Wyoming Game and Fish Department biologists have investigated the report of a Casper man who found four sets of apparent wolf tracks and reported seeing three wolves on Poison Spider Road, an agency spokesman said Friday.

"They found large canid tracks," Eric Keszler said.

Since their reintroduction in Yellowstone National Park the mid-1990s, the presence of gray wolves has been confirmed elsewhere in Wyoming, but not in Natrona County, Keszler said.

At least not until 4:15 p.m. on Thursday, when Dennis Corr said he and a friend arrived at a canal about three miles west of Poison Spider School for ice fishing.

They always look for tracks, and saw some unusual ones, Corr said Friday.

"'Holy cow, Marcus, that had to have been a mountain lion,'" Corr told his young friend.

Those tracks were from one of three animals, they were fresh, and a closer look determined they weren't lion tracks, either, Corr said.

He used his cell phone to take pictures of the prodigious paw prints, including one with his smaller handprint in the snow for comparison, he said.

Corr then looked up and saw what he positively believes were wolves - a black male, a charcoal gray pup, and a gray female - about 200 yards away on a dirt road on a hill, he said.

"To see them that close in the wild was intimidating. Seeing them was mesmerizing," Corr said. "There's no words to describe the intimidation."

He called a friend who is a deputy with the Natrona County Sheriff's Office, who told him to call the Game and Fish Department.

Friday morning, Keszler said Game and Fish biologists went to the canal, where they saw tracks from three or four animals, but they had no way to determine what made the tracks.

Better evidence, preferably a sighting or a photograph of the animals plus fur or scat, would have better identified them, Keszler said.

Corr said the biologists told him they saw dogs running sheep on the hill and asked if he saw the dogs instead of wolves.

However, the biologists reported the dogs with the sheep were white, and not like the black and gray animals he saw, he said.

In recent months, Keszler said the Game and Fish Department has received reports of a possible lone wolf presence in the Casper and Muddy Mountain area, but no evidence including tracks was found.

The department has not received any reports of livestock predation, either, Keszler said.

Wolves are still listed under the Endangered Species Act, and it's illegal to kill them unless they are caught in the act of attacking livestock, he said.

Because of the wolf sightings, Corr said he notified some rancher friends whose cows are calving early.

Corr said he didn't see tracking collars on the animals he saw, but he doesn't believe they were dogs or wolf-dog hybrids.

"The heads were enormous," Corr said.

He estimated the pup to be twice the size of a black Labrador Retriever, he said.

The animals weren't coyotes unless they were "100 times on steroids," he said, adding he hunts coyotes on the Price Ranch.

"If that's a coyote, I want one," Corr said. "I want one mounted on my wall."

Until better evidence is available, the Game and Fish Department won't confirm wolves are in Natrona County because of Corr's report, Keszler said. "They very possibly could have been [wolves] based on the evidence [Corr] had."

However, Corr isn't backing down from what he believes he saw, he said.

"They're not telling me I'm wrong," he said.

Reach reporter Tom Morton at (307) 266-0592, or at Tom.Morton@trib.com.