It has been seven months since wolves were first released in Pitkin County and neighboring counties. In January, wolves were released directly into Pitkin County, while some wolves that were reintroduced in Colorado in 2023 had migrated from Grand County into the Roaring Fork Valley. 

According to a Colorado Parks and Wildlife update to the Pitkin County Commission on Tuesday, depredations in Pitkin County began in February 2025. Following the February depredations, there was a gap in wolf depredations until May when several depredations caused CPW to take lethal action against one wolf. 

“Those events that we documented in late May did trigger chronic depredation,” said Matt Yamashita, District wildlife manager for CPW. “CPW local staff were given direction by our upper level management to lethally remove one animal, and one animal was prescribed in our policy that it will occur one animal at a time in order to try to effectively change the behavior of the pack.”

In May, there were four depredation events in the Roaring Fork Valley that culminated in CPW killing wolf 2405 of the Copper Creek Pack. Two calves were injured, two killed, and one cow was injured within the span of 10 days. Collar data from the Copper Creek pack shows they were in the area for the four incidents. 

Yamashita explained that CPW aims to offer a chance for a pack to change its behavior by removing one wolf at a time.

CPW staff said that while producers have been rightfully frustrated by depredations, they have also been a supportive part of a coalition working to reduce wolf-livestock interactions. 

“It’s admirable, (ranchers) don’t have to open their doors in order to say, hey, come talk with us,” said Yamashita. “They’re frustrated enough, I would understand if they didn’t. However, they continue to call us up and say, we would love for you to come over here and sit down and chat with us more. As long as we can continue doing that, we’ll see our way through some of this.”

Commissioners did not take action at this meeting as its purpose was for informational updates from CPW on a variety of wildlife topics. Commissioners did take the opportunity to ask questions of the CPW staff about the reintroduction.

Commissioner Jeffrey Woodruff asked specifically about indirect losses potentially incurred as a result of wolves. 

According to the CPW response, there is a route for producers to be compensated for losses incurred beyond actual depredation. 

“We can compensate them if they have decreased (pregnancy) rates and they have a track record of showing what their historical levels were at, then we will compensate them based on that,” said Yamashita. “If, historically, they had 80% pregnancy, and then this year, they went and did checks and it went down to 65% then the agency would compensate them.”

When asked how the county can assist CPW on this matter, CPW asked that various stakeholders continue to engage them in the conversation.