DENVER (AP) - A British Columbian lynx released in Colorado two years ago was last tracked north of Missoula, Mont., more than 800 miles from where he was released in March 2003 near Creede.

His travels were reported in Yellowstone Science magazine and confirmed by Rick Kahn, Colorado Division of Wildlife lynx coordinator.

"We don't know where he's heading, but he may be going back to the area where he was trapped," Kahn said.

There have been 166 lynx released in southwest Colorado since 1999 under a program to reintroduce the long-haired, tuft-eared cats.

Like other lynx, the male tracked in Montana is wearing a radio collar.

Early last June, his signal beamed up in the Snowy Range in Wyoming north of Steamboat Springs. About the same time, a female released in Colorado gave birth to three kittens in the Snowy Mountains, 225 miles from where the cat was released near Creede four years earlier.

At the end of July, the male's collar indicated it was west of Jackson, Wyo., but no one knows how it crossed the Red Desert.

It then went near the Grassy Lake Reservoir between Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks and into Yellowstone, where it was tracked near Mammoth Hot Springs.

In late August, it was due north of Livingston, Mont., near the Crazy Mountains, before it was tracked north of Missoula in October.

"We have a report it has crossed over into the panhandle of Idaho," Kahn said.

Lynx are an endangered species in Colorado. They have wandered from the state before.

In 1999, a male lynx wandered from Durango and ended up along the North Platte River in Nebraska, almost 400 miles from the release site. It was found after it was shot and killed illegally.