State reports new wolf pack near Sherman Pass

SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) — The state has a new wolf pack, the 19th since the animals began returning to Washington in the 1990s.

State wildlife managers say part of a northcentral Washington wolf pack has split away and formed a new group called the Sherman Pack.

State wolf program manager Danny Martorello says the pack roams in the vicinity of Sherman Pass in Ferry County, north of the Colville Indian Reservation.

The Spokesman-Review reports that at the end of 2015, the state was home to at least 90 wolves and eight breeding pairs.

Wolves were shot, poisoned and trapped nearly to extinction in the state in the 1920s and 1930s. Wolves began returning in the state from nearby states and Canada in the 1990s, sometimes causing conflict with ranchers.