Speaker 1: Welcome back to cutting the distance. Today's guest comes to
Speaker 1: us with a bunch of data, research and information on elk,
Speaker 1: their biology, and their behavior. I want to see how
Speaker 1: we may be able to take this information and use
Speaker 1: it to our benefit during hunting season. See what makes sense,
Speaker 1: what relates, what doesn't, and what you're seeing out there.
Speaker 1: So Brock McMillan comes to us with a PhD in biology.
Speaker 1: He was a professor professor of ecology at Minnesota State
Speaker 1: University for nine years prior to joining the faculty as
Speaker 1: Wildlife Ecologist at BYU for the past fifteen years. In
Speaker 1: addition to all of his professional experience, he is also
Speaker 1: an archery elkhunter, which I'm most excited about because we
Speaker 1: get to jump in and talk about some of the
Speaker 1: things that I've observed and if they have a biological
Speaker 1: reasoning as well as what he's observed and maybe how
Speaker 1: they relate how they're differ I also hoped to dive
Speaker 1: into some of the research and see if it sheds
Speaker 1: a little light on why and how come those questions
Speaker 1: that I ask myself every September, and I find myself
Speaker 1: trying to answer those every fall. So welcome to the show. Brock.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much, Lisa.
Speaker 1: I appreciate having you here. I know you guys are
Speaker 1: just like everywhere across the West. You're in the thick
Speaker 1: a calving season. How's that going for you there in Utah?
Speaker 2: It's going great. We're right dead center. So yesterday we
Speaker 2: collared our middle calf, meaning that half of our elk
Speaker 2: that we have colored have given birth and half are
Speaker 2: still waiting to give birth. And so yesterday was the
Speaker 2: dead center day, gotcha.
Speaker 1: And that relates to timing, which we're definitely going to
Speaker 1: jump into here in a little bit, you know, timing
Speaker 1: of the rut and how that affects you know, drop
Speaker 1: dates and whatnot. I know, you know, being from Washington,
Speaker 1: we're up a little bit further north. I know they're
Speaker 1: just kind of I think there may be a little
Speaker 1: bit on the front end, and so we'll talk a
Speaker 1: little bit about that and how latitude may affect that
Speaker 1: may not affect it, in your opinion. I'm gonna actually
Speaker 1: gonna go over to eastern Washington and help capture calves
Speaker 1: here next week and then interview there biologists. So yeah,
Speaker 1: it's it's that time of year. Really thankful to have
Speaker 1: you here. So, like every podcast, we're going to start
Speaker 1: with some listener questions, and for this episode, I went
Speaker 1: to is it September Yet? It's a Facebook group, a
Speaker 1: bunch of diehard Archel hunters. They live for that month
Speaker 1: of September. So I'm excited to bring some of their
Speaker 1: questions to you here, Brock And the first one that
Speaker 1: we got from Dan Scalis from the from the is
Speaker 1: it September Yet?
Speaker 2: Group?
Speaker 1: In your opinion, how does the moon phase affect the
Speaker 1: rut and the elk behavior? You know, there's a lot
Speaker 1: of built up I'm gonna I'm gonna elaborate on that.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of talk about, you know, taking your
Speaker 1: vacation around moon phases, are taking it, you know, just
Speaker 1: on the backside of a full moon in your opinion
Speaker 1: or not even your opinion. What does the science or
Speaker 1: research say about full moon and how to affects the rut?
Speaker 2: Jason, I would love to be able to answer that question.
Speaker 2: I don't know, and that's a bad answer, But we
Speaker 2: have activity data right now from we've actually GPS colored
Speaker 2: about one thy seven hundred elk and so we know
Speaker 2: movement behavior for all of those animals and we're just
Speaker 2: analyzing right now the effect of time of day, season,
Speaker 2: moon phase. So I don't have a complete answer for that,
Speaker 2: but undoubtedly it has some effect.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm going to roll a little bit of my information,
Speaker 1: a little background on myself, Brock. You know, being an engineer,
Speaker 1: I'm very data driven. It's why I like talking to
Speaker 1: biologists because it's like, the data is what the data is.
Speaker 1: You can read it and interpolate it however you want.
Speaker 1: But one year, we set out a trail camera one
Speaker 1: a one month cycle. We set out on October first
Speaker 1: and we picked it up on September first. We then
Speaker 1: went through and categorized every picture we got of bowls,
Speaker 1: time of day, and what it related to the moon phase.
Speaker 1: And all we saw was a slight shift in timing
Speaker 1: when the moon was out, we would see those animals
Speaker 1: coming out a little bit later if the moon wasn't.
Speaker 1: And it didn't really seem to have an effect as
Speaker 1: much as you would think. It was just a slight
Speaker 1: a slight movement in time. Now that's you know, unscientific,
Speaker 1: it's just me looking at one trail camera and one location.
