SENECA — An elk hunter who shot and killed a wolf in the North Malheur Hunt Unit on U.S. Forest Service property southeast of Seneca was acting in self-defense, an investigation by the Oregon State Police has found.

The hunter called the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife on the morning of Thursday, Nov. 2, to report the incident, Oregon State Police officials said in a news release. A sergeant and a senior trooper with OSP’s Fish and Wildlife Division and a district biologist from the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife responded to the scene and met the hunter.

“Based on the wolf’s location we believe the wolf was from the Logan Valley Pack,” said ODFW wildlife biologist and wolf coordinator Roblyn Brown in an email to the Eagle.

The hunter properly followed instructions and left the scene intact, officials said. The hunter then voluntarily led OSP and ODFW to the scene.

Grant County District Attorney Jim Carpenter told the newspaper he was informed by a state police sergeant that the hunter was determined to have been acting in self-defense. Carpenter said he saw no grounds for filing charges against the hunter or taking any additional action in the case.

Carpenter said the hunter is from Grant County.

The hunter was tracking elk on a ridge when a wolf came out from the timber in front of him, the investigation found. The hunter stated he yelled at the wolf and waved his arms in an effort to scare the animal away.

The wolf then reportedly looked at the hunter from a distance of approximately 30 yards and started coming directly toward him, according to the report.

The hunter said he feared for his safety and fired one round from about 18 yards, striking the wolf and killing it instantly, officials said.

After shooting the wolf, the hunter told investigators, a second wolf came out of the timber and the hunter fired a shot into the air, causing the wolf to flee.

“The person felt threatened and did what was appropriate in the case based on the close proximity,” Brown said.

The preliminary investigation found that the hunter acted reasonably in shooting the wolf for personal safety and appropriately notified officials immediately upon shooting the wolf, OSP officials said.

“The hunter shot the wolf when it continued to approach despite him reporting yelling and waving his arms to scare it away,” Michelle Dennehy, a spokesperson for ODFW, said in an email. “Wolf attacks (on people) are extremely rare, so although it is unlikely this wolf would have attacked, wild animals are unpredictable and this wolf didn’t respond as expected to attempts to scare it.”

According to the latest ODFW annual report on wolf conservation and management, looking at data from 2022, the known wolf count in Oregon was 178. There were 20 wolf mortalities documented last year, including 17 that were caused by humans, according to the report.

“While these incidents have immediate impacts on the numbers of wolves in the area, at current levels of mortality, we are continuing to see an upward trend in the population and expansion to other parts of the state,” Dennehy said. “Wolves are habitat generalists, so we expect them to continue to thrive if given a chance. Typically, new wolves will eventually move into an area once it becomes free of other wolves (wolves are very territorial).”