Ut elk

Vitalwave · Apr 13, 2022

elkhunterUT said:
I just watched the Southern RAC meeting held yesterday and Mike Wardle shared additional info on the Beaver unit elk flight from this year. Here are the details as food for thought:

Beaver Unit Herd objective = 1,050
Actual Herd Estimate = 860
Elk observed on flight = 644
# of Cows/Calves = 350
# of Bulls = 294 (sightability issues for some bulls would put this # closer to 350)
Mature Bulls = 70%

So assuming there are 350 total bulls on the Beaver unit given the sightability issues, 245 of those are mature bulls (5 point or bigger). If you give 51 tags total which is what is being recommended for 2022, lets assume a 75% success rate across all hunts (probably high). That means ONLY 38 bulls are being harvested. I won't share my opinion since it offends some here, but the conclusion is pretty clear.

The other issue at play here on these units where there is not a lot of harvest is that the elk population is aging overall and with that age comes reductions in productivity. These units are headed for a nose dive. Units like the Wasatch and Manti where there is much higher harvest #'s, have a younger overall population and seem to be doing well producing elk to keep up with higher harvest.

This is ACTUAL data-do with it what you will

This is great info! Thanks for sharing. I was looking for more recent info.

Vitalwave · Apr 13, 2022

roadrunner said:
No, an uncontrolled OTC unit is not the same as increasing tags in an LE by 10% or even 20%. Never said make an LE unit an OTC unit.

It's a no brainer though that if you greatly limit or even shut down hunting for a while, any unit will improve...

Right, I wasn’t saying make the the limited entry units OTC I was just using the uintas as an example of what too many tags in a given area feels like.

slamdunk · Apr 13, 2022

roadrunner said:
No, an uncontrolled OTC unit is not the same as increasing tags in an LE by 10% or even 20%. Never said make an LE unit an OTC unit.

It's a no brainer though that if you greatly limit or even shut down hunting for a while, any unit will improve...

Wouldn't the only "improvement" be the number of bulls that WOULD have been harvested?
Bulls don't improve herd sizes, cows having calves do.

roadrunner · Apr 13, 2022

slamdunk said:
Wouldn't the only "improvement" be the number of bulls that WOULD have been harvested?
Bulls don't improve herd sizes, cows having calves do.

But without bulls...nature doesn't follow the twisted philosophy of gender confusion.

slamdunk · Apr 13, 2022

roadrunner said:
But without bulls...nature doesn't follow the twisted philosophy of gender confusion.

I have to disagree.
Elk are no different than deer and we've had this discussion about deer herds for the past couple months.
Removing MALES doesn't hurt the herd.
One MALE can still service the same amount of females as four males can.

We are talking about "excess bulls", not "herds".

Shutting down a unit only saves those bulls that would have otherwise been harvested by hunters, the cows would still be bred by the remaining bulls.

You're only creating more bulls when closing a unit, which brings us right to where we are on LE units...."bull heavy".

roadrunner · Apr 14, 2022

slamdunk said:
I have to disagree.
Elk are no different than deer and we've had this discussion about deer herds for the past couple months.
Removing MALES doesn't hurt the herd.
One MALE can still service the same amount of females as four males can.

We are talking about "excess bulls", not "herds".

Shutting down a unit only saves those bulls that would have otherwise been harvested by hunters, the cows would still be bred by the remaining bulls.

You're only creating more bulls when closing a unit, which brings us right to where we are on LE units...."bull heavy".

So, you're saying a cow (or doe) can have a calf (or fawn) without a bull (or buck) somewhere in the mix?

Also, that is an exaggeration to say one MALE can service the same amount of females as four males can because a male can't be everywhere at once...

slamdunk · Apr 14, 2022

roadrunner said:
So, you're saying a cow (or doe) can have a calf (or fawn) without a bull (or buck) somewhere in the mix?

Also, that is an exaggeration to say one MALE can service the same amount of females as four males can because a male can't be everywhere at once...

Where are we short on bull to cow ratio in any unit?
There is a reason for objectives.
You simply don't need 4 bulls in a herd to service 10 cows (average individual herd size).

roadrunner · Apr 14, 2022

slamdunk said:
Where are we short on bull to cow ratio in any unit?
There is a reason for objectives.
You simply don't need 4 bulls in a herd to service 10 cows (average individual herd size).

