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The Elk Decade HE SUN WAS Just Minutes Over the Another 1,542 Elk Would Follow Over the Mountaintops of Breathitt County Next Few Years

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The Elk Decade HE SUN WAS Just Minutes Over the Another 1,542 Elk Would Follow Over the Mountaintops of Breathitt County Next Few Years The Elk Decade HE SUN WAS just minutes over the Another 1,542 elk would follow over the mountaintops of Breathitt County next few years. The untold Twhen Middlesboro resident Mark Since that December day, Kentucky’s Sheckels placed the crosshairs of his .270 ambitious elk restoration program has been rifle behind the shoulder of a 6x6 bull elk an overwhelming success in a variety of ways. story of and squeezed the trigger. One hundred and Today, the herd numbers approximately twenty-five yards away, the bull staggered. 6,500 animals – more than all the other Kentucky’s elk Sheckels held tight as the big animal ran herds east of the Mississippi River. down the bowl of the mountain and out of Kentucky’s elk restoration story is a restoration sight – the bush the hunter used to conceal compelling tale of ambition, vision and years himself had blocked his view. of hard – and often dangerous – work. On a nearby ridge, Sheckel’s father, Bob, By Dave Baker and their good friend, Tennessee resident DOVE HUNTERS KICK-START Otis Parker, had an amphitheater view of ELK RESTORATION the kill. “I was jumping up and down when Tom Baker’s eyes blaze when asked how I saw that bull tumble down the hill,” Parker Kentucky’s elk program began. Although said. “He hit that bull just right.” no longer a member or chairman of the Similar stories unfolded throughout Kentucky Fish and Wildlife Commission, the second week of October as 93 hunters he still refers to the animals as “my elk.” He scoured the mountains of eastern Kentucky is the restoration effort’s pit bull. for the 2007 bull elk hunt. While final In the mid-1990s, Baker served as the scoring must wait until the antlers have fully head of the Kentucky chapter of the Rocky dried, preliminary scoring indicates the state Mountain Elk Foundation, an organization record for a typical bull could fall this year, a centered on a species that did not exist in the sure sign of a healthy herd. state. Baker was determined to change that. Ten years ago, former Gov. Paul Patton Elk had long been absent from the state. opened the door of a livestock trailer and In 1810, naturalist John James Audubon John Perkins photo released seven elk in eastern Kentucky. noted some elk still existed in Kentucky. 22 Kentucky Afield Winter 2007 fw.ky.gov A state police officer (left) Wildlife Commission. A strong advocate Undeterred, Grimes and Phillips started protects former Gov. Paul for eastern Kentucky interests, he foresaw doing their own research. “We got on the Patton during Kentucky’s first the potential that having an elk herd would phone and started calling other states that elk release in December 1997. have for the economy of the area. Without had started elk herds,” Grimes said. “We Hensley’s backing, elk restoration may have found out that Pennsylvania and Michigan By 1847, Audubon wrote, “we only remained a dream. had elk herds for around 90 years, and that believe that none are to be found their loss from brainworm was 2-3 percent. within hundreds of miles.” COULD ELK SURVIVE IN KENTUCKY? So it wasn’t the problem that we originally The eastern subspecies of Wildlife Division Director Roy Grimes thought it was.” elk is long extinct. To bring had his reservations. “My initial reaction They also discovered that restorations elk back to Kentucky would was that it wouldn’t work,” said Grimes, in some states did not work because the elk require the introduction of a who no longer works for Kentucky Fish and destroyed too many farm crops. Alabama different subspecies: the Rocky Wildlife. “I thought that brainworm would exterminated its fledgling herd a century Mountain elk. kill too many animals.” ago because of crop damage, Grimes said. Skeptics believed parasites John Phillips, whose innovations as the The researchers decided that Kentuckians and disease would kill off elk head of Kentucky’s deer program helped would not accept elk in their region if the in the eastern United States. build the trophy-class herd of today, had his animals destroyed too many crops. Baker wanted to prove them own concerns. “I was skeptical, because a lot The biologists decided that a free- wrong – but he needed money of the research I’d seen in school and read ranging elk herd could survive in for a study. in the textbooks was that brainworm would Kentucky. Now they had to figure out Baker displayed a gutsy negate elk in the east,” said Phillips, who where to put them. determination when he retired in 1999. Phillips studied satellite maps, then flew convinced a