Nora G. Hertel

USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin

BLACK RIVER FALLS - Three gray wolves walked along a tree line, not far from an unpaved road. One took a seat before turning into an opening in the central Wisconsin forest. Their tracks lingered in the snow.

But the wolves were long gone when trackers came through in early March, seeking prints of the controversial canines east of Black River Falls to count and map them for the state.

It's detective work, said Rachel Tilseth, the 63-year-old volunteer tracker and wolf conservation advocate behind the website Wolves of Douglas County Wisconsin. She and Steve Meurett, a 57-year-old volunteer tracker and deer hunter, took USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin out to witness a morning of carnivore tracking in the Wisconsin snow.

"After you hear the whole pack howl, you're hooked. I got hooked," Tilseth said. She has helped monitor wolves through winter tracking and summer howl surveys since about 2000. "I'm attracted to the fact that they're pack animals, that they're very intelligent. That they're finally back."

Roughly 900 wolves live in the Northwoods and parts of central Wisconsin, according to last winter's data. The population recovered over the last 50 years. Meurett and Tilseth wonder about the fate of the animals in Wisconsin and the future of the state's tracking program if, or perhaps when, wolves are removed from the federal endangered species list and wolf hunting resumes.

The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources lost some trackers when the wolf hunt returned in 2012, because volunteers didn't want to gather data available to hunters. But that program always has turnover, said David MacFarland, large carnivore specialist with the DNR. Volunteer trackers are "crucial" to the DNR's research on wolves, MacFarland said.

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Collecting a survey of carnivore prints is a methodical practice, but there's a little magic, too, as trackers envision woodland scenes based on evidence left in the snow. Meurett and Tilseth worked together to discern a narrative about the wolves in the woods. They determined the speed and size of the animals by their gate.

The main set of tracks indicated a wolf a few feet long from shoulder to hip, trotting along the tree line. As they followed the wolf tracks farther along, other prints cropped up to and from the forest: a weasel-like fisher walking atop the snow, deer with delicate hooves that catch a bit of snow with each step. One of the wolves dragged knuckles from its four-inch paw, but usually the canines leave clean prints, Tilseth said.

Some hunters, farmers, scientists and Republican state lawmakers in Wisconsin have called on Congress to return control of wolves to individual states. When the wolves are removed from the federal endangered species list, Wisconsin can allow a hunting season as it did between 2012 and 2014.

Both of Wisconsin's U.S. senators, Republican Ron Johnson and Democrat Tammy Baldwin, want wolves off the endangered list. And some federal lawmakers are working on changes to the Endangered Species Act that would limit lawsuits against the government tied to its management of endangered or threatened animals .

Wolves have been in the Wisconsin area for thousands of years, according to a state DNR fact sheet, but their numbers dwindled to near zero in the mid-20th century. They returned to the state once protected by the federal government and supported through a DNR wolf recovery program started in the 1980s.

Eight wolves populate the forests east of Black River Falls, Meurett said. On some surveys he'll spend five hours out in the woods, hunting down tracks. He drove about 10 mph in early March, eyes peeled out the window. He'd been there a few days earlier and knew where to look. Any disturbances in the snow could reveal traffic from an elusive carnivore.

On the first stop, marks of a bobcat filled a tire rut in the road. Meurett demonstrated with his hand that one toe on a bobcat paw stands out above the others. Across the way, hounds left tracks, and Meurett guessed they were hunting coyote.

Later in the morning, he stopped between two bodies of water to identify muskrat prints crossing the road, complete with an indent from its dragging tail. Next to the muskrat marks Meurett and Tilseth puzzled over what looked like an otter next to something unusual. They eventually figured the otter slid across the road on its belly, pushing with its feet.

"We're hitting a smorgasbord today," Meurett said about the variety of prints, his boots crunching around his red truck.

Meurett and Tilseth can both identify and dismiss a deer print from afar. They have each been trained through the DNR tracking program and know how to discern different carnivores by the tracks and report data to the DNR.