I had to go back and reread what you even posted/asked. The improvement will be the number of bulls that WILL be harvested, and bulls do make a difference to herd health.

You increase the genetic sample size, you improve the herd's health.

I know that NOBODY cares about other states in this forum audience, until you need to buy a NR tag to go hunting to keep things as they are. I have seen first hand what happens when you greatly reduce the genetic contribution to herd strength. When you only focus on shooting a "monster", you will reduce genetic diversity by culling out the best contributors which has a direct impact on herd strength and health.

JakeH · Apr 14, 2022

roadrunner said:
I had to go back and reread what you even posted/asked. The improvement will be the number of bulls that WILL be harvested, and bulls do make a difference to herd health.

You increase the genetic sample size, you improve the herd's health.

I know that NOBODY cares about other states in this forum audience, until you need to buy a NR tag to go hunting to keep things as they are. I have seen first hand what happens when you greatly reduce the genetic contribution to herd strength. When you only focus on shooting a "monster", you will reduce genetic diversity by culling out the best contributors which has a direct impact on herd strength and health.

(I have seen first hand what happens when you greatly reduce the genetic contribution to herd strength. When you only focus on shooting a "monster", you will reduce genetic diversity by culling out the best contributors which has a direct impact on herd )

This line is a prime example of why more focus should be applied to the archery hunts to target the excess bulls on a unit. Most archery hunters are going to be far less picky when it comes to genetic quality, a big mean mature 300-330 bull thats never gonna get bigger (which I bet makes up the majority of bulls) will get an arrows almost every time.

Where a rifle hunter has a higher likelihood of passing those bulls until later in the hunt.

slamdunk · Apr 14, 2022

roadrunner said:
I had to go back and reread what you even posted/asked. The improvement will be the number of bulls that WILL be harvested, and bulls do make a difference to herd health.

You increase the genetic sample size, you improve the herd's health.

I know that NOBODY cares about other states in this forum audience, until you need to buy a NR tag to go hunting to keep things as they are. I have seen first hand what happens when you greatly reduce the genetic contribution to herd strength. When you only focus on shooting a "monster", you will reduce genetic diversity by culling out the best contributors which has a direct impact on herd strength and health.

I can agree with several of the points here, especially the "opportunities".

But.....on killing "monsters" those aren't necessarily the only contributors to genetics.
A young breeding bull can still pass on some awesome genetics if they are in his blood that just can't be seen yet due to his age and he doesn't show it yet.

roadrunner · Apr 14, 2022

slamdunk said:
A young breeding bull can still pass on some awesome genetics if they are in his blood that just can't be seen yet due to his age and he doesn't show it yet.

But only for a limited amount of time. Those good and dominate genetics only are in play for a few short years. Overtime as you remove too many of them, those better genetics begin to mix with sub-par or recessive genetics and you start to see narrow beam and tine bulls and massively large two point and three point muley bucks.

Again, have seen it first hand. It's taken about 15 years, but it's there now staring everyone in the face trying to figure out what happened...

slamdunk · Apr 14, 2022

roadrunner said:
But only for a limited amount of time. Those good and dominate genetics only are in play for a few short years. Overtime as you remove too many of them, those better genetics begin to mix with sub-par or recessive genetics and you start to see narrow beam and tine bulls and massively large two point and three point muley bucks.

Again, have seen it first hand. It's taken about 15 years, but it's there now staring everyone in the face trying to figure out what happened...

How are you determining this?
Not meaning to pick on the question but all you are associating genetics to are bulls.
We don't know what cows can throw a fantastic genetic trate to a calf, but that IS fact.

roadrunner · Apr 14, 2022

slamdunk said:
How are you determining this?
Not meaning to pick on the question but all you are associating genetics to are bulls.
We don't know what cows can throw a fantastic genetic trate to a calf, but that IS fact.

Here's another fact, a cow can have a recessive and dominate gene. A bull can have two recessive genes. The calf can have a 50% chance at two recessive genes and a 50% chance of a dominate and a recessive gene. Any combination is less than ideal.

