I don't know what made me think about it but last night while trying to go to sleep I was reminiscing about a farm where I had the privilege of
hunt. This would have been in the late 40's through the early 60's. One day while driving down the country road to the farm a red wolf came out of a field and ran in front of the car for a short distance before getting into some timber. The time would have probably been in the early 50's.

That was the first and only time that I ever saw one. From what I can determine they are now pretty much extinct. Do any of you, in the states
surrounding OK, have any knowledge of their current existence?

I think that I know the fate of the one that I saw because the farmer told me later that a man he had hired to cut wood had cornered one in a dead end creek bed and killed it with an axe.

Here's the facts.

Red Wolf Facts and Video - Canis rufus - Defenders of Wildlife - Defenders of Wildlife#

f.t.

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South Carolina-God's country

I recall reading that the red wolf is extinct in Texas and that they were trying to introduce a different wolf into the state. Years after that we were driving south on U.S. 59 (on vacation) and saw what I took to be a wolf. If any of you Texans know the current status of the wolf in the state it would be nice to hear about it. Thanks

I've read that interbreeding with coyotes has largely eliminated the pure Red Wolf strain. They may survive in isolated areas.

T-Star

The Eastern Coyotes are bigger then you'd expect. They have crossbred with the RedWolves...Here in Maine, they get pretty big.

giz

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Non gratum anus rodentum

In Canada, a couple of those killed a singer in a park last year.

T-Star

It seems that there is an attempt to reintroduce the Red Wolf in Florida near here. How “we” the State of Florida, are going to avoid Coyote interbreeding which has distroyed everyone else’s program I do not know.
I suspect that a very large part of our plan will be based upon wishful thinking.
In the end I suspect we will produce a bigger, faster, coyote.

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Ipsis Rebus Dictantitbus

Texas Parks and Wildlife will tell you they are extinct in Texas. There are rumors of them being sighted in isolated areas along the Texas coast. (Not too many isolated areas on the coast anymore!)

I thought I saw one in Calhoun County about a year ago, but I am since convinced it was probably not. The odds of them interbreeding with coyotes are extremely high, since coyotes exist in almost every Texas county, and I would think if they were here, there are no pure bloodlines anymore.

There is a small experimental breeding population in the Aligator National Wildlife Refuge in NC.

I saw some at the National Zoo in DC awhile back, and was surprised at their modest size, no bigger than a typical coyote. I don't know about the coloration of eastern coyotes, but in this neck of the woods, coyotes run toward rufous. It would be very difficult, I think, to identify one species from the other in a hunting situation, especially in poor lighting conditions. Insist that anywhere they may be reintroduced that they be given "experimental" status so that if they are inadvertently shot when mistaken for a coyote, the shooter isn't subject to some severe punishment for an honest mistake.