A North Carolina wildlife crossing will save people. Can it save the last wild red wolves too?


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ALLIGATOR RIVER NATIONAL WILDLIFE REFUGE, N.C. (AP) — Hunters were once the greatest human threat to the country’s only unique wolf species. Today, it’s motorists.

That fact was brought home last June, when red wolf breeding male No. 2444 was struck and killed on U.S. 64 near Manns Harbor, North Carolina. His death likely meant five pups he’d been providing for died, too.

“We were hoping the mother would return and resume care, but she never did,” Joe Madison, head of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s red wolf recovery program, said during a recent visit to the site.

For decades, conservationists have pushed for changes to U.S. 64, a busy two-lane highway to the popular Outer Banks that runs straight through the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge – one of just two places in the world where red wolves run free.

They may finally be getting their wish.

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