A cow can have two dominate genes and the bull a dominate and a recessive. The calf will be 50/50 on dominate/dominate or dominate/recessive. Half the outcomes are less than ideal.

You can reverse the dominate/recessive combo to bulls instead of cows, but it still takes a male and female, so yes, absolutely bulls contribute to herd health. Too many recessive bulls running around because the dominate bulls have picked off and you begin to suffer in quality and health.

We have dozens of breeds of dogs, horses, etc by looking for specific dominate genes and encouraging those characteristics through selective breeding. I'm not making this stuff up...

schoolhousegrizz · Apr 17, 2022

JakeH said:
this right here, why is it only 8% because the best dates to hunt are for the rifle season. You put an archery season the same dates as the rifle hunt now and I guarantee that 8% will increase substantially.

Especially if you change the dates on the rifle season.

BrowningRage · Apr 18, 2022

These discussions are very near to the question "how do we fix Social Security?"... Modern ideas to fix an idea that once seemed so good, but after decades we realize its unsustainable.

If I had my 'drothers'- I'd do everything I could to reduce animal deaths that have nothing to do with sportsmen. As is mentioned so often: drought, winter kill, predators, forage, etc... If we can target those, then look at reducing hunting opportunity as the last resort, that'd be my plan.

Dryfly · May 4, 2022

Elkslayer2015 said:
We better start coming up with some ideas for the Elk committee.
Structure is what needs to be in place.

This is my opinion for LE ELK/GS ELK

Archery gets split up into 2 - 15 day seasons.

September 1-15 early season archery for deer/elk state wide.

September 15-30 late season archery for deer/elk state wide.

September 15-24 Muzzleloader (this will overlap the Archery) LE/Elk/LE Deer.

October 1 -5 LE/GS 1st season rifle starts run it for 5 days.

October 10-15 LE/GS 2 season rifle hunt/spike hunt starts.

October 20-25 LE/GS 3 season rifle hunt starts/this will be running during the LE/LE deer/GS rifle deer hunt.

November add a LE/GS HAMS hunt for 9 days. The success will be extremely lower on this hunt.

Success will drop and we will be able to issue more tags. The key thing is making it harder.

GS Elk has Low success. because It's harder.

As a 60 year old life long Utah bow-hunter...I have zero desire to bow hunt with guys muzzle-loader hunting at the same time. Asinine idea. It would for sure lower the success rate of archery hunters, it may also get a couple of us shot.

How about this...if you weren't born and raised in Utah, you are out of luck, period. Problem solved. Those of us who have been paying into the system since long before there were even any draws, should always get some sort of preference. Out of state transplants...not so much.

redlegs11 · May 4, 2022

I couldn't agree with you more dryfly and I live in northern Cali

roadrunner · May 4, 2022

Dryfly said:
How about this...if you weren't born and raised in Utah, you are out of luck, period. Problem solved. Those of us who have been paying into the system since long before there were even any draws, should always get some sort of preference. Out of state transplants...not so much.

I agree. Utahns should stay in their own state to protect and fully exercise the use of its natural resources and residents of other states should use and protect theirs as well.

Including water and fuel. Afterall, we have to put up with environmental regulation and loss of habitat for it...

Steve Oz · May 5, 2022

D33RHNTR said:
There is far more than what is currently being utilized by our elk…

Imagine what we could do with eliminating public grazing and turning the wild horses into dog food as well

Feral horses. They are an invasive species that should be eliminated as such. “Wild” gives them way too much social credit.

D33RHNTR · May 5, 2022

Steve Oz said:
Feral horses. They are an invasive species that should be eliminated as such. “Wild” gives them way too much social credit.

Wild horses are no more special than a common carp. Both have completely destroyed entire ecosystems with their presence, yet the state and feds are willing to dump millions into the eradication of one of them annually, while they are dumping millions into the protection and preservation of another.

ColdBore · May 7, 2022

roadrunner said:
I agree. Utahns should stay in their own state to protect and fully exercise the use of its natural resources and residents of other states should use and protect theirs as well.

Including water and fuel. Afterall, we have to put up with environmental regulation and loss of habitat for it...

Funny how that works.

When guys start getting protective of "their" resources, they always forget about the consequences if others would do the same.

Dryfly · May 10, 2022

roadrunner said:
I agree. Utahns should stay in their own state to protect and fully exercise the use of its natural resources and residents of other states should use and protect theirs as well.

Including water and fuel. Afterall, we have to put up with environmental regulation and loss of habitat for it...

Works great for me. Water, power, food. If Utah were to run our state this way, we don't need anything from anyone. So. Cal may be screwed when we cut off the water we send them, as well as the electricity that comes from here. Every bit of gas that has ever been in my vehicle was refined in North SLC. Yours too most likely. We have extra power plants, I worked on building 3 of them. Water... if we cut the flow from the flaming gorge damn that goes to Ca. we would have far more than we need. We could do just fine and far better than most states.

roadrunner · May 10, 2022

Dryfly said:
Works great for me. Water, power, food. If Utah were to run our state this way, we don't need anything from anyone. So. Cal may be screwed when we cut off the water we send them, as well as the electricity that comes from here. Every bit of gas that has ever been in my vehicle was refined in North SLC. Yours too most likely. We have extra power plants, I worked on building 3 of them. Water... if we cut the flow from the flaming gorge damn that goes to Ca. we would have far more than we need. We could do just fine and far better than most states.

Just as long as UT can continue to produce the oil it needs

Cowkiller · May 10, 2022

Sure Flaming Gorge Dam is in Utah. You think the water behind it comes from Utah? Very little of it does.

If all states relied on their own natural water supplies, Utah would have less water than almost all other states.

elkassassin · May 10, 2022

You Don't Need To Wonder about That!

We Might need some More Refineries!

But We're Sitting on one of The Biggest Oil Reserves around!

roadrunner said:
Just as long as UT can continue to produce the oil it needs

elkassassin · May 10, 2022

There's Some Truth To That!

Driest I've Ever Seen It!

Cowkiller said:
Sure Flaming Gorge Dam is in Utah. You think the water behind it comes from Utah? Very little of it does.

If all states relied on their own natural water supplies, Utah would have less water than almost all other states.

roadrunner · May 10, 2022

elkassassin said:
You Don't Need To Wonder about That!

We Might need some More Refineries!

But We're Sitting on one of The Biggest Oil Reserves around!

Really?!?! Never knew the Uinta Basin or the Lisbon Valley area rivaled the Permian.

Unless you're talking about a hidden untapped reservoir.

JakeH · May 10, 2022

roadrunner said:
Really?!?! Never knew the Uinta Basin or the Lisbon Valley area rivaled the Permian.

Unless you're talking about a hidden untapped reservoir.

They are plenty big enough to run utahs needs and then some. And majority of it is untapped, don't know about it being hidden.

roadrunner · May 10, 2022

JakeH said:
They are plenty big enough to run utahs needs and then some. And majority of it is untapped, don't know about it being hidden.

Big enough even with the swelling population? I know exploratory work was done a few years ago and that acreage was crossed off.

Of course infrastructure is a limitation.

JakeH · May 10, 2022

roadrunner said:
Big enough even with the swelling population? I know exploratory work was done a few years ago and that acreage was crossed off.

Of course infrastructure is a limitation.

It's not as easy to access as the Permian stuff, but there is still alot of it. When oil prices are down its not as profitable. But if it's all we had to run on we could last a long damn time. And we got a butt load of Natrual Gas as well. Actually have several rigs up and running right now for gas with no plan to stop.

roadrunner · May 10, 2022

JakeH said:
It's not as easy to access as the Permian stuff, but there is still alot of it. When oil prices are down its not as profitable. But if it's all we had to run on we could last a long damn time. And we got a butt load of Natrual Gas as well. Actually have several rigs up and running right now for gas with no plan to stop.

UT is ranked 11th on the list for recoverable reserves. What has brought these numbers up, as well as for everyone else, are the increased tech and methods used for directional drilling and completion. This has made the Permian #1 and a close rival to the Saudi fields.

What was once "untapped" because of traditional downspacing limits the net accessible acreage can now be recovered. CO2 injection, as well, helps with enhanced oil recovery in mature fields such as Aneth in far SE Utah.

I digress, now back to UT elk.