One year ago today, scientists and researchers at Colossal Biosciences saw a breakthrough so startling that, a decade earlier, the scene would be written off as the ravings of a Michael Crichton novel. After less than five years of research and planning, a pair of pups born from a gray wolf mother, but which featured snow white hair and tails that better resembled a fox, came howling into the world.

It was the dire wolf resurrected, or at least an exact genetic replica of this lost apex predator from the Pleistocene Epoch of a hundred thousand years ago. And both of Colossal’s versions were baying into the laboratory fluorescence.

For Chief Animal Officer Matt James, it was something of a eureka moment. He of course had been preparing for the day for months, basing his planning on earlier zoological work. (He previously witnessed the birth of multiple animals under his care at the Dallas and Miami zoos.) Yet it’s a different thing to intellectualize the imminent return of an animal the world has not seen in over 10,000 years, and another to witness cubs with the coloring of polar bears in your hand. For context, gray wolves typically are born in dark charcoal coats.

“That was that holy shit moment of ‘we’ve done it,’” James says almost a year later when we sit down with him during a tour of Colossal’s new cutting-edge headquarters in Dallas, Texas. “This isn’t one of my typical experiences, this is very different, and then there was this sudden rush of urgent responsibility.”

When we meet with James, it’s only been a handful of years, but what might feel like a lifetime, since he joined Colossal near its founding in 2021. As with most people, the zoological expert was initially bemused by the concept of de-extinction, wherein a biotech company would use gene-editing and CRISPR technology to revive long lost species that would serve some beneficial role to long-damaged ecosystems. But it’s funny how quickly that can change.

“I said ‘what are you talking about? This is a ridiculous idea,’” James recalls with a grin when he thinks back on the first time he heard about billionaire entrepreneur Ben Lamm and renowned geneticist George Church’s hopes for bringing back the woolly mammoth. Yet a curious thing about the recent breakthroughs in de-extinction is how quickly something that sounded like science fiction a day ago is treated like scientific fact tomorrow. For James, that occurred after his first meeting with Lamm where they swiftly moved past the incredulity of can we do this? to the cold gravity of how we should do this.

“My questions and my critiques were all around ‘but then what?’” says James. “How do you take care of it? How do you get it in the wild? How do you build the networks of people, the government regulatory pathways, the social science needed in order to rewild an animal?”

A year after the birth of the dire wolves now named Romulus and Remus, the prudence of those bigger questions are coming into view of the public as well.

‘It’ll Take Generations’

One of the most surprising things about raising dire wolves for the first time in a dozen millennia, give or take, is how quickly they are growing, even under the watchful eye of James and a team of around the clock specialists at an undisclosed location. A year ago, the eldest pups of the Colossal wolf pack were nursing with their mothers before being switched to a milk replacer formula (the first female, Khaleesi, wasn’t born until 2025). However, the original plan James and company drew up for the pair was partially based on gray wolves in captivity. This soon proved inefficient.

“We started introducing small ground meat, and we got them onto what typical zoo animals would eat, which tends to be a prepared diet of dry kibble and some ground meats,” explains James. “But these guys made it pretty evident that they wanted to chew on stuff, and they wanted to tear stuff. So then it was like, ‘Oh we need whole prey. You gotta bring in some whole prey.’ So here’s a rabbit, here’s a whole chicken. Here’s a quarter of a deer; here’s a half deer; here’s a whole deer. Now they’re eating full carcasses, and they sort of gorge and fast and gorge and fast.”

The ability to adapt has been crucial to writing—and amending—an animal care manual for the dire wolves, a manual which James points out is “a world’s first effort” since he and his team are compiling it for a species that has not existed for 10,000 years. Yet it speaks for how long a journey lies ahead for the dire wolves. Given Romulus and Remus’ desire to tear and destroy, it even invites the obvious question of how soon it is until they can hunt? 

“They give chase,” James says, “but they’re not skilled hunters yet. They’re still young, and they’re still kind of goofy. They get a lot of deer that come through, and they quickly just break off in a chase. It wouldn’t be too dissimilar to my Australian shepherd. She sees a squirrel, she’s off, but if she ever got the squirrel, I’m not sure she’d know what to do next.”

James’ example also belies a key difference between a domesticated dog and a true wolf pack. One is raised and sheltered by humans; the other learns to hunt from its elders. These dire wolves have no elders though.

“It’ll take generations of dire wolves to get to the point where they’re truly independent and skilled hunters,” James admits. “We’ll continue to work with some cross-fostering efforts so you can bring in experienced wolves, they don’t have to be dire wolves, so they can raise a pack and teach them how to hunt. We can [learn from] this generation, and it will be really fundamental to creating future generations of animals. These guys—Romulus, Remus, and Khaleesi—are likely to never be really skilled hunters, but we’ll work through generations of wolves and remove human intervention at every step, until you get to the point where you have these truly wild animals.”

James’ acknowledgment that Romulus, Remus, and Khaleesi are just the first of generations of dire wolves to come is intriguing, especially since when the species’ revival was announced in April, the publicly stated plan was to eventually build up a wolf pack of six to eight dire wolves.

“We’re still going to focus on this pack and building a pack structure for these guys,” James explains. “We have opportunities to work with some of our Indigenous partners, some of our Native American partners, to try to do this type of effort on their lands, and I think that’s where we can get into more of the hands-off management.”

Welcome to Pleistocene Park

It all raises the question of what the future might look like for truly rewilded dire wolves. Given Colossal’s bullish expectations for the woolly mammoth’s return in 2028, it becomes tempting to entertain the idea of a ‘Pleistocene Park’ where mammoths, dire wolves, and maybe even one day a saber-toothed tiger walk the same earth. Colossal CEO Ben Lamm is hesitant to quite invite such a vision, although he does see a plausible “ecotourism” future for several species in their historically native climates, and with the approval and assistance of local governments. This would resemble less a theme park of wonders than other successful reintegrations of endangered pieces in the 20th century.

While discussing Colossal’s efforts to bring back the thylacine (also known as the Tasmanian Tiger), Lamm freely makes comparisons to a ubiquitous feature that wildlife tourists and nature-lovers recognize from modern-day Wyoming.

Says Lamm, “If we are successful with rewilding Tasmanian Tigers, or thylacines, back into the wild, I see a world where there are areas open—and where the government and Indigenous people, and others want them to be. Parks where people can go and see them in their natural habitat. Like where you can go see bison and you can go see wolves and whatnot in Yellowstone, but you’re also not encroaching on them, and they’re serving their ecological function. It’s not like they’re being put in this transactional model.”

James, meanwhile, is in the process of writing a rewilding plan for every extinct species Colossal has earmarked (plus a few that remain secret). This includes the dire wolf and mammoth, as well as the great moa, among others. Each would also be the first of its kind for animals that haven’t existed in either centuries or millennia. He’s doing this while still visiting Romulus, Remus, and Khaleesi for a few days every month. (Six months ago it was closer to three days every week, though they remain monitored daily by a team of veterinarians and conservationists.)

It’s a long way from his own initial disbelief at the prospect of de-extinction. But according to the zoologist, this is part and parcel with the whole world’s reaction to CRISPR technology.

“The most surprising thing is how quickly people get past that gut reaction that I had,” James observes. “If you look at what we’ve done in Mauritius and what we’ve done in Tasmania, what we’re doing with local stakeholders here in the U.S., when we first walk in a room, there’s a lot of ‘we’ve been really looking forward to talking to you because you have this ridiculous idea!’ And then 10 minutes later, they’re engaged, they want to take part in it. They become a real partner.”

One might call it the dire wolf effect.

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