In my neck of the woods, wolves are allowed to roam their territory under the proviso of local citizens that nothing goes wrong - even the perception of it.  For example, the Fishtrap pack that I had studied for a decade was constantly blamed for eating all the deer in our area, which apparently didn’t leave much for the bears, cougars and coyotes that live there as well. 

Nevertheless, deer are as common as dirt in our area. Even the coveted elk herds are doing well.  This information comes from the limited scientific studies regarding the population trends of ungulates in Montana. Despite the evidence, the locals still believed that the Fishtrap pack rendered our local area “deer less.”  There were "survivors" of course, but not nearly enough to hunt during the fall, which was the real issue. All this according to the people who are "in-tune" with their surrounding environment.

I also hear from people who are concerned that wolves will reproduce like lemmings, and we will soon be up to our armpits in wolf packs. It turns out wolf packs have their own versions of population control. In 2005, for example, the Fishtrap pack had only 2 - 3 pups, while the year before there were seven.  Despite the number of pups born each spring, the pack has maintained 7 - 12 wolves annually. This is because pup mortality can be high in wolf packs, up to 50 percent. In addition, some individuals, called dispersers, leave the pack to strike out on their own. Wolf packs also defend their territory from intrusion by other wolves. In this case their territory size was about 250 square miles. The net result of all these processes has been that within a pack’s territory there is rarely a large increase in the number of wolves. So when community members let me know when they have seen wolves, over time they are most likely seeing the same ones over and over.
 
This brings us back to the first point which is how many deer can a wolf pack possibly eat within their territory? This, of course, is greatly dependent on the number of deer present. Even if they ate one deer a week that would only be 52 deer each year. We all know there are more deer than that, even to the point of having to avoid them with our cars. We’ve all seen them. Some just stand at the road edge and sigh, waiting for the right moment to step into oncoming traffic. Or perhaps they are the individuals who know they will be eaten anyway and are just tired of “running.” And we have all witnessed the X-deer, who for sport think they can reach the other side of the road before the semi arrives.
 
So do wolves kill all the deer in northwest Montana? No. In fact it is deer that we are up to our armpits in. The wildest rumor I’ve heard so far takes into account this biological tendency. Apparently some enterprising auto insurance companies have released wolves into the forest so they will chase deer onto the road only to be hit by unsuspecting motorists. So be aware of the Allstate pack. They’ll be the ones with bumper stickers on their butts that say, “Sponsored by the Committee of Stupid Rumors.”