Volunteer trackers fill out forms marking the carnivore print, direction of travel and location. They mark if they see scat, urine or blood. And wolf tracks get a little more attention than other prints. Trackers must follow the prints and do some sleuthing to see if they come from two wolves or 20, Meurett said.

"Always a puzzle or a story in the snow to figure out — that's the part I love," Meurett wrote in an email after the tracking excursion.

Meurett lives in Neillsville. Tillseth usually tracks in Dunn or Douglas counties. She lives in Menomonie. Both are retired art teachers and met through their shared interest in wolves.

Roughly 150 volunteers produce about half the surveys the DNR relies on to determine Wisconsin's wolf population, MacFarland said. Staff and paid contractors do the rest of the surveys, which are used, along with trail camera footage and aerial surveys, to calculate the number of wolves in the state each winter.

"Monitoring wolves is hard," MacFarland said. "Compared to other species in the state, they're a very low density."

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'Quite the political animal'

The Wisconsin wolf revival has stirred bad blood in Wisconsin and beyond, thanks in part to reports of wolves that harass cattle and kill sheep or dogs — both pets and hunting hounds.

Some deer hunters don't like that wolves prey on the whitetail herd, although studies show that wolves tend to pick off weak or disabled deer, according to the DNR.

"The wolf is quite the predator, quite the political animal," Tilseth said.

She admires that predator and has a lot of stories from her years tracking. She's come across a deer carcass, partially eaten by a pack, skin pulled down, tufts of hair on the ground around it. And once Tilseth stumbled across a den of unguarded puppies on a survey and hurried off before she disturbed them too much. She recognized the pups as offspring of wolves she'd tracked before.

Tilseth does howl surveys in the summer and fall, which help the DNR assess how the wolves are reproducing in a given year. "At first, I sounded like such a pup," she said. "But with practice you get better."

Tillseth writes about wolves and advocates for them on her website, which includes calls to action and information for other wolf sympathizers. She calls for non-lethal wolf management techniques for farmers such as guard dogs, flags and lighting. Tilseth laments the Wisconsin laws that allowed wolf hunting with dogs and still allow bear hunters to train their hounds in known wolf territories.

Wolves are a spiritual animal to Tilseth. It's rare to see them, even for her.

Meurett is more interested in the science, rather than the politics, of wolves. He's a deer hunter with bow or gun and he hunts birds. Tracking carnivores is akin to hunting, he said.

The state's 1999 wolf management plan made 350 wolves a population goal. It's still used by some as a benchmark.

"That's the frustration for me. They're not using the (current) science," Meurett said, in the cab of his truck. He also wants the state to ensure both pro- and anti-wolf groups have a voice in wolf management here.

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The DNR has been working on a new wolf management plan, but it won't be finalized while things are in the air at the federal level, MacFarland said.

As for setting a goal population for wolves, he said: "There's definitely conflicting viewpoints on that."

A survey by the DNR in 2014 shows that more Wisconsin residents than not had a favorable view of wolves, especially in parts of the state where wolves don't live. Deer hunters and people living in rural areas wanted fewer wolves in the state compared with other respondents, according to the survey.

Meurett, despite being a deer hunter, enjoys Wisconsin wolves. People ask him if he's afraid when he tracks. He's not. But he's respectful, he said.

Before driving back to Black River Falls, Meurett stopped on a deeply rutted road at a set of tracks. Coyote. Possibly two. Tilseth found evidence of a turkey and across the road Meurett circled until he put the story together: A coyote crossed, urinated on a bush, left scat and kicked up his feet in the nearby snow.

Back on the highway, past the birch stands and the oak and pine trees, Meurett reflected on wolves again. He thinks that the more people learn about wolves the better they'll be managed.

"I think they're an important part of the ecosystem," he said. "Once you get to understand them, that fear goes away."

Nora G. Hertel: nora.herte@gannettwisconsin.com or 715-845-0665; on Twitter @nghertel.