Four Montana wolves from the Boulder Pack shot after killing cattle

The federal agency Animal Damage Control (ADC) has shot four wolves from the Boulder Pack in the Deer Lodge Valley of western Montana. The wolves had likely killed or mortally injured seven cows on the ranch of Fred Benson near the town of Deer Lodge. The cattle predation, the largest in recent Montana history, took place on the night of January 1 or early morning of January 2.

A spokesperson from ADC said there was no doubt wolves killed the cows, and he was "pretty positive that [they shot] the wolves involved." The wolves were found a few miles east of the kill site. They were shot from the air.

The pack is thought to have had nine members. The Boulder Pack is one of the eight or nine packs that stem from the wolves that began to naturally reinhabit Montana in the 1980s. These wolves have no connection with reintroduced wolves in Yellowstone or in central Idaho.

Killed were three adult males and one adult female wolf. The dead cattle were Angus. The Boulder Pack had been in livestock trouble before. Some of the pack fed on dead cows in September 1995 near Basin, Montana (not far west of the state capital at Helena). Five of these wolves were captured at that time. Three wolves were pups and were returned to the pack (which had additional members not involved in the incident). The two captured adults were relocated to Glacier National Park. A sixth wolf, the likely alpha female was never captured.

The Boulder Pack is the pack that has established the most southerly territory of the natural Montana wolf packs. Many people believe that within a year or two these wolves will merge with the reintroductions in Idaho and in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.

The wolves that naturally returned to Montana have been responsible for a good deal more livestock attacks than those that were reintroduced. Nevertheless, prior to this incident total payments by Defenders of Wildlife as compensation for livestock killed, has been just somewhat over $20,000 in a period of over a decade.