Years of DNA testing of an animal shot by a hunter in Cherry Valley, Otsego County, has revealed the first documented case in decades of a wild gray wolf roaming in New York, according to the state Department of Environmental Conservation and New York State Museum researchers.
In December 2021, a deer hunter shot and killed what he thought was a coyote during coyote hunting season. But the male canine weighed 84 pounds – unusually large for a coyote – so the hunter contacted the DEC, setting in motion years of DNA analyses and other testing.
Researchers from the New York State Museum in Albany, Princeton University and the Northeast Ecological Recovery Society recently confirmed the animal was a wild gray wolf. The findings were presented by Jeremy Kirchman, curator of birds and mammals at the museum.
“The Cherry Valley wolf specimen is an exceptionally important piece of physical evidence of occasional dispersals by wild wolves into the northeastern U.S. from core breeding areas in eastern Canada,” Kirchman said. “The specimen will remain preserved in the Museum’s mammalogy collection in perpetuity, where it will be available for future study.”
Gray wolves were largely eliminated from the northeastern U.S. by the late 19th century, according to the museum. Since 1900, there have been occasional reports of the wolves in New York, including three confirmed wolves over the last 25 years.
The Cherry Valley wolf is the first gray wolf with a wild diet confirmed to be found in New York state since 2001, when a hunter shot a 99-pound male in Saratoga County, near the Adirondack Park boundary, according to the DEC.
Testing done on a nearly 100-pound canine shot in 2005 in Cayuga County determined the animal was a captive wolf with a commercial diet, the DEC says.
The Cherry Valley wolf is now displayed as part of the state museum’s Canine Contrasts exhibit.