It would not be unusual to see a hybrid wolf. That would be part dog and part wolf. There are folks in the hollows who indeed breed them this way. Could one have escaped capitivity?
'All my lies are always wishes" ~Jeff Tweedy~
Quite possible . This same scenario of a personal pet escaping into the wild has also been therorized concerning the eastern cougar. Why not also the wolf ?
Getting lost is a way to find yourself.
Yes I know a Grey wolf is typically larger, but there are some pretty good size coyotes, the largest that I know of is near 80lbs, which is about average for the GW -- also the colorization can vary in both species, so that's not necessarily at tell-tale sign.
As I said in my original post, some coyotes are easy to ID, but I've seen pics of some that look damn near wolf like, but I'm no where near an expert.
As for Red wolves, I agree.
I'm no expert as I know many of you are, but they look pretty similar to me. IMO in the woods with nothing to reference size it's hard to tell height or the weight of animal.
I can except a wolf escaped from captivity or migrated from some other state.
Red Wolf
Grey Wolf
Coyote
After doing a quick search I found this article on releasing wolves in VA and WV by U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the U. S. Forest Service. I haven't found a follow up article, but if the release happened it's entirely possible some of the wolves survived and are reproducing.
http://www.vlrc.org/articles/42.html
Quite a large range of sizes with coyotes. The last really big one I saw, I thought it was a German Shepherd. Seen some runty ones that were healthy.
Thanks for those photos. Enjoyed comparing the eye/muzzle differences.
80 pound coyote? I'm from Missouri on that one. Show me.
Most coyotes I have seen in the east are around 40-50 pounds. Grey Wolves will run 120. Red Wolves aren't found in the wild except for a few places where they have been introduced by the USF&WS. I have a Red Wolf recovery site about 250 yards from where I am sitting as I type this. They live in an enclosure. I hear them howling most nights.
'All my lies are always wishes" ~Jeff Tweedy~
I'm not talking to you about this anymore MOWGLI, you obviously know a lot more about this subject than me. Maybe there's not coyote out there that can fool you, but I know they can fool me and many others.
My memory was a little off on the record size coyote, but here's the link
http://home.sou.edu/~rible/wildlife/coyote.html
From the link:
"Northern coyote subspecies are larger than southern subspecies (Beckoff 1977). One of the largestcoyotes on record weighed 74¾ pounds and measured over five feet in total length (Young 1951). Coyotes can run up to 40 miles per hour, but normally only run between 25 and 30 miles per hour. They may also jump as high as 14 feet (Whitaker 1980). Coyotes generally don't live in close-knit packs, as do wolves, and are much more solitary. The coyote packs that have been observed usually consist of family members. (Beckoff 1977)."
I didn't mean to sound offended by your posts. Alls good.
A farmer shot a wild wolf in Mass last year. Only confirmed incident of a wild wolf on the east cost ive heard of.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/art...ns_up_in_mass/
Adventure is the invitation to the common person, to become uncommon. ~ wm
Bivouac is a French word for "mistake". ~ Ed Viesturs
I live in a very rural area of Central Virginia and I think I saw a gray wolf this morning going to work. It was solid gray and too big to be a fox and bigger than any coyote I have ever seen. It was graceful and majestic. I tried to grab my camera and spooked him. What a shame because I would've had proof!!!
The Bays Mt menagerie lost some wolves from their pen when a storm laid a tree across their double fencing late last year.
To my knowledge they've retreived all but one.
That's over 200 miles to SNP.
Not the same animal I guess, but there's one at large somewhere, feasibly along the AT corridor.
I think I read the other day that something like 60% of the eastern coyotes tested were wolf-hybrids.
Con men understand that their job is not to use facts to convince skeptics but to use words to help the gullible to believe what they want to believe - Thomas Sowell