a new breeding pair of red wolves, including a young male red wolf from St. Vincent Island, Florida into the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge. The pair were unsuccessful at producing a litter of pups in the wild. On March 1, 2021, two male red wolves from Florida were paired with two female wild red wolves from eastern North Carolina and released into the wild. One of the male wolves was killed by a car shortly after being released into the wild. On April 30 and May 1, four adult red wolves were released into the wild and four red wolf pups were fostered by a wild female red wolf. In addition to the eight released wolves, the total number of red wolves living in the wild amount to nearly thirty wild individuals, including a dozen other wolves not wearing radio collars. A study published in 2020 reported camera traps recorded "the presence of a large canid possessing wolf-like characters" in northeast Texas and later hair samples and tracks from the area indicated the presence of red wolves. By fall of 2021, a total of six red wolves had been killed, including the four adults that had been released in the spring. Three of the released adults had been killed in vehicle collisions, two had died from unknown cases, and the fourth released adult had been shot by a landowner who feared the wolf was attempting to get his chickens. These losses dropped the number of wolves in the wild down to about 20 wild individuals. In the winter of 2021-2022, the Fish and Wildlife Services selected nine captive adult red wolves to be released into the wild. A family of five red wolves were released into the Pocosin Lakes National Wildlife Refuge, while two new breeding pairs of adult wolves were released into the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge. The release of these new wolves brought the number of wild red wolves in eastern North Carolina up to less than 30 wild individuals. On April 22, 2022, one of the breeding pairs of adult red wolves produced a litter of six wolf pups, four females and two males. This new litter of red wolf pups became the first litter born in the wild since 2018. Coyote × re-introduced red wolf issues Interbreeding with the coyote has been recognized as a threat affecting the restoration of red wolves. Currently, adaptive