Remember “OR7,” the Oregon-based wolf that created a stir when it wandered into Northern California a couple of years ago? It looks like it has found a mate and settled down in Oregon . . .

Oregon’s famous wandering gray wolf, dubbed OR-7, may have found the mate he has trekked thousands of miles looking for, wildlife authorities said Monday. It’s likely the pair spawned pups, and if confirmed, the rare predators would be the first breeding pair of wolves in the Oregon’s Cascade Range since the early 1900s.

Officials said cameras in the Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest in the southern Cascades captured several images of what appears to be a female wolf in the same area where OR-7’s GPS collar shows he has been living.

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist John Stephenson said it is not proof, but it is likely the two wolves mated over the winter and are rearing pups that would have been born in April. Biologists won’t start looking for a den until June, to avoid endangering the pups.

Read more . . .

“OR7,” the first wild wolf to enter California in almost 90 years (see earlier story), seems to have settled down in Northern California for now after a brief excursion back into Oregon . . .

A young male wolf from Oregon that has won worldwide fame while trekking across mountains, deserts and highways looking for a mate has had what appears to be his first close encounter with people, and got his picture taken, to boot.

A federal trapper, a state game warden and a state wildlife biologist were visiting ranchers in Northern California on Tuesday to notify them that GPS signals showed the gray wolf was in the area, when they stopped to look over a sagebrush hillside with binoculars, said Karen Kovacs, wildlife program manager for the California Department of Fish and Game in Redding, Calif.

“There, all of a sudden, out pops a head, and there he is,” she said. “He appeared very healthy.”

Continue reading . . .