Speaker 1: But we did see, you know, the moon, whether it
Speaker 1: relates to the brightness or their visibility. We did see things,
Speaker 1: you know, leave earlier and come out later. I guess,
Speaker 1: you know, at water, and this was at a water source,
Speaker 1: so I need, I guess we need to preface that
Speaker 1: as well as I also went back and looked at
Speaker 1: you know, fifteen or twenty of my bowl kills that
Speaker 1: I could remember days and times and whatnot. And one
Speaker 1: thing that was actually contrary to what you hear. You
Speaker 1: know a lot of what said is you know, following
Speaker 1: a full moon is the best time to hunt, you know,
Speaker 1: off of a full moon, going into no moon is
Speaker 1: your best time to hunt. I'd actually killed the majoriy.
Speaker 1: I think fourteen out of twenty of those bulls. We're
Speaker 1: leading up to a full moon within that week of
Speaker 1: the full moon. And so not that it's good data,
Speaker 1: at least in my you know, circumstances, It didn't seem
Speaker 1: to matter that much, right.
Speaker 2: Jason so Well, The literature is the evidence that is
Speaker 2: in the literature suggests that photo period is what drives
Speaker 2: the hormone cycles on both male and female elk, and
Speaker 2: so there can be an effective moon phase, and we
Speaker 2: hope to be able to determine if there is an
Speaker 2: effective moon phase, but the primary driver is photo period.
Speaker 2: So as days under shortening, testosterone levels are increasing in
Speaker 2: the bulls and the follicle stimulating hormone in the females
Speaker 2: is leading them into estrus.
Speaker 1: Okay, yeah, we're gonna jump into that pretty heavy here
Speaker 1: in a little bit, so we'll talk about photo period.
Speaker 1: But this is really it's not non scientific. But I
Speaker 1: get asked a lot of times, if you only could
Speaker 1: take one week of vacation, when would you you hunt it.
Speaker 1: It's really what you're looking at the hunt, whether you
Speaker 1: want kind of that pre red action, whether you want
Speaker 1: to be in the middle of the bagling, whether you
Speaker 1: want to be on the post. But there's only so
Speaker 1: many days in September. So in my position where I
Speaker 1: can hunt a lot, I'm just hunting regardless of the
Speaker 1: moon phase. But I don't and this is all opinion based.
Speaker 1: I don't think it matters as much as we like
Speaker 1: to think. But but it's real, you know. It's just
Speaker 1: based on my experience when they're running.
Speaker 2: They're running, Jason, so I think that you're probably right there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Okay. Our second question comes in from Thorn Monday.
Speaker 1: Thorn Monday, excuse me, also from is it September yet
Speaker 1: during a colon? You have a bowl all riled up
Speaker 1: and the next thing that bowl rounds up his cows
Speaker 1: and leaves. Is there is there biology involved there. We're
Speaker 1: going to get deep into the coaling elk here in
Speaker 1: a little bit, but I wanted to throw this question
Speaker 1: up front. Yeah, and I guess there may not be
Speaker 1: enough information. You know, Winding, did you get too close
Speaker 1: or did that bowl feel threatened? But can you explain
Speaker 1: that that scenario out in the field and what you
Speaker 1: think maybe going through that bull's head that was involved
Speaker 1: in the call in and willing to communicate with you
Speaker 1: and then all of a sudden stops the communication.
Speaker 2: I don't have a biological explanation with that. I've had
Speaker 2: that exact same experience several times. And maybe Jason, you're
Speaker 2: a better color than I am, but my guess is
Speaker 2: you've had that situation as well. I think every bull
Speaker 2: has a different personality, and actually there's been some personality
Speaker 2: work done lately, and that's true. They have different personalities.
Speaker 2: Some are much more likely to take risks than others.
Speaker 2: So I think that I don't know if you can
Speaker 2: get too close, if they don't smell you. My experience,
Speaker 2: and I don't know Jason be different. I go in
Speaker 2: hard until I get pretty close, and then I try
Speaker 2: to be quiet because Elkern amazing. You know that in
Speaker 2: the woods, there's no reason to be timid getting close.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, I'm in that same boat. I feel, you know,
Speaker 1: Number one, they don't smell you. Number two, you know
Speaker 1: you obviously don't want to let them see you secondary,
Speaker 1: but it's not as it's not as important as is
Speaker 1: being scented. But I'm the same way. As long as
Speaker 1: you're not gonna get picked off, getting as close as
Speaker 1: possible has always been my game plan. I vegetation and
Speaker 1: terrain allow it. I'm gonna I'm gonna get real, real tight.
Speaker 1: Because we all know and and maybe elaborate on that
Speaker 1: question why he rounds his bull or why that bull
Speaker 1: rounds his cows up and leaves, it's it's that it's
Speaker 1: that threat of losing it, losing his cows. You know,
Speaker 1: These these bulls are out there with the sole purpose
Speaker 1: to live and then recreate, you know, And and they've
Speaker 1: got there for sure. Thing if a bull starts to
Speaker 1: put pressure on them, or you do get too close
Speaker 1: and his personality is such that he'd rather retain his
Speaker 1: cows and not risk fighting. A new bullet showed up
Speaker 1: for him, of course he's going to go the other way.
Speaker 1: And and we talked about it on this podcast before,
Speaker 1: and I've talked about it in some of my calling strategy.
