Gray wolves hadn’t been seen in south Michigan since the 1900s. This winter, a local hunter shot one

MARSHALL, Mich. (AP) — Wildlife officials say an animal a Michigan hunter thought was a big coyote when he shot it in January has been determined to be a gray wolf. That’s the first time the species has been found in southern Michigan in more than a century. Michigan’s Department of Natural Resources says the hunter took the animal in Calhoun County, in the southern reaches of Michigan’s Lower Peninsula, while taking part in legal coyote hunting. He believed it was a large coyote. But genetic tests on the animal confirmed it was a gray wolf. The question of how the wolf ended up in southern Michigan remains under investigation by the DNR.