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Last Updated on Saturday, 29 October 2011 01:00

Written by Saige Albert

Pinedale – “If we can lower the prevalence of brucellosis in the elk, we can reduce the risk of transmission of the disease from elk to cattle,” says brucellosis biologist Brandon Scurlock of the Wyoming Game and Fish Department.

“About 22 percent of elk that use feed grounds show antibodies to brucellosis, meaning they have been exposed to the bacteria – they don’t necessarily have the disease,” says Scurlock. “In the northwest, we’re seeing an increasing trend in the native wintering elk, but in terms of feed ground elk, the sero-prevalence has been stable or slightly decreasing.”

When Wyoming lost its brucellosis-free status, research was implemented for both wildlife and cattle. One pilot project and top recommendation of the Brucellosis Coordination Team was the test and slaughter project, which is in the monitoring stage right now.

“They recommended that we conduct the project on all three feed grounds in the Pinedale elk herd unit,” explains Scurlock. “We erected large portable corral traps on the feedgrounds and tested as many yearling and older female elk as we could capture. Those testing seropositive were slaughtered at a USDA facility in Idaho.”

Following slaughter, the meat was returned to Wyoming and distributed to the Salvation Army.

The five-year project began in 2006 and recently concluded, with 2011 being the first year that no elk were slaughtered.

“It was effective at reducing seroprevalence in the population,” says Scurlock. “At the Muddy Creek feed ground, seroprevalence dropped from 37 percent to five percent in the course of five years.”

“However, it was a pilot project that the task force recommended,” continued Scurlock. “It cost over $1 million to implement and is likely not very feasible on a broad scale. We did learn some valuable information and saw prevalence decrease, so we are monitoring the elk now.”

Monitoring efforts will continue for several years to determine if the test and slaughter project will provide long-term results, or if the decrease in prevalence is simply a short-term solution.

Scurlock also mentions that elk are vaccinated with Strain 19 of the bacteria to help them fight the Brucella infections better.

The vaccine doesn’t prevent infection, but rather works to prevent abortions and, as a result, reduces transmission of brucellosis.

Scurlock comments, “We have been monitoring the efficacy of Strain 19 vaccination program since 1989 by bleeding elk and looking at the serology.”

A new method of monitoring vaccination efficacy is through the use of vaginal implant transmitters (VITs). VITs are implanted into pregnant elk.

“When those transmitters are expelled, you can track abortions and normal births,” says WGFD wildlife disease specialist Hank Edwards.  

“We started using the VITs to see if there is a difference in abortion rate between vaccinated and unvaccinated elk,” explains Scurlock. “It doesn’t appear to have an affect on seroprevalence – vaccinated animals have the same prevalence as unvaccinated animals, but we are trying to see if there is a difference in abortion rates.”

Scurlock further explains that the vaccine is expensive, and vaccinating elk is a labor-intensive process.

“We don’t want to continue vaccinating unless we see a benefit,” says Scurlock.

Edwards adds that some work is being done to improve vaccines for elk.

“One of the research projects going on at the Sybille Research Facility is to determine which adjuvants work best with elk and the vaccine,” says Edwards. “An adjuvant is something added to a vaccine to enhance the immune response. This project is being done in conjunction with Steve Olson at the National Animal Disease Center.”

Other research is being done to develop a better vaccine. The opening of the Bio-Safety Level 3 lab in the Wyoming State Vet Laboratory will facilitate continuing research. This new lab will allow research with the Brucella bacteria directly.

VITs are also used to determine the location and timings of abortions. In combination with GPS collars, WGFD biologists are able to look at elk contact with aborted fetuses.

“We are trying to see when and where the elk are aborting so we can develop management strategies to reduce chances of contact with the fetus,” says Scurlock. “We have been doing that since 2006 on 17 of 23 feeding grounds.”

In a “Target Feedground Project,” the WGFD is also using flexible management strategies and changing feeding styles to reduce contact with aborted fetuses.

“The most contact occurs when a fetus is expelled right on the feed line, as compared to off a feed line,” says Scurlock. “We determined that using experimental culture-negative fetuses and game cameras.”

By identifying that less contact is made away from feed lines, Scurlock notes that the use of low-density feeding will reduce population density when elk are on feed and should reduce contact and transmission of the bacterium.

The same project has identified that most VITs are expelled in March and April, allowing the WGFD some other management options.

