No wolves in SW Michigan. Certainly does not line up with my assumptions about coyotes.
405wcf;
Good afternoon to you sir, I hope you're keeping well, warm and dry in this latest blast and you're all well.
Thanks for an interesting thread, wolves and coyotes are something that I've been trying to learn for much of my life and have been attempting to shoot them for more than 40 years of it. I've been successful often enough with coyotes, finally got an Okanagan wolf to howl back to me this year and shot over top of one in Saskatchewan many years back.
Forgive me for repeating this story if you've read it from me previously, but it's instructive of how some wolves will go wherever it is they might have a mind to go.
Years back before the wolves had moved into our area, there was not season for them unless the hunter was First Nations.
So it was that a local FN chap brought a decent sized wolf into the taxidermy shop that was just down the road from us, owned by a father and son team that our family was very close friends with.
The taxidermists related to us that this wolf had both an ear tag and a collar, both of which they removed of course before peeling it.
They suggested to the FN hunter that he take them into the local Ministry of Forests, Lands and Natural Resources or whatever the Wildlife folks were going by back then, which he did.
When he took it in, the helpful bios tracked both the collar and ear tag and found that this wolf had been caught and ear tagged on the other side of the several mountain ranges in Alberta, then was one of the wolves transplanted into Yellowstone where it was collared.
We're about 700 miles from Yellowstone more or less, perhaps a wee bit less as the crow flies or the wolf trots, not sure.
Obligatory wolf track photo from this past fall, just a bit northeast of where I sit today.
That folder is a snitch over 8½".
In a couple other conversations with bios from the Ministry over the years, they've said wolves will commonly travel huge circuits quite often or at least our BC ones to.
While I'm far from an expert on anything, the biggest coyote I've ever shot here I tried to weigh on a fish scale that went to 25lb and it surpassed that easily. If I was to guess, I'd think it would've been high 30's, but that's guessing for sure.
Again still guessing, that photo looks more wolf than coyote to me.
I'd be curious to learn what it actually is, so if anyone finds out and posts it, thanks in advance.
All the best.
Dwayne