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  Newsmakers   Rare wolverine spotted in Sierra Nevada

Rare wolverine spotted in Sierra Nevada

AP
Published : Jul 26, 2016, 6:10 am IST
Updated : Jul 26, 2016, 6:10 am IST

Scientists following up on a rare wolverine sighting in the Sierra Nevada set up cameras and captured video of the animal scurrying in the snow, scaling a tree and chewing on bait.

Scientists following up on a rare wolverine sighting in the Sierra Nevada set up cameras and captured video of the animal scurrying in the snow, scaling a tree and chewing on bait.

They believe the wolverine is the same one that eight years ago became the first documented in the area since the 1920s. Chris Stermer, a wildlife biologist with the California department of fish and wildlife, set up the remote cameras in the Tahoe National Forest after officials at a field station sent him photos in January of unusual tracks in the snow near Truckee. “They were definitely wolverine tracks,” Stermer told the Sierra Sun newspaper.

Wolverines, a member of the weasel family that look like a small bear with big claws, once were found throughout the Rocky Mountains and as far west as the Sierra. An estimated 250 to 300 wolverines survive in remote areas of Montana, Wyoming, Idaho, Oregon and Washington state, according to wildlife officials. Prior to the 2008 sighting, scientists were convinced fur trapping during the early 1900s had wiped out the species in California. Now, a warming planet is threatening to shrink the deep mountain snows that wolverines need to den, scientists say. The male carnivore near Lake Tahoe apparently migrated from the Sawtooth Range in Idaho, Stermer said.