“We are looking at truncating the feeding season,” says Scurlock. “If we can get elk off feed grounds earlier in the year, by February for instance, they won’t be concentrated and we can reduce brucellosis that way.”

Brucellosis on feed grounds and in areas of high-density elk is perhaps more predictable than the occurrence of the disease in and around the Cody and Meeteetse areas.   In cooperation with Montana State University, a research project is in progress with the goal of identifying why brucellosis has established in the area.

“Angela Brennan with MSU has been working for the last two years or better trying to figure out what has changed in the Cody region that has allowed brucellosis become established,” says Edwards. “We have some theories, and are in the process of looking at that question, but we can’t definitively point our finger at any one cause – we don’t have any concrete answers yet.”

Saige Albert is assistant editor of the Wyoming Livestock Roundup and can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .

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Last Updated on Thursday, 16 December 2010 15:53

Written by Christy Martinez

A new strategy for controlling elk populations in the Laramie Peak area will begin Nov. 21 with a pilot project managed by the Wyoming Game and Fish Department (WGFD).
WGFD Wildlife Management Coordinator Darryl Lutz says the project came together a few months ago in August, when Lee Knox was hired as the Hunt Management Coordinator for the Northern Laramie Peak Hunter Management and Access Program, or HMAP.
“With the landowners, it really came together in the last month,” he adds.
Elk population numbers have been above management objective in the Laramie Peak herd unit for several years, even though the WGFD says they’ve worked closely with landowners on management. In an area with a population objective of 5,000 elk, Lutz says the rough estimate of the actual population is 10,000 elk.
“The program provides a new opportunity for hunters to access private lands to harvest a cow elk,” says Knox, who will work with landowners to identify areas where the elk are congregating on private lands, and who will then help point pre-selected hunters to those locations. “We’re trying to place hunters where the elk are to give them the best opportunity to harvest an animal.”
According to the WGFD, Knox will not serve as a guide, and will not necessarily accompany hunters in the field.
“Other states have started hunter management programs similar to ours, and they’ve had some success, so we copied their concept and are making an attempt to increase elk harvest,” says Lutz.
The HMAP effort isn’t technically a part of the Private Lands, Public Wildlife program, but Lutz says it is an extension of WGFD efforts to increase hunter access and manage big game populations toward objective.
HMAP also isn’t a license issuance program. “We will only use the licenses we already issued for the 2010 season,” notes Lutz. Hunt Area 7, which is primarily the La Prele Creek drainage south of Douglas, has 4,450 issued licenses for 2010, while the adjoining Hunt Area 19 has 700 licenses. Those are the two areas targeted by HMAP.
The program will run through Jan. 31, 2011 and is open to antlerless elk hunting for people with valid elk area 7 type 1, 4, 6 and 8 elk license. Each three-day hunt period has a limit of 15 hunters, and Lutz says half of those hunt periods have already been taken, and that December is full.
All applicants will be required to attend an orientation session on the first morning of their hunt, and after hunters have selected an available time period they will be able to obtain permission and vehicle identification slips and ranch rules.
“We believe the harvest we’ve gotten the last couple of years has at least dampened population growth, and, based on previous statistics, we’ll probably harvest around 2,500 head of elk this year,” states Lutz.
The WGFD has already worked closely with the landowners participating in HMAP through previous population control efforts, and Lutz says he thinks the landowner community in the area has become “at least a little bit comfortable with the access program already in place.”
“These landowners already have a pretty close relationship with local Game and Fish personnel, and I think there’s already a level of trust,” says Lutz.
However, Laramie Peak area landowner Richard Cross isn’t convinced the new HMAP program is the key to controlling area elk numbers. In his opinion, the WGFD is trying to gain more control of hunting.
“They want the hunters to ask them to hunt, instead of asking the landowner directly,” says Cross, who hasn’t yet put his property into the program, in part because he’s already leased his hunting rights.
He says he sees a potential problem in the HMAP program is having the public come back the next year, thinking the same rules apply. “The hunters will get permission from the Game and Fish to hunt where the Game and Fish thinks there’s elk, and the second year they’ll be back, saying they got permission from the Game and Fish to hunt on the land, and they won’t ask the landowner first.”
Cross says that’s a common problem with the existing WGFD walk-in areas. “Many landowners have signed up for those, and they’ve haven’t worked out, so they quit them, but the next year the people come back. As a landowner, we can’t keep them out once we let them in. They think once a walk-in area, forever a walk-in area, and I think that same thing will happen with this new program.”
“If they really were sincere about getting elk numbers down, they’d intensify the season and make it shorter,” states Cross of the WGFD. “Right now they have a five-month season that scatters the elk out, and they can’t acquire permission to get on some places.”
“I think the Game and Fish has too much power,” says Cross. “They keep wanting to give the public more and more rights, which erodes the rights of the private landowner.”
However, Lutz says the key to managing the Laramie Peak elk herd, like others in the state, is continued cooperation between the WGFD and landowners.
“We’ve worked closely together in the past, and now we’re trying something different. If it works, we might try it in a different part of the state, and again in the same area,” says Lutz.
Come the end of January 2011, harvest numbers will be in, and both the WGFD and landowners will know whether the pilot project was a success.
Christy Martinez is managing editor of the Wyoming Livestock Roundup and can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .

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Last Updated on Thursday, 07 February 2008 06:26

Written by Cat Urbigkit

Pinedale – The Wyoming Game and Fish Department (G&F) proceeded forward with the third year of testing members of the Pinedale Elk Herd for brucellosis, and sending test-positive animals to slaughter this past week.
    Elk have been trapped and bled for brucellosis testing during the last two winters at the Muddy Creek elk feedground near Boulder, but this year the program expanded to include a testing program at the Fall Creek feedground, which is also located along the western flank of the Wind River Mountains near Pinedale. During the first two years of testing, 71 cow elk were removed after testing seropositive for the disease.
    After baiting the traps at Muddy Creek and Fall Creek on Monday, the elk declined to cooperate and the trap efforts were called off for the day. To the surprise of the handling crew on Tuesday morning, when they arrived to try the trap again, they found the elk had entered the trap during the night, somehow severing the rope keeping the trap gate open, resulting in about 300 elk trapping themselves. Tuesday’s capture was the largest group of elk worked by the agency in one of the traps. It was a cold morning and this bunch of rowdy elk jumped in the squeeze chutes, kicked anything made of plywood, and even managed to collapse an interior portion of the trap. Luckily, no one was injured in a long day of bleeding elk for brucellosis testing.
    But with more than 20 big bulls in the trap, some of the other elk didn’t fare too well. In total eight elk were killed, mostly due to being gored or trampled, or stress-related death. The bulls were tranquilized and removed from the trap so the cows and calves could be handled safely.
    Of the 184 adult cow elk that were bled for testing and held overnight, 20 tested seropositive for brucellosis. Two of these were cows that had been euthanized, but the remaining 18 were shipped to a USDA-inspected facility in eastern Idaho for slaughter on Wednesday morning. A team of scientists was slated to travel to Idaho to collect tissue samples for further testing.
    The trap was triggered by G&F personnel at the Muddy Creek feedground on Wednesday morning, with about 200 elk captured inside. Of the captive elk, 112 were test-eligible females. As the testing crew finished work for the day Wednesday and began moving the cow elk into the larger pod of the trap for holding overnight while awaiting test results, a large group of elk crowded against a gate, and it failed, resulting in the release of about 40 elk back onto the feedground. These cows are all wearing rubber neck collars with numbers corresponding to the blood samples, allowing for fairly easy identification of any animals that test positive for the disease. In years past, a few elk that were accidentally released from the trap and tested sero-positive were shot on the feedlines. Results of Wednesday’s testing effort weren’t available when this article was written. G&F officials said they would re-evaluate what to do about the escapees once the lab results were in hand.
    This test-and-removal program is a five-year pilot project geared to reduce the brucellosis rate in the elk herd while reducing the risk of transmitting the disease to cattle. It was a key recommendation of the Wyoming Brucellosis Coordination Team.
    Cat Urbigkit is a correspondent for the Wyoming Livestock Roundup.

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Last Updated on Saturday, 29 October 2011 01:00

Written by Saige Albert

Cody – Most elk in the Cody area are doing well, a fact that’s been confirmed by a recent survey by the Wyoming Game and Fish Department (WGFD).

“We found the elk residing around Carter Mountain, the south side of the South Fork and Boulder Basin were characterized by high calf ratios and large sample sizes,” explains WGFD wildlife biologist Doug McWhirter. “Those herds are thriving and that is reflected in our winter herd numbers.”  

Elk in the extreme north end of the herd unit, however, are characterized by lower densities and very low calf ratios. These areas, primarily in the Upper North Fork of the Shoshone River and associated areas of Yellowstone National Park, are struggling.

