Dog walkers are being encouraged to leash their pets following a deadly wolf encounter on a Lemon Creek area trail.
A Juneau resident reported he was walking three dogs behind the Home Depot store Wednesday when a black wolf attacked the group.
Alaska Department of Fish and Game biologist Stephanie Sell said a male chihuahua was reported killed in the melee.
Then a second dog gave chase into the woods.
“He was able to call his dog back and the wolf kind of followed a little bit,” Sell said. “But he was able to throw rocks at the wolf to get it to move away and he was able to collect his dog and get back to his truck.”
Fish and Game’s switchboard lit up after the wolf attack was posted on Facebook. Sell said there’s been an uptick in wolf sightings.
“We’ve been receiving multiple reports of wolf encounters recently and honestly the common denominator has been domesticated dogs,” she said. “In their natural environment, wolves usually defend their territories against other wolves, and so it’s fairly common to kill other wolves in territorial disputes. Wolves will also show this kind of aggression towards domesticated dogs just because they’re of the same species – the canid family.”
Encounters with aggressive wolves can be reported to Fish and Game by calling 465-4265.
