The prong-horns appear to possess a highly nervous temperament, which requires for their welfare the wide free sweep of the open plains. They do not thrive and increase in inclosures, even in large game preserves, as do deer, elk, and buffalo. For this reason, it will require the greatest care to protect and foster these attractive members of our fauna to save them from soon being numbered among the many wild species which have been destroyed by the coming of civilized man.
WAPITI, OR AMERICAN ELK (Cervus canadensis and its relatives)
By a curious transposition of names the early settlers applied to the American wapiti the term elk, which belongs to the European representative of our moose. Our elk is a close relative of the European stag. It is the handsomest and, next to the moose, the largest member of the deer family in America. The old bulls, weighing more than 800 pounds, bear superb widely branched antlers, which give them a picturesque and noble mien. This is the only American deer which has a well-marked light rump-patch. The young, numbering from one to three, are white spotted, like the fawns of other deer.
Originally the elk was the most wide ranging of our hoofed game animals. It occupied all the continent from north of Peace River, Canada, south to southern New Mexico, and from central Massachusetts and North Carolina to the Pacific coast of California. Like the buffalo, it appeared to be equally at home in the forested region east of the Mississippi River and on the open plains flanking the Rocky Mountains. Its range also extended from sea-level to above timberline on lofty mountain ranges.
Exterminated throughout most of their original range, elk still occupy some of their early haunts in western Canada, Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, and the Pacific Coast States. The last elk was killed in Pennsylvania about 60 years ago, and in Michigan and Minnesota some 20 years later. The main body of the survivors are now in the Yellowstone Park region. Their size and the readiness with which they thrive in captivity has led to serious consideration of elk farming as an industry.
In the West, before the settlement of their range crowded the elk back, large numbers lived throughout the year on the plains and among the foothills. They have now become mountain animals, spending the spring and summer largely in the timberline forests and alpine meadows, where many bands linger until the heavy snows of early winter force them down to the foothills and valleys. During the last days of their abundance in the Rocky Mountains winter herds numbering thousands gathered in Estes Park and other foothill valleys.
Elk are the most polygamous of all our deer, each bull gathering a small herd of cows during the fall. At the beginning of the mating season the bulls wander widely through the high forest glades, their musical bugling piercing the silence with some of the most stirring notes of the wilderness. Amid the wild grandeur of these remote mountain fastnesses the appearance of a full-antlered buck on the skyline of some bare ridge presents a noble picture of wild life.
There are probably over 40,000 elk still left in the United States, and of these more than 30,000 are located in Wyoming, mainly in and about Yellowstone National Park.
During the last few years great interest has been shown in the reintroduction of elk in parts of their former range, where they had been exterminated and where conditions are still suitable for their perpetuation. Such efforts are meeting with much success. Not only do the animals thrive and increase rapidly, but local sentiment is almost unanimous in their favor. This is well shown by the active interest taken by both cattle and sheep owners in northern Arizona in regard to a band of elk introduced a few years ago on their mountain stock ranges. The stockmen exercise a virtual wardenship over these animals that insures them against molestation, and the herd is rapidly increasing.
As against this, we have the despicable work of poachers, who are shooting elk for their two canine teeth and leaving the body to the coyotes. Information has been received that more than 500 elk were ruthlessly slaughtered for this purpose about the border of Yellowstone National Park during the winter of 1915-1916.