Some Mexican wolves have been introduced to Arizona and New Mexico, but a wolf spotted on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon National Park is considered to look more like the large bodied gray wolf populations that have been reintroduced to the northern Rocky Mountains with such success.

If so, it must have taken a remarkable journey – the nearest breeding population from which it could have come is over a thousand kilometers away near Yellowstone National Park.

The Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) welcomed the report. “In the early 1900s over 30 wolves on the North Kaibab, including Grand Canyon National Park, were killed by government hunters,” said Kim Crumbo, conservation director for Grand Canyon Wildlands Council. “The possibility that a determined wolf could make it to the Canyon region is cause for celebration, and we must insist that every effort be taken to protect this brave wanderer.”

The Fish and Wildlife Service are seeking to collect fecal samples to confirm that the animal is indeed a wolf, rather than a wolf-dog hybrid.

Two years ago a wolf known as OR-7 left his pack in Oregon to become California's first wolf in 87 years, but is now back in his home state raising pups, adding credibility to the possibility of a journey such as this.

So these Grand Canyon wolves came from Wyoming, not Oregon, California, or Mexico?

On the north rim, woof*!  (*yes)

Heh. And now in Yellowstone:

http://pandawhale.com/post/53213/when-they-brought-the-wolves-to-yellowstone-they-had-no-clue-this-would-be-the-result