A stray animal in Anchorage last month that looked a lot like a wolf but also like a dog was, in fact, a wolf hybrid, announced the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.
The animal, nicknamed “Gary,” gained widespread attention online as people speculated about her species.
In a Facebook group that now has more than 1,000 members, called Gary’s Tour of Anchorage, residents shared videos and photos of the black and gray animal as she traveled across the city, with dozens of sightings covering Sand Lake, Midtown, the Hillside and East Anchorage.
Gary was eventually found dead on Oct. 7 near Minnesota Drive and 26th Avenue. She wasn’t wearing a collar. Fish and Game said she was likely hit and killed by a vehicle. Gary was an older female, and was 67 pounds when she died.
Fish and Game’s regional officer in Anchorage, Cynthia Wardlow, initially said there was no indication the animal was a wolf, but said there were “enough unusual circumstances” to conduct genetic testing. Samples were collected and sent to the Veterinary Genetics Laboratory at the University of California, Davis, for what’s called a wolf-dog hybridization test.
Fish and Game announced the results in a news release on Tuesday. It says results indicate Gary was a wolf hybrid, but the testing did not determine the degree of hybridization, or percentage of wolf DNA.
In an interview Tuesday, Wardlow said she’s happy the species was determined.
“I'm glad we were able to answer the question, both for the public and also for the other biologists that I work with,” Wardlow said. “It's really great to be able to actually answer that question, at least, of what was this animal?”
The death of Gary shocked members of the Facebook group, like Shelly Scarpella.
“I think everyone was kind of sucker punched when we all woke up and heard what happened. We were all like, ‘Oh my gosh,’ you know, it just upset us,” she said.
Scarpella said she thought Gary was a wolf hybrid when she first saw her.
Scarpella paints memorial rocks in her free time. She’s finished over 60 rocks so far in tribute to Gary. They’re covered in glitter, with a howling wolf in the center. A few are hidden around town.
“I just think it's neat to be able to drop them and they mean something to people,” Scarpella said.
She said she’s also glad to have confirmation that Gary was a wolf hybrid.
But, Wardlow said there’s still a lot they don’t know about Gary, including where she came from.
Wardlow said they still don’t know where Gary came from.
“We don't have any idea of what was going on with it before it started being spotted in Anchorage — if it was a pet that someone was keeping illegally, or if it had gotten loose in some other part of the state and eventually traveled to Anchorage. Those are all questions that we do not have answers to,” she said.
Wolf hybrids are illegal to own in Anchorage. The state describes a wolf hybrid as the offspring from a wolf or wolf hybrid with a dog or another wolf hybrid. In 2011, a Matanuska Susitna Borough-based tourist business faced criminal charges for possessing wolf hybrids without a permit.
Wardlow said Gary covered a lot of territory as she roamed Anchorage, but the distance she traveled isn’t specific to wolf hybrids.
“Sometimes you'll see behavior like that with a regular dog,” she said. “This one was covering a lot of territory, but we have had reports of sled dogs that also once they get loose or are no longer in familiar surroundings, can cover miles and miles of ground in a day.
Wolves are not unusual in Anchorage, there are five distinguished packs that live within city limits: The Knik River Pack, Eklutna Pack, Portage Pack, Ship Creek Pack and Elmendorf Pack. There are between 7,000 and 11,000 wolves in Alaska, according to Fish and Game.
In September, trail cameras captured a wolf pack killing a moose calf in Far North Bicentennial Park.