Speaker 1: Is this is why I sometimes start with different levels
Speaker 1: of threat, like what a cow call have necessarily forced
Speaker 1: him to leave right away? Or you know, and don't
Speaker 1: get me wrong, I'm a heavy bugler, but you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's sometimes tough to figure out why that bull
Speaker 1: just just rounds up and leaves at a certain point
Speaker 1: during the call in. We may not know, and it.
Speaker 2: Mind change during the rut, because you know, bulls may
Speaker 2: lose thirty percent of their body masks. They may be
Speaker 2: losing three hundred pounds during the rut when they're not
Speaker 2: eating and they're fighting all the time. So early in
Speaker 2: the rut, the dominant bull's there and he's saying, I'm
Speaker 2: willing to fight anybody. But ten days later he may say,
Speaker 2: I'm out of energy and I'm going to avoid any
Speaker 2: conflict that I can.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a lot less energy expended to round his
Speaker 1: cows up and leave versus dealing with a you know,
Speaker 1: another mature bull. Okay, this one, And I apologize ahead
Speaker 1: of time, Brock. These were the four questions I pulled
Speaker 1: his user questions, so I didn't let you you kind
Speaker 1: of review them, and I don't know if you'll have
Speaker 1: an answer or not. But does so in the West,
Speaker 1: we deal in Elk Country, we deal with a lot
Speaker 1: of fire conditions, especially into September and especially as of late.
Speaker 1: Is there any indication that smoky air, poor air quality
Speaker 1: affects running bulls at all? Or is it strictly based
Speaker 1: on photo period.
Speaker 2: I don't think anybody studied that, but I can't imagine
Speaker 2: there's an effect.
Speaker 1: Okay, yeah, I'm I'm in that same boat, aside from
Speaker 1: the effect that has on me trying to breathe and
Speaker 1: you know, get around a little bit. Yeah, okay. And
Speaker 1: that was from Marshall Buyer in there on is it
Speaker 1: September yet? And then you may have some insight to
Speaker 1: this when this is a little more technical question comes
Speaker 1: from Michael Cummings from is it September yet? What does
Speaker 1: a science say about shooting bulls versus cows for the
Speaker 1: health of the herd? And I'm going to elaborate on
Speaker 1: this question a little bit. Is sometimes you see areas
Speaker 1: where herds are really i would say performing poorlion area,
Speaker 1: or they're they're not meeting objectives, and then you get
Speaker 1: frustrated with the Fish and Wildlife Commission or the you
Speaker 1: know whoever it may be, that we're, dang it, we're
Speaker 1: giving two bull takes out, but yet we still have
Speaker 1: fifty cow takes in the unit. I'm gonna I'm gonna
Speaker 1: ask that from a hunter's perspective, what does what does
Speaker 1: in your opinion taking cows versus bulls, because and how
Speaker 1: does that negatively or in it, you know, adversely, affect
Speaker 1: it or does it in your opinion?
Speaker 2: So I hope this is something we get into because
Speaker 2: I think this is a really complex question. If you're
Speaker 2: a rancher, a cattle rancher, you don't want any bulls
Speaker 2: in your herd because every bull you put in the
Speaker 2: herd is is a lack of food for another cow
Speaker 2: to produce a calf. And I think it's generally the
Speaker 2: same for elk. You don't need very many bulls in
Speaker 2: the herd to service all the cows and to service
Speaker 2: them during their estress. I hear all the time. Well,
Speaker 2: if you don't have enough, they go into a second estress.
Speaker 2: We have no evidence of that whatsoever. Zero and so
Speaker 2: and so the more bulls that you remove from the herd,
Speaker 2: the more productive the herd's going to be. Now, there's
Speaker 2: less bulls to see when you're hunting if you do that,
Speaker 2: but the herd as a whole will be more productive.
Speaker 2: The other kicker is Jason, and this is a big
Speaker 2: one for us in Utah is as a population ages, say,
Speaker 2: for example, you are not removing cows, and the average
Speaker 2: age of the cow increases, the likelihood that that cow
Speaker 2: becomes pregnant goes down with age, and so as a
Speaker 2: herd ages as a whole, the productivity of that herd
Speaker 2: goes down. Regardless of how many are on the landscape.
Speaker 2: So there's a whole bunch of factors. If we have
Speaker 2: too many miles on the landscape, production is going to
Speaker 2: go down because nutrition drives whether whether a cow goes
Speaker 2: into estress or not. If she's not fat enough, she
Speaker 2: doesn't even go into estres and so pregnancy rates will
Speaker 2: be low. Same thing if the herd's getting old and
Speaker 2: see late, ray will be low and the herd just
Speaker 2: won't be as productive as it was during the growth
Speaker 2: phase for that herd. Does that make sense?
Speaker 1: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense, And we're going
Speaker 1: to jump into herd dynamics and a little bit bold
Speaker 1: of Cali ratio and some of that, and I've got
Speaker 1: I've got a lot more questions we can expand on this, like, well,
Speaker 1: what's a good management tool to make sure you're only
Speaker 1: taking those those older cols or how do you determine that?
