Bill's Nevada Hunt:
Elk Season
Page Only
(This was Page 1, but Bill tagged out so quickly, this is the only elk page. I was prepared for this to go on forever!
First posted November 7, 2010 Last edited November 10, 2010

Saturday, November 6 Elk Season begins!

The elk season in unit 111 is from November 6 to November 20. Some background information on elk in the Schell Creek Range.

According to an article by Mike Sevon, elk were introduced into the Schell Creek Range in 1932. It started in 1931 when Mr. J. A Robison of the United States Game Protective Association appeared before the White Pine County Commissioners and offered a carload of elk if the county paid the freight charges from Yellowstone Park. I know from previous reading, getting ready for my Wyoming elk hunts, that the Park had been created in 1872 and its game was protected by the US military. Market hunters were thrown out of the Park (there are some very interesting tales in Olaus Murie's Elk of North America) and the herds there survived, while almost all the elk in the rest of the US were eliminated by unregulated hunting. The Yellowstone herds served as the source for repopulation efforts across the US in the decades following 1920.

The freight bill, according to Mike Sevon, to bring the elk from Gardner, Montana, on the eastern border of Yellowstone, to Ely, Nevada, was the enormous amount of $173. The Commissioners accepted the offer, and 15 calves, 15 cows, 2 spike bulls plus two extras (Mike Sevon does not mention the sex of the two "extras") were shipped on February 13, 1932. There was some contention that the elk would compete with the rancher's cows, and the Commissioners guaranteed the ranchers that the herd would be limited to 200 animals, unless experience showed that a larger herd would not be a problem for the ranchers. This conflict between ranchers and hunters would continue until present times. The herd increased to 40 animals in one year, was up to 60 by 1934, and 300 by 1947. Hunting was started that year, with 60 tags being issued.

The Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation estimated that Nevada had 11,000 elk overall in 2009 and 12,300 in 2010, with a 32/100 bull/cow ratio. The Schell Creek Range has a large elk herd. According to a Nevada Department of Wildlife report, Bill's hunt area has the largest herds and yields 90% of the bulls killed per year in Nevada.My research suggests that the largest elk herds are on the eastern side of the Schells. Bill is now on the eastern side, at Horse Canyon. He may stay there, or he may be moving to the Duck Creek Basin, Cooper Canyon, or Cooper Wash areas, all of which are on the eastern side and have the most elk, according to my reading between the lines of the local outfitters. Photos of Duck Creek Basin show aspen groves and the websites of all the local outfitters show racks to make you drool. He may stay in Horse Canyon to avoid the crowds.

No word from Bill, but the weather is sunny for sunrise with a temp around 43°. The nights will be around freezing and soon the weather will turn more typical for elk country: snow!

Sunday, November 7

Still no word from our correspondent, Bill. We need to get him hooked up to a satellite connection and have him post some words and pix! Weather remains clear but clouds are forming now and snow is definitely in the forecast, probably (70% chance) tomorrow. We await word from the field.

Later in the day: Bill called in, he is OK. It is only the second day of the elk season and HE HAS ONE DOWN!  I will let him tell the tale. I don't want to spoil his fun, and I am dying to see how close I came to what was really going on.

Tuesday, November 9

Bill should have a wrangler haul his meat out today, so he may be on the road soon and back home, where we can pressure him for NEWS!

Wednesday, November 10