Downed power line makes crispy critters in Montana

A downed power line near Eureka in northwestern Montana electrocuted more than a dozen wild animals over a period of several months before the carnage was discovered recently by crews with the Lincoln Electrical Cooperative.

Company officials believe a dry tree fell on the high-voltage power line sometime during the summer, but it failed to touch anything to ground out the line and cut the power, which would have alerted the cooperative to the problem.

When workers from the co-op visited the location for general maintenance in October, they discovered five whitetail deer, four black bears, two wolves, one coyote and a turkey vulture—all in various stages of decomposition. According to Roger Pitman, operations superintendent at the Lincoln Electric Cooperative, one of the wolf carcasses was “still warm” when it was found.

“We’re just thankful there weren’t any two-legged creatures up there, except for the turkey vulture,” Pitman observed.

Officials with Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, who were called to the grisly scene, speculated that the deer were likely first to be electrocuted and the carcasses attracted the other species, which are all known scavengers.

Tim Their, a FWP biologist, said he’s seen similar cases of deer being hit by trains, with their decaying carcasses subsequently luring in predators.

“It’s sort of a chain reaction,” he said. “But I’ve never seen it relative to a power line before.”