Colorado could bring back wolverines in an unprecedented rewilding effort

Move would be the first return of the animal in North America and is part of ongoing effort to restore native species

A bipartisan group of Colorado lawmakers are proposing legislation to reintroduce wolverines, one of the country’s rarest carnivores, into a state primed with deep snow and high mountains. The unprecedented move would be the first wolverine reintroduction in North America, and is part of an ongoing effort by Coloradans to restore the state’s native species.

Restoring wolverines to the Centennial state could provide the threatened species with a buffer population at a time when the US Fish and Wildlife Service says wolverines’ low numbers face threats from climate change and habitat fragmentation. Conservationists and state biologists have long pushed for the reintroduction, saying Colorado has plenty of unoccupied habitat and could support as many as 100 or even 180 wolverines, dramatically increasing the species’ North American population.