My point was the hunting will only exacerbate the problem by pushing the elk across the highway.
and onto private property where they will do damage. Both of these end results will have drastic consequences.
Why kill all cows when they are the ones that will carry the young? As I said, 1 cow killed = 2 elk.
They have been talking about reducing and controlling the population since before the relocation...They have failed..... surprise, surprise.
There were a couple of different "roundups"
I do know the NE corner got about a hundred elk...and with all due respect 400,...I'm pretty sure those elk didn't migrate back.
Are people opposed to relocating?
It just seems like such a waste to kill them. Don't get me wrong...I have no problem with hunting them...but It seems like a bad idea to me.
Relocation may be costly but we have the resources why not utilize them...I'd much rather pay for this than wolf feasibility studies.
According to what I've read the Hanford population grows by about 25% +/- per year.
So, do they then open the hunting back up in 5 years to cull more elk or do they have a continual season?
Without spending all night researching, this is what I could find...
Fifteen elk died in a three-day roundup at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation this week, seven from stress after being too tightly packed into a corral, a state wildlife manager said Friday.
Earlier this week, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service acknowledged only four deaths when it said the roundup was ending prematurely because of problems getting and keeping the elk corralled.
Two elk also died during a February test roundup of 20 head.
All told, "we handled 174 elk and lost 17," said Dale Bambrick, regional director in Yakima for the state Department of Fish and Wildlife.
Though the projected mortality rate for the project was 5 percent to 10 percent, based.
Thursday, March 9, 2000
Hanford elk roundup suddenly goes awry
By Linda Ashton
The Associated Press
YAKIMA - Sixty elk broke free of a corral at the Hanford nuclear reservation yesterday, severely injuring three and bringing an early end to a wildlife roundup. The injured elk were destroyed.
"It ended not really well," said Kathy Criddle, an information specialist for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
A helicopter cowboy had herded the elk from the Rattlesnake Hills into the figure-eight corral yesterday morning, the second day the animals had been brought in.
"It all went perfectly, like (Tuesday). Then they busted through the fence, knocked about 20 feet down, and they all escaped," Criddle said.
Three elk were trampled as the herd bolted. They were humanely destroyed, and Wanapum tribal members butchered the carcasses.
Wildlife managers had hoped to round up 200 elk this week from the 120-square-mile Arid Lands Ecology Reserve on the western edge of the nuclear reservation.
They ended up with 130 elk, half of which were transported by livestock trailer to the Selkirk Range in northeastern Washington and half to the Blue Mountains in southeastern Washington. Twenty other elk were moved to the Blue mountains last month after they were tested for disease and radiation exposure.
"Basically, that's it. We're done for the year," Criddle said.
What had been called the largest wildlife roundup in the state was a challenge from the beginning. On Monday the helicopter crew couldn't move the herd from a chute through the gate into the corral. One elk died.
Several modifications were made to the gateway, including doubling its width to 20 feet, in hopes of eliminating whatever had alarmed the herd.
On Tuesday the aerial cowboys rounded up 150 elk, and 130 were moved to the Blue Mountains. Twenty were released yesterday morning because they'd been held captive too long, Criddle said.
The relocation program is part of a plan to manage the size of the fast-growing Hanford elk herd, which is estimated at nearly 1,000 head.
The big animals pose a threat to fragile shrub-steppe vegetation on the no-hunting reserve, and they have wandered outside its boundaries to eat nearby farmers' crops.
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