They were placed in a holding pen just before breeding season. May. They were released Thursday because elk calving has begun, and the pack will have abundant prey to subsist and feed the young. The interagency wolf management team has no immediate plans for additional releases this year. Soft mesh pens were set up to keep the animals together. The wolves escaped the pens by the next day, which wasn't unexpected by biologists.
Monitoring indicates that the wolves have remained together.
The helicopter transfer of the Mule Pack, which was brought in from New Mexico, was hampered the first day by high winds. Early the second day, the helicopter successfully transported them to the pack mules. The trip on mules to the mesh pens was trouble-free. According to biologists, the success of using pack mules to transfer the wolves was so successful that it opens new opportunities to for transporting wolves to more remote places. The Mexican, the most endangered subspecies of gray wolf in North America, is showing signs of success.