federal judge and Brainworms, known to scientists as around the state in a small plane to look for federal prosecutor to divert the meningeal worms, can leave their victims suitable elk habitat. “There were some dandy fines of 27 people caught dove blind, lame, disoriented or dead. These places in western Kentucky where elk would hunting over bait in Simpson thread-like worms grow to adulthood in the work,” Phillips recalled. “But there was County into funding for an space between the animal’s brain and skull. too much farmland that elk could damage, John Perkins photo John elk study. That seed money After laying their eggs, the larval offspring and the residents would never accept them. eventually led to the release of pass through the animal’s digestive tract. The only area that looked suitable was 29 elk into a 700-acre fenced area at Land The larvae then latch onto snails and slugs. southeastern Kentucky.” Between the Lakes in western Kentucky When animals graze, they inadvertently eat Southeastern Kentucky encompassed in 1996. the slugs and snails clinging to the plants. That starts EAST MEETS WEST their life cycle again. Elk at Land Between the Lakes would Brainworms are only always be a novelty herd as long as they were found in the east, because contained within a fence. True restoration coniferous forests to the required free-roaming animals. north and the dry plains Doug Hensley, the Seventh District and deserts to the west act Kentucky Fish and Wildlife Commission as natural roadblocks to the member from Hazard, decided it was time. slugs and snails that carry “Doug came in my office one day and the larvae. said, ‘Wouldn’t it be great if we restored elk The brainworm can to eastern Kentucky?’ That’s how the whole infect both deer and elk. thing got started,” recalled former Fish However, white-tailed deer and Wildlife Commissioner Tom Bennett. in Kentucky evolved with “Tom Baker was working in the other part brainworms, and they serve of the state for Land Between the Lakes, as hosts rather than victims. but he wasn’t in the picture to begin with Researchers believe that the in eastern Kentucky.” extinct eastern subspecies of “It was a perfect storm situation,” elk evolved with brainworm Bennett said. “You now had two like-minded immunity, too. Bringing a people working toward the same goal.” different subspecies of elk Baker and Hensley would become into the state that didn’t Photo courtesy Bill Auxier strong allies in the elk restoration cause. have any kind of resistance Bill Auxier took this bull on the opening day of the 2007 Hensley would become the keystone for to the brainworm, however, season. Preliminary measurements show it may be larg- elk restoration on the Kentucky Fish and could be disastrous. er than Kentucky’s current state record for a typical rack. fw.ky.gov Winter 2007 Kentucky Afield 23 2.3 million acres with 1 percent cropland, 6 percent grasslands and 93 percent forest. Reclaimed strip mines had opened up the forest to grasslands; the percentage of grasslands was marginal, but still enough. A BOLD PROPOSAL FOR ELK RESTORATION Phillips and Grimes settled upon a full- blown elk restoration. By stocking 200 elk a year for nine years, the herd would reach 7,200 animals – about one elk for every square mile – in 17 years. “That shocked Tom (Bennett),” Grimes said. “I think people were expecting us to create a novelty herd of a couple of hundred.” Hensley supported the concept because he did not want a novelty herd. He wanted a huntable population of elk. “We learned from the deer restoration programs that we had since the 1950s that putting just a few animals in an area didn’t work as well as a mass stocking,” he said. “That’s why we wanted to bring in a lot of elk.” Grimes and Phillips presented their recommendations to the Kentucky Fish and Wildlife Commission on March 7, 1997. mine site to some visitors? Hensley didn’t PIVOTAL DAY FOR ELK RESTORATION However, Bennett said, “We didn’t have the say much more; Tate was glad to do the State Fish and Wildlife Commission money or the financial resources to pay for a favor. Those visitors included Baker and Ron members picked up the issue again at their long-term restoration program.” Marcoux from the Rocky Mountain Elk next meeting on June 13, 1997. It was a Baker stepped up. The Rocky Mountain Foundation headquarters in Montana. pivotal moment for the elk program. Elk Foundation, he told commission Baker had never been on a reclaimed Baker sat silently while others discussed members, would consider funding the project. mine site. But as they drove around in the issue. “The commission members liked With that prospect, department employees Tate’s Ford Bronco, Baker looked across the idea, but they just couldn’t pay for it,” spent the next three months pitching the the mountains and saw miles of elk habitat.
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