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Officials have investigated over 209 livestock deaths in Montana caused by mountain lions, grizzly bears, and wolves over the past year to determine whether agriculture producers can be compensated for the losses.

Dalin Tidwell, Montana state director for Wildlife Services, told the Board of Livestock at its meeting on Wednesday that it’s been a fairly standard season for predation losses in Montana, and that most of the investigations involve wolves and grizzly bears.

As of Sept. 7, 92 of the 209 investigations involved grizzly bears, 35 involved mountain lions, and 82 involved wolves. Each investigation is sometimes for several different animals.

Some notable attacks this year were 27 cattle lost to a grizzly in Glacier County and 37 lambs to a grizzly in Lewis and Clark County.

Predation losses are documented by Wildlife Services and the Montana Livestock Loss Board, which compensates ranchers for losses caused by wolves, grizzly bears and mountain lions.

When a livestock carcass is discovered, wildlife services will perform a necropsy and determine which species killed the animal. If the cause of death was a grizzly, wolf, or mountain lion, Wildlife Services will start an investigative report. That can be used to file a loss claim with the livestock loss board.

The compensation money allocated to the board comes from the “general pool” in the state Legislature. In 2021, livestock losses recorded on the board totaled 413 animals for a value of nearly $350,000. Based on data from last year, compensation for one killed cow was just over $1,000.

Tidwell said the predation loss numbers he presented are not official and always changing — they had already increased slightly a day after he presented them to the board.

The data “gives a snapshot of what’s going on and how busy we’ve been,” Tidwell said. He added those investigations are just for animal deaths that are reported and verified.

“There’s many more out there that don’t get reported to us but are still lost,” he said.

The loss board keeps a running tally of losses on its website. George Edwards, who runs the Livestock Loss Board, wrote in a meeting document that the majority of claims tend to come in from mid-August until the end of November, so what’s reflected on the board’s website right now underestimates the losses and isn’t comparable to the end-of-year data from 2021.

Claims are now coming in at a rate seen in prior years, according to Edwards.

The Livestock Loss Board’s website, last updated on Aug. 30, had 78 total losses: 50 confirmed and 19 probable cattle, six sheep, two goats, and one guard dog lost to one of the three predators. The state will have to pay just under $80,000 to compensate for those losses.

Coyote losses are not compensated through the livestock loss board. Data from the meeting indicated coyotes had killed 120 calves and 718 lambs over the past year, among other animals.

“Coyotes are one of the worst predators in our state,” said Donna Wilham, Board of Livestock secretary. Compensating for the deaths they cause “would cost a lot,” she said.

Wildlife Services uses other methods to control coyote predation, such as surveying landscapes with helicopters. The Board of Livestock recently started using a new helicopter, which was also discussed in Wednesday’s meeting.

There were also reports of beehive losses to predators this year, Tidwell said. Black bears harmed 18 beehives while grizzlies harmed seven, as of Sept. 7.

Often, beekeepers use electric fences to keep bears out, but sometimes that doesn’t work.

“Some bears beat the fence. I’ve seen big giant holes they’ve dug to get under a fence. Big holes, like excavator sized holes to get under them,” Tidwell said.

Some beekeepers don’t use electric fences, but that could change with new federal funding Montana Wildlife Services received to add electric fences to small apiaries and backyard chicken coops to hinder predators. Montana got a portion of congressional non-lethal predator management funding, which Wildlife Services used to hire three range riders and a fencing crew with two full-time and one seasonal employee.

A meeting attendee asked Tidwell what was done with the grizzly bears associated with attacks. Tidwell said he didn’t know the details, but that at least 15 grizzlies caught this year were “more than likely to be euthanized.”

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Isabel Hicks covers agriculture and is a Report for America corps member. She can be reached at 406-582-2651 or ihicks@dailychronicle.com.

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