Speaker 1: So I've got some questions from a hunter's perspective like
Speaker 1: and a game manager's perspective like how do you even
Speaker 1: manage that for the optimal hurt health? But we'll jump
Speaker 1: into that. So No, I appreciate you answering that question,
Speaker 1: and I'll kind of wrap up our listener questions today,
Speaker 1: Brock And once again, if you have questions of your
Speaker 1: own you'd like me or my guests the experts to
Speaker 1: try to answer, feel free to email us at CTD
Speaker 1: at phelpsgame Calls dot com, or reach out to us
Speaker 1: on social and give us your questions and we'll try
Speaker 1: to include him here. So can't thank the guys over
Speaker 1: at is it September yet? Page enough for filling us
Speaker 1: up with some questions, and the ones I didn't get to,
Speaker 1: we're for sure going to get to in my conversation.
Speaker 1: So next up, we're going to jump into my discussion here, Brock.
Speaker 2: Excellent.
Speaker 1: So I'm all, like I mentioned earlier, I'm excited when
Speaker 1: I get to talk to biologists, researcher, scientists, people that
Speaker 1: have hard data to look at when and you know, I,
Speaker 1: I would say, I go out there as a guy
Speaker 1: that just learned by trial and error this works, just
Speaker 1: doesn't work. Maybe I have an opinion why or why
Speaker 1: it doesn't, but there's no data right besides it happening
Speaker 1: multiple times or not. And so very excited to talk
Speaker 1: to you today, Brock and kind of run some scenarios, questions, issues,
Speaker 1: whatever it may be by you to see if you
Speaker 1: know what the what the science supports. I know we
Speaker 1: had a great conversation a week ago, and I got
Speaker 1: excited about some of the things you had talked about about,
Speaker 1: like cows coming into Estrus, why you you know adjacent
Speaker 1: units are doing good. So really excited to jump in here.
Speaker 1: So I'm gonna I'm gonna break this all the way
Speaker 1: down to the foundation, and I don't feel that any
Speaker 1: of this is below elk hunters. But let's start with
Speaker 1: the elkra in general. I want to build this whole
Speaker 1: conversation off that foundation. Can you just go into the
Speaker 1: generalities of the elkred as far as timing, you know,
Speaker 1: bulls going to cows, cows going to bulls, like, as
Speaker 1: far as the bulls run the herd for that amount
Speaker 1: of time, or do the lead cows run the run
Speaker 1: the herd?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 1: Just give us a five minute snapshot of the elk
Speaker 1: rat and what's taking place.
Speaker 2: So I think the el elkra is dictit yeh, I'm sorry,
Speaker 2: is dictated by patrician is get dictated by birth. So
Speaker 2: what's driving when the rut is is that that calf
Speaker 2: has maximum new pretrition when it has maximum need, and
Speaker 2: so the female the maximum energetic requirement is just prior
Speaker 2: to weaning that calf. So the female gives birth like
Speaker 2: right now the first of June, and for the next
Speaker 2: three or four or sometimes six or seven months she's
Speaker 2: nursing that young although she starts to wean in two
Speaker 2: to three months, so she needs maximum food on the
Speaker 2: ground in two to three months from right now to
Speaker 2: help that calf grow as much as possible, and so
Speaker 2: that dictates when the calf is born, and that's the
Speaker 2: evolutionary force is going to drive that date. And then
Speaker 2: gestation is two hundred and forty to two hundred and
Speaker 2: fifty days, and so the rut has to happen two
Speaker 2: hundred and forty to two hundred and fifty days before
Speaker 2: that date for everything to be optimal. And so I
Speaker 2: think that's what's driving when the rut happens. So if today,
Speaker 2: which it is the peak of partrition on the unit
Speaker 2: we're studying right now, were the peak Partrician, then like
Speaker 2: the twenty fourth of September should have been the peak
Speaker 2: of rut this last year.
Speaker 1: Do you feel that those those two hundred and forty
Speaker 1: days is that variable amongst units or is it kind
Speaker 1: of pre programmed, like you said, into that evolutionary data,
Speaker 1: or is it two hundred and fifty days for a
Speaker 1: certain unit and two hundred and thirty days for a
Speaker 1: different unit.
Speaker 2: That's a great question. All we know about the gestation
Speaker 2: is from captive ELK, and what we know in captive
Speaker 2: ELK is gestation can vary from about two hundred and
Speaker 2: forty to two hundred and sixty two days. I don't
Speaker 2: think there's near that much variation. Those are the extremes.
Speaker 2: I think that in general it varies from two hundred
Speaker 2: and forty five to two hundred and fifty days. And
Speaker 2: like humans, it's not everybody is exactly nine months. Some
Speaker 2: come a couple of days shorter, some cold a couple
Speaker 2: of days longer, in my case a week longer. And
Speaker 2: I was eleven pounds that kind of thing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, so let me I don't want to to
Speaker 1: miss interpret your your numbers, but you're saying that it's
Speaker 1: a fairly tight range. Because if you're saying only twenty
Speaker 1: two days is the extreme ranges of the envelope, does
Speaker 1: that mean all these elk or all these cows are
Speaker 1: being bred within a very very short time window. Or
Speaker 1: I mean, because we've all been out there, right, and
Speaker 1: so we've heard bols, bigel and you know, end of
Speaker 1: August all the way to the beginning of October, larger
Speaker 1: herds seem to take longer. Are those all is that
Speaker 1: red activity happening outside of the breeding or or is
Speaker 1: it are those like anomalies or outliers Why that bull stays,
Speaker 1: you know, kind of active and those cows are entering
Speaker 1: estrius those kind of off times outside of that twenty
Speaker 1: two day window you kind of just mentioned.
