Animal Damage Control (ADC) has finally killed the two wolves in the Murphy Lake Pack that are suspected of killing 27 sheep in two incidents since June.

Carter Niemeier shot the two wolves from a helicopter. Niemeier is the ADC's specialist in wolf dispatching, and has a reputation of effectiveness. The two wolves were described as big, but one had a bad limp from some injury.

Following the wolves as I do, injury seems to often be involved when wolves turn to livestock killing.  Last summer when most of the Sawtooth Pack in Augusta, MT was shot and ten pups brought to Yellowstone (the "Sawtooth Pups"), examination of the dead wolves showed that they have suffered a number of injuries, probably reducing their ability to kill deer and elk.

The Murphy Lake Pack is a naturally formed pack consisting of wolves that are descendents of those that reinhabited NW Montana after coming down from Canada. Wolves have full endangered species status in this part of Montana, and the entire pack cannot legally be killed (unlike the naturally-formed Boulder Pack, further to the south, which is in the "experimental population" area).