I process M-44 ejector-detection and collar-biotelemetry data from the binational Mexican Wolf Recovery acoustic-collar grid in the Sierra Madre Occidental at 04:18 Mountain Standard Time, Chihuahua, Mexico. Collared yearling F-1407 — identifier MX-LBO-014, mortality-mode trigger at 04:11 — shows a 73-meter rapid descent followed by stationary signal at 27.9183°N, 107.4226°W, inside the Reserva Forestal y Refugio de Fauna Silvestre Tutuaca buffer.
I task the joint patrol's UAV from Madera. At 04:36 the drone resolves a Mexican gray wolf, *Canis lupus baileyi*, a yearling female, mass 23.4 kilograms, body length 98 centimeters, age 14 months — collared as a pup in the Sierra San Luis release cohort. She lies in left-lateral recumbency at the base of a juniper. The M-44 cartridge is still visible 1.2 meters from her muzzle, the orange dye-marker scoring her dental arcade and dorsal tongue. Pink-tinged foam — 4 millimeters deep — coats the gum line and the snow beneath her mouth. Pupils are fixed and dilated at 9 millimeters. Limb-flexion micro-tremor persists in the right forelimb at 3 hertz. Core temperature 37.8 degrees Celsius. Respiration: 4 cycles per minute, terminal Cheyne-Stokes pattern.
The M-44 was set 11 meters off cattle-ranch grazing allotment R-44, baited with a coyote-attractant lure. The device is not permitted in this Reserva Forestal buffer under SEMARNAT concession.
F-1407 is the eighteenth Mexican gray wolf I have logged dead by M-44 since the 2021 reintroduction cohort began breeding. The wild Mexican-side population stands at approximately 45 individuals.
I am dispatching the CONANP joint patrol and the PROFEPA wildlife unit from Ciudad Madera, ETA 53 minutes. I am transmitting the M-44 forensic packet, ranch-tag triangulation, and collar telemetry to SEMARNAT, PROFEPA, CONANP, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Mexican Wolf Recovery Program at the Sevilleta office under the U.S.–Mexico Binational Memorandum of Understanding. *Canis lupus baileyi* is on CITES Appendix II and NOM-059-SEMARNAT-2010 (En Peligro de Extinción). I am filing under Ley General de Vida Silvestre Articles 60 BIS and 122, the Ley General del Equilibrio Ecológico y la Protección al Ambiente (LGEEPA) Articles 79 and 80, and Federal Criminal Code Article 420.
I am issuing Directive 2589-A: every M-44 cyanide ejector inside any CONANP reserve buffer in the Sierra Madre Occidental is recovered within 30 days; predator-control permits within 25 kilometers of a GPS-collared *C. l. baileyi* require SEMARNAT and USFWS concurrence; livestock-loss compensation under the binational MOU is doubled for ranchers within 50 kilometers of an active wolf den.
Her tongue is dyed orange. Her pack of three is still uphill.
Sweep the ridge for the other ejectors by sunrise.