Colorado Parks and Wildlife confirms establishment of new gray wolf pack

July 22, 2026

DENVER – 

Colorado Parks and Wildlife (CPW) has confirmed the formation of a new gray wolf pack: the Piney Ridge Pack in Eagle County.

With the confirmation of this new pack,  CPW has confirmed successful reproduction in four packs this year: Piney Ridge, One Ear, Three Creeks and Copper Creek.  Average litter size for wolves is 4-6 pups.

More information about packs will be included in the agency's 2026-2027 annual report released in spring 2027.

“Detection of pups in late spring or early summer is inherently challenging, because of their use of remote habitats in dense cover, secretive nature of very young animals, and time potentially underground,” said CPW’s Wolf Conservation Program Manager Eric Odell. “We are continuing to monitor the four reproducing packs in Colorado and will include minimum counts of the entire wolf population in our annual biological year report next spring.”

Pack formation carries a number of benefits to both individual wolves and the overall restoration program. Data in Colorado has shown that wolves in established packs have higher survival rates compared to dispersing wolves or wolves not in packs.

Pack formation also plays a role in conflict minimization efforts. Wolf movements become more localized than dispersing wolves since packs generally move within an established territory. 

“We are still working from a modest amount of data in Colorado — due to the relatively new nature of our wolf population as well as its small size, — but so far we are seeing a clear pattern of wolves in packs surviving longer than wolves that are not in packs,” said Dr. Brenna Cassidy, CPW Wolf Monitoring and Data Coordinator. “For instance in the last biological year (April 1, 2025 - March 30, 2026) we experienced 10 mortalities among our wolf population, seven of these were dispersers and only three were pack members. This shows us the benefit of having more packs on the Colorado landscape for both adult survival and reproduction as we work to achieve the goals of the Colorado Wolf Restoration and Management Plan. ”

Territories formed by packs help CPW’s field staff prioritize where conflict minimization tools (such as fladry and scare devices) and techniques (like range riding and hazing) should be deployed to address potential wolf-livestock conflict.

CPW continues to be in active communication, specifically with producers who have known wolf activity localized near their operations and is working closely with them to ensure access to viable, reasonable, and effective conflict minimization resources. Additional information about CPW’s conflict minimization program can be found in the agency’s Wolf-Livestock Conflict Minimization Program Producer Guide.

The public can learn more about CPW wolf monitoring efforts and how it is increasing CPW understanding of wolf behavior in this recent story from the Colorado Outdoors blog.

Information concerning Colorado’s gray wolf packs can be found in the 2025-2026 Colorado Gray Wolf Annual Report and will be included in the 2026-2027 annual report next spring.

Members of the public who believe they have seen a wolf are encouraged to submit a wolf sighting form on CPW’s website. Receiving reports of wolf sightings from the public — especially with high-quality photos or video — is extremely helpful to CPW as the agency monitors and tracks the movement of gray wolves. This will become increasingly important as the population of uncollared wolves grows through successful reproduction and natural immigration into Colorado.

CPW would like to remind the public that gray wolves are a state and federal endangered species. Additionally, Colorado’s wolf packs may be residing on privately owned lands. Going onto private lands without permission is considered trespassing which is subject to punishment by the local jurisdiction.

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