Speaker 2: So so the twenty two day window is the gestation.
Speaker 2: So that doesn't go oh, gotcha, gotcha. Yeah, that doesn't
Speaker 2: dictate how long the red is because it we don't
Speaker 2: have hard data yet. But what we think is happening
Speaker 2: is a cow has to reach a certain condition level
Speaker 2: before she can go into estress, and so healthy fat
Speaker 2: cows come into estress earlier than poor condition cows, if
Speaker 2: the poor condition cow comes into estress at all. And
Speaker 2: so we had our first birth, Jason, nine days ago
Speaker 2: now and we're already in the middle. But my guess
Speaker 2: is that partrition our birthing will tell all the way
Speaker 2: towards the end of June. And so yeah, absolutely, the
Speaker 2: rout may start nine days before September twenty fourth start
Speaker 2: going really good. So we're sitting at about September fifteenth
Speaker 2: for these units here, and the majority of all the
Speaker 2: animals are going to be bred by October fifth, but
Speaker 2: there are some that were poor conditions that are still
Speaker 2: trying to get to sufficient condition to go into estress,
Speaker 2: and so it may lag. The rut may lag all
Speaker 2: the way into the middle or even to the end
Speaker 2: of October for those few straggler cows that are still
Speaker 2: trying to get enough fat on their bones.
Speaker 1: So I'm just trying to reduce this data to areas
Speaker 1: i've hunted. So if you're in, let's say, a unit
Speaker 1: that doesn't have necessarily the best winning ground and so
Speaker 1: those cows go back into spring and summer in poorer condition,
Speaker 1: is that where you may see that rut going longer
Speaker 1: just because it's taking them a little bit more. Their
Speaker 1: health doesn't is good, and so you may see that
Speaker 1: rut go longer in those more mountainous units Versus if
Speaker 1: you're in a low lying unit that has easy winners,
Speaker 1: you may see them all come in like you said,
Speaker 1: middle of September and hit all at the same time,
Speaker 1: where you get a high percentage of your cows all
Speaker 1: at once, versus you know, different levels or a spread
Speaker 1: out array of health.
Speaker 2: So that's a great question, and I don't know one
Speaker 2: hundred percent of the answer. If I draw on deer
Speaker 2: data so that they're a little different than elk, summer
Speaker 2: habitat is way more important than winter habitat, And I
Speaker 2: think it's true for elk too, unless they're feeding on
Speaker 2: somebody'sself off al filled or haystack. And so what they
Speaker 2: come out of winter in condition is dictated by the
Speaker 2: condition they go into winter, and so what they have
Speaker 2: to eat in the summer dictates more about it estross
Speaker 2: than how mild the winters are where they're living, gotcha.
Speaker 1: So they can they can overcome that hard winter through
Speaker 1: their their feed and hell through you know, late spring summer,
Speaker 1: and then that will get them back to kicking their
Speaker 1: estress off at the right time.
Speaker 2: Right because because their their condition is September is dictating
Speaker 2: what is happening, and so they have the ability to
Speaker 2: overcome anything that happened in winter. Every elk on the
Speaker 2: landscape in an area that has real winters basically is
Speaker 2: burnt through all of their energy reserves by the end
Speaker 2: of winter, and and they're running on fumes, especially true
Speaker 2: for deer, but elk two they're running on fumes by
Speaker 2: by April. Gotcha.
Speaker 1: Okay, Yeah, I think that that's a great, great conversation,
Speaker 1: and I'm sure there's a little little side pieces we
Speaker 1: could pick at there or there for a long time.
Speaker 1: So during that rut, in your opinion, you know, at
Speaker 1: least in my area up in the mountains, you know,
Speaker 1: the bulls like to hang out together through July most August,
Speaker 1: and then towards the end of August. In the middle
Speaker 1: of August, we can start to see these bulls split
Speaker 1: up and the cows have hung out by themselves, maybe
Speaker 1: some immature bulls. And you're is there or data that
Speaker 1: supports the bulls going to the cows or the cows
Speaker 1: going to the bulls. As you know, let's say you're
Speaker 1: running trail cameras and you've got all these pictures of
Speaker 1: bulls and they disappear. Should I go to the nearest
Speaker 1: location of cows or what what's going on there during
Speaker 1: the rut?
