California’s first-ever annual wolf management report shows the state’s wolf population increased by 10 percent over the last year. It also showed a sizable jump in the number of wolf-livestock attacks and the compensation costs associated with them.
The 2025 California Gray Wolf Conservation and Management Annual Report, prepared by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW), shows a minimum of 55 wolves in the Golden State. Eight of its nine wolf packs are in northeast California,while the other is about 400 miles to the south, just north of Bakersfield. Four new packs formed in 2025 and six of the packs reproduced with a minimum of 32 pups.
However, as wolf numbers grew, so did the number of problemslinked to them. CDFW reports depredation investigations increased from 74 in 2024 to 267 in 2025, or a 261-percent increase. Of those wolf-livestock incidents, officials verified 198 of them as confirmed or probable. Ninety of them came from one pack in the Sierra Valley, a wolf pack no longer in existence because CDFW lethally removed the animals in October 2025 because of repeated chronic depredation.
“Despite extensive non-lethal efforts, including hazing and adaptive tools used by our Summer Strike Team, these wolves continued to prey on livestock,” said then-CDFW Director Charlton H. Bonham.“The BeyemSeyo pack became so reliant on cattle at an unprecedented level, and we could not break the cycle, which ultimately is not good for the long-term recovery of wolves or for people.”
As incidents increased, so did cost. CDFW doled out $354,795 in 2025 compensation payments compared to $48,070 in 2024, a 638-percent increase.
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(Photo credit: California Department of Fish and Wildlife)
