Current numbers: 2
Pack status: Active. Designated in 2011.
The Teanaway Pack was one of the first packs to establish and have pups in the North Cascades Recovery Region, and just the fourth pack confirmed in the state since wolves were exterminated in the 1930s. Over their original tenure (2011-2022), they successfully lived alongside livestock in their territory with few conflicts, and played a key role in the ongoing return of wolves to the Cascades.
They were designated as a pack in 2011. The pack was founded by wolves WA32M and WA12F, siblings who were born to the Lookout Pack in 2008 as part of the very first litter of wolf pups born in Washington since extirpation. Inbreeding among wolves is extremely rare, but can happen in isolated populations due to low population and low connectivity to other packs.
In 2012 or 2013, breeding female WA12F disappeared, leaving behind several offspring, including females WA38F and WA72F, who were born in 2012.
In March 2014, it was reported that two female wolves from the Teanaway Pack had dispersed and started the Wenatchee Pack.
In early 2014, the Teanaway Pack consisted of breeding male WA32M and his two daughters/nieces WA38F and WA72F. WA32M and WA38F produced a litter of five pups.
The breeding female, WA38F, was illegally killed in October 2014 when she was two years old. At the time, the pack was only one of two successfully breeding packs known in the North Cascades Recovery Region. The poaching of WA38F left her sister, WA72F, and the breeding male, WA32M, to raise the pups she left behind. Three out of five pups survived to the end of 2014.
The Teanaway Pack did not have any new pups in 2015. In early 2015, two of the surviving pups from the previous year (then about ten months old) were captured and collared, given the designations WA43F and WA44M. WA44M dispersed to the north in mid 2015. His collar died shortly after he began his dispersal.
In 2016, WA43F, dispersed to British Columbia, Canada. The map to the right shows her dispersal path – her location is indicated by the purple dots. (The others are 54m from the Huckleberry Pack and 65m from the Smackout Pack.)
With just the two of them left, WA32M and WA72F produced their first litter of pups in 2016 and became a very successful pair of leaders. Though younger and smaller than WA32M, WA72F led most of the pack’s expeditions while WA32M followed her lead.
There were at least eight pack members in 2017, and the pack had breeding pair status. WA72F was captured and collared that year. At the end of 2018, the pack had at least five members and had breeding pair status.
In May 2019, WA32M was captured and re-collared. Also that month, a black wolf was photographed in the pack’s territory for the first time since wolves had returned. In June 2019, WA43F, the female who was born in 2014 and had dispersed to Canada in 2016, was legally killed near Douglas Lake in British Columbia. The 2019 annual survey confirmed six wolves in the Teanaway Pack, with 32M and 72F remaining as the longstanding breeding pair. The mysterious black wolf of unknown origin was seen around the pack’s territory again in late 2019.
In early 2020, the black wolf, who was later designated WA106M, pushed out breeding male WA32M, who was then an old wolf at the age of 12 (most wolves live 3-4 years). WA32M left the pack’s territory, wandering alone between the Teanaway and Naneum pack territories before dying during the summer. He had led the Teanaway Pack for ten years.
WA106M and WA72F, then age 8, produced a litter of five pups that spring. This litter was the first that was not the product of inbreeding since the pack’s establishment. Two pups survived the year. Biologists also collared a two-year-old adult male, a son of WA32M and WA72F, in February 2020, who was designated WA102M. He dispersed to the Naneum Pack in March 2020. At the end of 2020, the Teanaway Pack had five members, including WA72F and WA106M as the leading pair.
In 2021, WA72F and WA106M had one surviving pup. By the end of 2021, there were four wolves confirmed in the Teanaway Pack. WA102M left the Naneum Pack in November of 2021, dispersing again, traveling over 190 miles in 14 days before joining the Stranger Pack in Northeast Washington.
In early 2022, WA72F disappeared. She was then 10 years old, a remarkable feat for a wild wolf. She was an incredibly good leader during her 7-year reign. The cause of her disappearance is unknown. Her offspring left the pack’s territory, but WA106M remained, wandering the territory alone for nearly a year.
WA125M, a disperser from the Naneum area and possible son of WA106M and WA72F, walked through the Teanaway pack territory in October 2022 and reached the Five Sisters territory in Eastern Washington by the end of November 2022. He was documented traveling with 3 other adult wolves within that territory in February 2023.
Since WA106M was the lone resident of the Teanaway Pack territory at the end of 2022, the territory lost its “pack” status.
In the spring of 2023, WA106M left the pack territory, crossing I-90 to the South Cascades in early summer. Several weeks after he left the pack territory, WA129F, a young female dispersing from the Loup Loup Pack, entered the Teanaway territory. Finding no wolves there, she also attempted to cross I-90 to the south, losing her life to a vehicle in the attempt.
WA106M spent much of the summer into fall covering a large area of the South Cascades, likely searching for a mate. WA106Mwas illegally killed in the fall of 2023. The killing was under investigation until the statute of limitations expired in 2024.
. In the summer of 2023, WA136M, who was collared in the Navarre Pack in May 2022 as a 2-year-old, dispersed south to the former Teanaway pack area and then moved east to the former Naneum pack area.
In late 2024, WA136M returned to the Teanaway territory and was traveling with one other wolf. Two wolves in the territory restored the Teanaway as an official pack.
In October of 2024, wolf WA44M was killed by other wolves in northern Washington. He was one of the pups born in the Teanaway Packin 2014 to WA38F and WA32M. He had dispersed north as a yearling in 2015 before his collar died, after which, he went untracked for seven years. He was captured and re-collared in the Shady Pass Pack in 2022. He was likely the breeding male of this pack.
In the autumn of 2024, he left the Shady Pass Pack territory. He wandered north into the territory of the Lookout Pack – the first pack confirmed to return to Washington, and the territory where the first litter of pups was born in 2008.
In 2024, the Lookout Pack numbered 13 wolves. Wolves defend their territory from intruding wolves, and 44M, then an old wolf at age 10, didn’t stand a chance against the large pack. In October 2024, he died in the territory his father and grandmother had been born 16 years earlier.
Photos
Useful Links
Washington Department of Fish & Wildlife – Teanaway