Speaker 2: So so, we have about seven years of data on
Speaker 2: this question. We haven't looked at it pecifically the way
Speaker 2: you're asking here, but it appears that when bulls lose
Speaker 2: the velvet, they start heading for traditional running grounds, and
Speaker 2: the cows do too, and so they have areas that
Speaker 2: they meet and it may be very different than where
Speaker 2: they've spent the whole summer, either of them. If that
Speaker 2: makes sense.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I would say, just in my observation, the cows
Speaker 1: seem to be closer to that running area, because it
Speaker 1: always seems like my bulls will up and leave, you know,
Speaker 1: go a mile in a direction. But I know that
Speaker 1: there was a majority of cows over there, and that's
Speaker 1: one of the reasons I always like when I'm scouting,
Speaker 1: not necessarily look for elk, not necessarily look for sign
Speaker 1: at the time, but like, where are the rubs? The
Speaker 1: rubs were like a great indicator of where they're running
Speaker 1: and where they're going to spend that September. But yeah,
Speaker 1: if they both move, I could see that. But I've
Speaker 1: always just assumed that the bulls are going to leave
Speaker 1: their location to go find the cows. But you're saying
Speaker 1: that there is some research or indication that those cows
Speaker 1: also may leave their area and go to like a
Speaker 1: neutral spot or a meetup spot.
Speaker 2: So the cow calf nursing grounds are often very similar
Speaker 2: to the running grounds, and so you're already going to
Speaker 2: find cows that are often but cows will move to
Speaker 2: those grounds as well.
Speaker 1: Gotcha. That wins up real well with what I've seen,
Speaker 1: and a lot of people get frustrated with only having
Speaker 1: cows on their cameras and like, well, unless you're looking
Speaker 1: for specific bulls like just hang out there, because I
Speaker 1: think those bulls will eventually show.
Speaker 2: In that area.
Speaker 1: They may just be hanging out in the secluded type
Speaker 1: basin or whatnot, or non visible.
Speaker 2: They may be three, four, ten miles away. We have
Speaker 2: some that move. I think we have one bull that
Speaker 2: I looked at in particular that went seventeen miles from
Speaker 2: like the twentieth of August to the tenth of September.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's amazing. You know, it does you no good
Speaker 1: to scout there, And that's why we always recommend scouting
Speaker 1: is absolutely close to your season as possible because things
Speaker 1: are going to change, you know, in addition to pressure
Speaker 1: on the landscape, you know, elk are just going to
Speaker 1: move regardless.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, and Utah archery season is like August fifteenth to
Speaker 2: September seventeenth. And the bulls that are there, you know
Speaker 2: as well as me, you scout them all summer and
Speaker 2: you go, I'm gonna start opening day this canyon and
Speaker 2: that's about the time they start losing velvet and there
Speaker 2: they may be there one or two days and then
Speaker 2: every one of them disappears from that canyon. You've scouted
Speaker 2: it all summer.
Speaker 1: Yep, we've got some good, good intel from guys that
Speaker 1: pay a lot of attention, like in Nevada. You know,
Speaker 1: they've got such an early season where he saw fifty
Speaker 1: plus mature bowls within a tight little pocket, and they're
Speaker 1: there so early that he said, as you see the
Speaker 1: rut like wind up. By time it was over, there
Speaker 1: were like two of those fifty bulls were left there
Speaker 1: or even in adjacent canyons. They just they all that
Speaker 1: was their spot to you know, sit in the velvet
Speaker 1: and eat the best green or whatever they had going.
Speaker 1: And then instantly the starts and they all filtered out
Speaker 1: of there, besides a couple of bulls. And so you know,
Speaker 1: we got some good data that those things just literally disappear.
Speaker 2: There's really good biological reasons for that, and it's been
Speaker 2: studied quite a bit. So cows of bulls have very
Speaker 2: different selective pressures. Cows are generally selecting habitat where they
Speaker 2: can feed their offspring, but also where their offspring are
Speaker 2: protected from predators, and bulls don't really worry about predators
Speaker 2: near as much, so they always go to the absolute
Speaker 2: best habitat that they confind to put on mass. And
Speaker 2: so because of those two different selective pressures they're offering
Speaker 2: separated in the summer.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna ask one more question here on just stuff
Speaker 1: that I want to know about the elkrat and what
Speaker 1: I've perceived. And the question is which elk runs the herd?
Speaker 1: Is it? Is it the bowl the herd bowl, or
Speaker 1: is it that lead cow? Or is it dual duty?
Speaker 1: Because in my opinion, i've seen like dual duty. But
Speaker 1: I'm going to listen to your answer and then maybe
Speaker 1: throwing some of my experience there.
Speaker 2: That's a great question, and I don't know the answer.
Speaker 2: I do know that when they're not together, it's that
Speaker 2: lead cow. Of course. In fact, we have we have cows.
Speaker 2: Their social structures pretty fluid, meaning that the groups that
Speaker 2: are living together. You may have these fifteen together today
Speaker 2: and four of them pick up and move over and
Speaker 2: join this group. And that's what I mean by fluid.
Speaker 2: They change who they're with regularly. And we have out
Speaker 2: the migrate in the winter, and where they migrate to
Speaker 2: is dictated by the lead cow. So I have we
Speaker 2: have cows we've been monitoring for five years and they
Speaker 2: go to a different place every single winter, and it's
Speaker 2: based on who they're with, and so I the a
Speaker 2: dope female is very or the matriarch, whoever, the dominant
Speaker 2: female in the group is the one that drives a
Speaker 2: lot of it. I'm not sure about males. I think
Speaker 2: it's got to be a combination because of that matriarchal
Speaker 2: lineage is so wrong.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And that's that's what I've seen, is it seems
Speaker 1: like as long as everything's going the way the bull
Speaker 1: wants it to, and he's not being pestered by satellite
Speaker 1: cows or he's not being pressured by people, hunters, predators,
Speaker 1: the lead cow kind of leads the herd back into
Speaker 1: their bedding area. She kind of leads them out to feed.
