BAKER CITY — A wolf or wolves from the Cornucopia pack inflicted fatal injuries on a working dog on a cattle ranch near Halfway this week.

And a state wildlife biologist who monitors wolves in Baker County said wolves from the Cornucopia and Keating packs — a total of at least 15 animals — have been making some unusual movements over the past month or so.

“It makes it harder to predict what’s going to happen, and it makes it harder on producers,” said Brian Ratliff, district wildlife biologist at the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife’s Baker City office.

Six wolves — three from each pack — are fitted with GPS tracking collars, but Ratliff said that in the past week or so two of those collars, one from each pack, ceased working.

The collars don’t allow anything approaching real-time information about the wolves’ location, Ratliff said.

(He said that uploading data from the collars to satellites uses a considerable amount of the collar’s battery power, so if they reported the location frequently the collars wouldn’t last long.)

The collars typically report their location once a day although some collars can report more often — the time varies to give a wider range of data — which is usually enough to allow Ratliff to spot trends and, when necessary, to alert ranchers that wolves have been frequenting a specific area.

That’s been the case recently in the north end of the Eagle Valley, north of Richland, Ratliff said.

Ranchers have frequently been hazing wolves in that area. Ratliff said he has hazed wolves there as well.

So far there have been no reports of wolves attacking livestock in that area, he said on Thursday, March 17.

The fatal attack on the working dog, a 40-pound heeler, happened across the Halfway Grade in the south end of Pine Valley, near Pine Town Lane.

The dog’s owner found the animal by its kennel the morning of March 15, Ratliff said.

The dog died later, after being treated by a veterinarian, and Ratliff said the owner, after burying the animal, called ODFW.

Ratliff said the dog was disinterred and, after he and another biologist examined its wounds on March 16, they confirmed that it had been attacked by a wolf or wolves.

He said it’s not certain where the attack happened, but he doesn’t think the dog, given the severity of its injuries, could have traveled very far after the attack.

According to the ODFW depredation report, the dog had “premortem bite punctures to the head and throat with associated muscle tissue trauma. Bruising of the hide and muscle trauma were found on the back, hips, and groin. The location and size of the tooth marks are consistent with wolf attack injuries on dogs.”

According to the report, GPS collar data from a yearling male wolf from the Cornucopia pack placed that wolf a half-mile from the ranch where the dog lived, at 2 a.m. and 5 a.m. on March 15.

(Ratliff said those locations weren’t uploaded to the satellite, from which they’re available to ODFW, until several hours later.)

Ratliff said the rancher told him that another of his dogs died on Christmas Day after showing up with severe injuries. Although ODFW biologists didn’t examine that dog, Ratliff said he looked at GPS collar data from that day and a wolf was near the ranch then, and it’s possible a wolf or wolves also attacked that dog.

Ratliff said he’s concerned about a pit, which is one mile from the ranch, where cattle carcasses are dumped.

He said wolves have roamed near that pit occasionally over the past several years, and he worries that it will continue to lure the predators.

Ratliff said ranchers who use that pit have partially buried and in some cases burned carcasses, but the site continues to remain a potential attractant for wolves.

Burying carcasses is the best way to avoid that problem, he said.

“I know it’s a lot more work for producers,” Ratliff said. “I don’t have a perfect solution. Sometimes even when carcasses are buried there’s still scent there. But burying carcasses is the best option.”

Wolves from two packs mingling

Ratliff said wolves from the Keating and Cornucopia packs have been mingling, and at times traveling together recently.

That’s uncommon, he said.

Wolves from the Keating Pack, which numbers at least 10 animals, including five pups born in the spring of 2021, had spent much of the winter around the north side of Keating Valley.

But recently at least five Keating wolves had moved east into the Low Hills country southeast of Halfway. That’s an area where wolves from the former Pine Creek Pack attacked cattle repeatedly during the spring of 2018, killing four and injuring at least seven.

Wolves from the Cornucopia Pack, meanwhile, have moved west and have been lingering in the north part of Eagle Valley.

The Cornucopia Pack consists of at least five wolves, but the pack has no breeding male, and Ratliff said it’s possible the pack’s breeding female won’t have a litter of pups this spring.

On March 18, wolves from the Cornucopia Pack had moved back across the Halfway grade and were in the northern part of Pine Valley, Ratliff said. He alerted ranchers in that area about the wolves’ latest movements.

The pack’s breeding male was illegally shot and killed in late September 2020 near Eagle Forks campground. A second wolf, a subadult female, was shot and killed in late October 2020 northeast of Halfway. It’s not clear whether that wolf was a member of a pack.

More recently, a 2-year-old male wolf from the Cornucopia Pack was hit by a car and killed along Highway 86, about 5 miles west of Richland, in April 2021.