Counting Elk Counts

Wednesday morning is foggy and chilly as we pull from the utility area in the park at 6:30am. My volunteer partner and I are embarking on the monthly elk count as citizen scientists for Rocky Mountain National Park. We collect data for the park’s elk and vegetation management plan.

Elk once roamed freely in the area. In the early 1900’s hunters extirpated the elk for the restaurants in Denver accommodating the growing residents and visitors on the front range. F.O. Stanley recognized a problem without wildlife for visitors to see in what was soon to become Rocky Mountain National Park. He imported a dozen elk from Yellowstone to Rocky to add to the tourism appeal of the area.

By the 1990’s, Stanley’s experiment was so successful that the elk population was larger, less migratory, and more concentrated than it had ever been. Plus, elk had few natural predators. By the early 2000’s, a proposed Elk and Vegetation plan aimed to cut the number of elk wintering in the park, regenerate aspen stands, and increase willow heights destroyed by too many grazing elk. Part of the plan is the regular monitoring of elk activity in the park and surrounding areas.

What could be more fun than going out early in the morning with the express purpose of looking for elk? Our citizen science role on those monthly counts is to find elk. Armed with a radio, binoculars, and spotting scope as well as a clipboard with the designated route and our data collection materials, we head out. If we see elk on the route, we stop and record the number; whether they are bulls, cows, yearlings, or calves; the numbers on any of the collars placed on cows for various research projects; and the location of the sightings.

The counts allow researchers to monitor the situation and make management changes as needed. Flexibility and adaptation are critical to establish desired future conditions for vegetation in the park and to oversee the elk population.

By design, the elk population is declining in the winter because they are migrating to lower elevations. The aspen and willow growth are coming back. With this growth, beavers are beginning to return to the park and create additional riparian areas. The progress is slow but finding the ecological balance that was badly disrupted is occurring.

I love the mornings I spend looking for elk and recording their characteristics and numbers. Anything about wildlife is dear to my heart, but I especially love making this contribution to science and to the recovery of an environment that can support a diversity of wildlife including elk, beavers, coyotes, and other native species.