wolf that (was) indigenous to Oregon and Idaho.” While old-timers say Oregon’s native wolves were just slightly larger than a coyote, with males weighing about 80 pounds, there are reports on the Internet of wolves in Idaho weighing over 170 pounds, said Rod Childers, a rancher near Enterprise and chairman of the Oregon Cattlemen’s Association. “They are bigger, and they are going to demand more food,” he said. That food is deer, elk and, possibly, cattle. Bangs, who lives in Helena, Mont., said examinations of skulls from modern wolves and ancient wolves from Oregon show that today’s wolves in the West are bigger, but only by a matter of millimeters when it comes to the head size...more