It isn't a surprise, really, that woodland caribou were finally declared extinct in the U.S. We've been watching the remaining woodland caribou in the Pacific Northwest dwindle to just a few stragglers for sometime. The animals, the lone pre-European settlement big game animal native to Montana that is now absent, once roamed as far south as Lolo Pass in the Bitterroot.
The last time woodland caribou were in the Treasure State was 2012, when five wandered down from British Columbia.
Here's my latest Flathead Beacon column about these extinct gray ghosts — extinct in the U.S. that is.