A 19-year-old Wisconsin duck hunter shot and killed a gray wolf at point-blank range on Sept. 21 while hunting on public land in Oneida County, according to the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources. Chase Melton, who was with two other teenagers at the time, has told reporters he had no choice but to pull the trigger. Melton said their duck blind was being surrounded by the pack of wolves, and when a wolf got within about 10 yards of him, he shot it with his 12-gauge and killed it.
“I probably could have touched it with my hand, that was extremely scary,” Melton told WJFW News Tuesday. “This wolf got to within 15 yards and I’m like he’s still coming, he’s still coming, he got within 8 to 10 yards and it’s not what I wanted to do but to protect us and to protect them … I pulled the trigger [on the closest wolf].”
A spokesperson with the WDNR confirmed with Outdoor Life that a game warden and wildlife biologist went out to investigate and confirmed the animal Melton had shot was a wolf.
“The investigation remains open and we can’t share any more details at this time,” the spokesperson wrote in an emailed statement.
Melton told WJFW that he and two hunting buddies, aged 13 and 14, had arrived at their blind near St. Germain around 3:45 a.m. on Saturday, the opening day of waterfowl season in Wisconsin’s north zone. Sometime around daybreak, the 14-year-old told Melton he saw a deer coming toward their blind.
“So I stood up and looked over and it was a wolf,” Melton said. “I tried making some noise, I was clapping, stomping, breaking some sticks, whatever. This wolf turned at me and we locked eyes, and it started to come at us not like a walk but like a jog almost … So, I started to panic a little bit, they started to panicking because they’re younger kids and they’re like, ‘Oh my god, we’ve got wolves around us.’”
A witness who was hunting nearby told WJFW News they saw at least five wolves surrounding the blind, along with another four other wolves in close proximity. The witness said they heard the wolves barking, growling, and howling as they approached the teenagers’ duck blind.
Melton, who could not be reached for comment Thursday, reportedly shot the closest wolf in the face with a load of non-toxic shot, killing it, according to WJFW. He then called and reported the incident to the WDNR as the pack retreated.
“This [one] wolf … went off into the woods, came down, and then grabbed this wolf that I shot by the neck and started dragging it off,” Melton told the news outlet. “I’ve never witnessed something like that.”
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The DNR’s investigation will consider, among other things, whether Melton was acting in self-defense when he shot and killed the wolf. Gray wolves are listed as federally endangered in Wisconsin, even though the statewide gray wolf population is currently around 1,000 strong. This status could change, as the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service recently filed an appeal in federal court to de-list the species. For the time being, however, it remains illegal to kill a wolf in Wisconsin for any reason other than “in defense of human life,” according to the WDNR.
And because gray wolves remain under federal management, the USFWS will likely be involved with the DNR’s investigation as well. The federal agency is still investigating a similar incident that occurred in northern Wisconsin on Dec. 25, when a retired game warden killed a collared wolf that had been hanging around his yard; he also claimed self-defense when reporting that incident to the DNR.
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