Speaker 1: She's the one that you know, gets up when it's
Speaker 1: time to leave bed and come back out to feed.
Speaker 1: And all of those what I would call just you know,
Speaker 1: the daily decisions that that herd is making and what
Speaker 1: they're going through with Now where I see the bull,
Speaker 1: there have been times where you know, he rounds his
Speaker 1: cows up and pushes them, you know, he gets force full,
Speaker 1: He uses you know, horns, uses his stature or whatever
Speaker 1: he needs to, and he will times force that herd
Speaker 1: to go where he wants them to, whether it's to
Speaker 1: escape danger, get him away from other bulls, whatever it
Speaker 1: may be. I've also seen like the bull push the
Speaker 1: cows off so that he can come back and either
Speaker 1: check out a bowl or confront a bowl that's pestering him.
Speaker 1: So I feel like it's a dual relationship. But I
Speaker 1: think if we weren't to interject, and if we weren't
Speaker 1: to spook the bowl or predators weren't, the lead cow
Speaker 1: is going to do the majority of the leading and
Speaker 1: that herd, even during the rut, until that bull feels
Speaker 1: pestered enough where there's a reason enough he wants to
Speaker 1: move those cows, he physically does.
Speaker 2: So I think that's generally true, that's supported by I mean,
Speaker 2: nobody's really looked at who's driving it that I know
Speaker 2: of anyway, nobody's really looked at who's driving their movement
Speaker 2: or their behavior during the rut. But during the rest
Speaker 2: of the year it's the lead cow, and I just
Speaker 2: I find it hard to think that that's how it
Speaker 2: goes for forty seven months of the year and then
Speaker 2: five months of the year bull comes in and takes over. Ultimately,
Speaker 2: ultimately the cow chooses to be with the bull or
Speaker 2: to let the bull there. I mean, yep, she's the
Speaker 2: final choice whether she's gonna mate with that bull or not.
Speaker 2: He may be the dominant bull and not let any
Speaker 2: of the bulls, but she only has to take one
Speaker 2: step if she doesn't want to make may with him. Yep, yep.
Speaker 1: No, that just some general questions about the Elkret kind
Speaker 1: of what I've thought. And so now we're going to
Speaker 1: run into rut timing, which is I botched the gestational
Speaker 1: period there in the last time. Now we're really talking
Speaker 1: about rut timing and when things start to get going,
Speaker 1: and a lot of it may be perceived. There may
Speaker 1: be people thinking the rut's going cranking at the end
Speaker 1: of August when we all know that's not happening, but
Speaker 1: they're here in Beagle, so they is perceived that the
Speaker 1: rut's you know, going at that time. So in my opinion,
Speaker 1: it's based on photo period. But I'm going to let
Speaker 1: you kind of jump in and and you kind of
Speaker 1: already answered this, I guess above when we're talking about
Speaker 1: you know, getting that cap on the around at the
Speaker 1: optimal time and then going backwards based on gestation from that.
Speaker 1: But in your opinion is that kicked off by photo period,
Speaker 1: which we you know, I think is a general consensus
Speaker 1: which lets them know that they're two hundred and fifty days,
Speaker 1: you know ahead, like that's their their their clock or
Speaker 1: what other factors affect kicking off the rut.
Speaker 2: So how it works JSON is is the evolutionary selective pressure.
Speaker 2: If the female gives birth at the right time of year,
Speaker 2: she's more likely to have an offspring survived, and if
Speaker 2: a female gives birth at the wrong time of year,
Speaker 2: she's less likely. And so if the successful female continues
Speaker 2: to be successful pretty soon that timing becomes the main
Speaker 2: timing because she's had all the calves and the ones
Speaker 2: at other times haven't. That's what drives that partriition timing,
Speaker 2: and that's what drives the timing of the rut. So
Speaker 2: it is. But but they don't say, oh, I need
Speaker 2: to give birth on June first, so I'm going to
Speaker 2: count back two hundred and fifty days. Of course they
Speaker 2: don't do that, So they've tied it to what's called
Speaker 2: a zite gaber that's zeit ge b e er, which
Speaker 2: is a German word that means timekeeper, and all animals
Speaker 2: you and I have an internal clock. You're younger than me,
Speaker 2: but I wake up every morning at like five minutes
Speaker 2: after six, and that's an internal clock in me. And
Speaker 2: that internal clock in mammals is regulated. In general, the
Speaker 2: primary thing that's regulated by is photo period. The zite
Speaker 2: gaber or the timekeeper or the clock setter is photo period.