This year the WGFD surveyed the Cody elk herd in late summer in an attempt to determine how different segments of the herd are doing. This is the first time this survey has been done for the herd.

“We have migratory elk and non-migratory elk,” says McWhirter. “We usually do our surveys in the winter, when all the migratory elk are wintering with the non-migratory elk, so it is hard to figure out how specific populations are doing.”

WGFD flew the survey this year on Aug. 13 and 14, before elk migrations occurred and hunting seasons began.

“As opposed to our traditional winter surveys, we looked at animals where they are hunted, so we had access to the specific population segment that we are concerned with,” says McWhirter.

The WGFD looked primarily at calf-cow ratios, yearling bull ratios and mature bull ratios. Calf-cow ratios are determined by looking at the number of calves per each 100 cows.

“The numbers are somewhat meaningful, but not having done this specific survey in the past, we aren’t trying to do a count. Rather, we are looking for that ratio data,” explains McWhirter.

“We didn’t know if non-migratory elk are doing well, or how the migrants affect those numbers,” says McWhirter, noting the population around Carter Mountain saw calf ratios in the 50s, which is very high.

They also studied the herd in a remote area known as the Thorofare.

“The Thorofare is a remote backcountry area, and it is one of the specific areas we were really interested in learning about, because there are no elk that winter there,” explains McWhirter. “That area also produces the majority of the mature bull harvest, and is a very popular place for hunters.”
The results of the survey in the area showed calf ratios were better than expected.

“It was really important for us to get a handle on what happens there,” adds McWhirter. “What we found was better than expected calf ratios and yearling bull ratios. The numbers aren’t great, but it was definitely better than we were expecting to find.”

Calf ratios came in at between 25 and 30 calves to 100 cow elk.

“We were expecting to see numbers similar to the migratory elk of the Clarks Fork herd, and what we found was much better,” comments McWhirter, noting that calf ratios in the Lamar Valley where migratory elk from the Clarks Fork herd summer, hit in the mid-teens.

McWhirter says this information is useful for assessing elk populations for management, and the WGFD will continue to replicate the survey to gather some trend data, although the surveys are dependent on funding.

“When we have the information that paints a trend, it is a lot more meaningful than data for one particular year,” McWhirter notes. “We plan to gather some additional information, but what we learned from this one survey was extremely revealing.”

A similar survey was done in the Clarks Fork elk herd for four years, and McWhirter anticipates doing a “spot check” in the future to see if trends have changed. The impetus for conducting a preseason survey in the Clarks Fork herd was to look for the presence of significant predation on elk calves, largely by grizzly bears, but also by wolves.

“Those calf ratios are very low. When we see low calf ratios by August and September, that is almost undoubtedly a signal of bear predation,” explains McWhirter. “The bears hit the calves at a very young age. We’ve noticed that in the Lamar Valley, and we were interested in seeing how predation may be affecting the Cody herd unit.”

McWhirter notes that surveys of the Clarks Fork herd were part of a larger study called the Absaroka Elk Ecology Project, a collaborative effort by the Wyoming Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit, WGFD and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

The project, which began in January 2007, aims to study the behavior, physiology and demography of the Clarks Fork elk herd in the Absaroka Range. The data has found that decreased pregnancy rates of cow elk as well as calf predation has lead to lower herd productivity.

The project has focused on identifying the factors limiting pregnancy rates, and, more broadly, at improving understanding of predator influence on prey and influence on elk migration in the Greater Yellowstone Area. The Absaroka Elk Ecology project anticipates a completion date in 2012 and 2013.

“The surveys in the Lamar Valley were part of that project, and we took some of what we learned from those surveys and are applying it to the Cody elk herd,” says McWhirter.

“Determining adult female survival rates was one of the biggest findings as far as elk management we learned from that project. If we remove hunting from the equation and just look at natural mortality, the survival of adult female elk remains quite high, even in areas of significant wolf and grizzly densities,” explains McWhirter.

“It is less than what we see in an area with no predation, but remains high enough to maintain and build hunting opportunity and population sizes.

However, significant calf mortality rates due to predation don’t produce a surplus for hunting, so hunting opportunities are diminished,” continues McWhirter.

The Cody elk herd occupies the north and south forks of the Shoshone River, the headwaters of the Yellowstone and areas north of the Greybull River and has an estimated population of between 6,000 and 7,000 elk.

Saige Albert is assistant editor of the Wyoming Livestock Roundup and can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .