Illustration of gray wolf
gray wolf
noun
: a large, broad-headed, wide-muzzled wolf (Canis lupus) that has a dense, heavy coat of usually light brown or brownish gray interspersed with black above and yellowish white below and that was formerly widely distributed throughout North America and Eurasia but is now greatly restricted to the more northerly parts of its range
The only sizable gray wolf population south of Canada and Alaska continues to roam the forest-and-lake country of northern Minnesota.—
Vic Banks
Vic BanksNote: The gray wolf has been considered a threat to livestock and people for hundreds of years and has been wiped out from most of its original range by hunting, trapping, and poisoning.
called also timber wolf
Examples of gray wolf in a Sentence
Recent Examples on the Web
This month Colossal Laboratories & Biosciences announced the birth late last year of three gray wolf puppies with 15 gene variants that belonged to dire wolves (Aenocyon dirus); this large carnivore went extinct about 13,000 years ago.
—Dan Vergano, Scientific American, 16 Apr. 2025
Scientists made 15 exact genetic edits to the gray wolf genome in order to create the new wolves that look like dire wolves.
—Joseph Wilkinson, New York Daily News, 8 Apr. 2025
The Colossal team thus engineered two other genes that shut down black and red pigmentation, leading to the dire wolf’s characteristic light color without causing any harm in the edited gray wolf genome.
—Jeffrey Kluger, Time, 7 Apr. 2025
Colorado has agreements with Utah, New Mexico and Arizona to recapture wolves that wander into those states and return them to Colorado, a move aimed at protecting the genes of the Mexican gray wolf.
—Katie Langford, Denver Post, 25 Apr. 2025
See All Example Sentences for gray wolf
Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to
show current usage.
Read More
Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors.
Send us feedback.
Dan Vergano, Scientific American, 16 Apr. 2025
Scientists made 15 exact genetic edits to the gray wolf genome in order to create the new wolves that look like dire wolves.
—Joseph Wilkinson, New York Daily News, 8 Apr. 2025
The Colossal team thus engineered two other genes that shut down black and red pigmentation, leading to the dire wolf’s characteristic light color without causing any harm in the edited gray wolf genome.
—Jeffrey Kluger, Time, 7 Apr. 2025
Colorado has agreements with Utah, New Mexico and Arizona to recapture wolves that wander into those states and return them to Colorado, a move aimed at protecting the genes of the Mexican gray wolf.
—Katie Langford, Denver Post, 25 Apr. 2025
See All Example Sentences for gray wolf
Cite this Entry
“Gray wolf.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gray%20wolf. Accessed 9 Jun. 2025.
Copy CitationLove words? Need even more definitions?
Merriam-Webster unabridged
Share