Top wolf official Eric Odell | Colorado Parks & Wildlife
The storm of setbacks facing Colorado's voter-approved gray wolf reintroduction program continues to howl out west as the initiative continues to get hammered by the feds and from within. Just yesterday, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service dropped a formal notice in the Federal Register demanding more answers on "conflict risk" with livestock, how Colorado is actually managing the chaos, and whether the state's compensation scheme is anything more than a slow-motion wealth transfer from taxpayers to ranchers who never asked for any of this.
This is the latest federal escalation after FWS killed the British Columbia import deal back in December, all while demanding a full audit of the program, and making it crystal clear they're not here to rubber-stamp progressive wildlife cosplay when it starts eating into American agriculture.
And in the event that wasn’t enough to make program proponents sweat, Eric Odell, the guy who's been the biological face and operational engine of Colorado Parks and Wildlife's wolf program since the ballot passed, just announced he's riding off into the sunset at the end of June after 25+ years with the agency.
The timing here is anything but coincidental. With releases halted for the 2026 season, reintroduced wolf survival rates hovering at just 44 percent, and taxpayer-funded compensation payouts to ranchers already doubling budgeted amounts (and climbing past $1 million), the program that was supposed to establish a self-sustaining population west of the Continental Divide is showing serious signs of strain. Program supporters still tout ecological benefits and early reproduction, but the accumulating pressures have many wondering if this experiment has enough runway left to take off.
Early wolf collaring efforts | CPW
As many of us remember, the program started with high hopes. The first 10 wolves from Oregon were released in December 2023, followed by 15 from British Columbia in January 2025, for a total of 25 translocated canines. Early packs formed, pups were born in 2024 and 2025, and some natural dispersals from Wyoming added to the mix.
CPW's goal was 30–50 wolves over the first few years to hit self-sustainability. But reality hit hard and the program is now officially on life support.
The Trump-era FWS, with Brian Nesvik at the helm and Doug Burgum's Interior crew, isn't playing the old game. Yesterday’s notice is an open invitation for public comment (through June 5) on how to actually make the 10(j) experimental population rule work, or whether the state has lost the plot enough for feds to step in and run it themselves, relocations, lethal takes, and all.
Odell's timely exit adds the perfect capstone. While agency spokespeople are calling it a "planned retirement", doing so in the middle of the program’s most fragile moment, and with the prior director already having been shown the door, screams leadership vacuum.
The truth is, we all expected some level of early-onset hiccups as reintroduction efforts are typically messy ordeals. But when half your founding population doesn't make it, compensation doubles the budget overnight, new animals can't be sourced, and the guy running the show heads for the exit, "hiccup" starts looking a lot like "structural failure."
Colorado's wolf program isn't dead yet, but it is running out of wolves, money, and is now without the one guy who knew how to keep the plates spinning. The next few months, as comments roll in and the next annual report drops, will tell us whether this thing gets reformed into something realistic, federalized into oblivion, or quietly allowed to fizzle.