Speaker 2: It can be resources, it can be a few other things,
Speaker 2: but the primary thing in mammals is photo period. And
Speaker 2: so that is what the brain is using to tell
Speaker 2: a bull elk and his testosterone levels should increase. And
Speaker 2: when his testosterol levels increase, that's when his antler's harden
Speaker 2: and he sheds the velvet, and that's when he starts
Speaker 2: into his test he's in large and he starts searching
Speaker 2: for potential mates. And so yeah, it absolutely can happen
Speaker 2: at the end of August that he starts searching for
Speaker 2: potential mates when there's none available.
Speaker 1: Gotcha. And then to wind it back a little bit,
Speaker 1: we talked about cows and their health affecting that are
Speaker 1: the cows they know by based on I'm not going
Speaker 1: to even try to resay the word you did it
Speaker 1: sound like lightsaber.
Speaker 2: Light?
Speaker 1: There you go, there you go there. The elks lightsaber,
Speaker 1: So if you were to look at that, they know
Speaker 1: they need to you know, based on that, which is
Speaker 1: a lot to do with photo period and the light
Speaker 1: that they're getting. They know they need to try to
Speaker 1: be you know, two hundred and forty to two hundred
Speaker 1: and fifty days ahead. But then their health also affects that,
Speaker 1: so right, so it's a little bit of a balance,
Speaker 1: like they know they need to come in now, but
Speaker 1: it may take five, ten, fifteen, twenty days based on
Speaker 1: them getting their health to a certain point. So they're
Speaker 1: just constantly trying to their bodies telling them too, but
Speaker 1: they just can't. Is that how that works?
Speaker 2: So yes, yes, and no, so they don't ever make
Speaker 2: a conscious decision. Evolution has dictated that when days are
Speaker 2: this long, that's the optimal time to go into estress,
Speaker 2: and so or actually, when nights are this long, uninterrupted
Speaker 2: darkness is what really regulates it. So when nights are
Speaker 2: this long, that's what the optimal time to go into estress.
Speaker 2: But if a female carried a calf the whole summer,
Speaker 2: or she nursed a calf the whole summer, she's still
Speaker 2: trying to recover and so she may be delayed if
Speaker 2: she was successful in raising a calf. Same thing. If
Speaker 2: you're living in a marginal habitat and you had to
Speaker 2: really severe winner and you had a calf, you're going
Speaker 2: to be delayed a little bit. If you're older, you're
Speaker 2: always in poorer condition, and maybe it delayed a little bit.
Speaker 2: So evolution is dictated the optimal, but there's a lot
Speaker 2: of other forces pushing them off the optimal.
Speaker 1: Gotcha that makes that makes a lot of sense there
Speaker 1: in your opinion, And I know we see it a
Speaker 1: lot more drastic in the deer population. But is the
Speaker 1: rut timing based you know, we've already talked about it
Speaker 1: being based on photo period, Which does that coordinate directly
Speaker 1: with latitude or does latitude itself have anything to do
Speaker 1: with that aside from the days being shorter or longer
Speaker 1: than you know, a different latitude.
Speaker 2: Sure, we we don't have a strong analysis on the
Speaker 2: effect of latitude for ELK, although we've just developed a
Speaker 2: mathematical model where we can look at timing of partration
Speaker 2: based on movement patterns and so we can look at that.
Speaker 2: But definitely in deer, uh, there is a strong Latin
Speaker 2: latitudinal effect. So you would expect it to be similar
Speaker 2: in Elk as well, and that is as you go north,
Speaker 2: the rut becomes earlier, which I have a little counterintuitive maybe
Speaker 2: for some people.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and and I mean it's very noticeable and deer
Speaker 1: you know, I was down in Mexico Cus deer hunting
Speaker 1: this year in the end of January, and the Cus
Speaker 1: deer were, you know, going crazy down there still, you know,
Speaker 1: or I like the Arizona over the counter archery taking
Speaker 1: meal deer rutting into December through the middle of January,
Speaker 1: and our ruts, you know, two months gone. But it
Speaker 1: doesn't It seems like I can go down to New
Speaker 1: Mexico and Elk hunt and the ruts the same same,
Speaker 1: you know, about the same spot as they are up
Speaker 1: here in Washington. Maybe a few days either way. But
Speaker 1: I was I've always been curious if there's anything that
Speaker 1: supports that latitude difference like it does on the deer side.
Speaker 2: So yeah, I don't know. Have me back next year
Speaker 2: and I should be able to answer that question more completely.
Speaker 2: Even in Utah, from northern part of the state to
Speaker 2: the southern part of the state, there's a full two
Speaker 2: weeks difference in deer yep. With the northern part of
Speaker 2: the state, peak partraition is about June fifth for deer,
Speaker 2: and in the southern part of the state it's like
Speaker 2: June twenty third, June twenty second, So you bacnate from that,
Speaker 2: and so that I mean, that's that's a huge difference latitudinal.
Speaker 2: I would expect there's some of that in elk, but
Speaker 2: I don't know for sure.
Speaker 1: Yeah, to wrap up rut timing, are there any other
Speaker 1: factors that are you know, that correlate high enough that
Speaker 1: that's worth talking about. Is it really just based on
Speaker 1: that photo period and in the length of the night?
Speaker 2: No. I think the one factor that that we haven't
Speaker 2: touched on maybe enough. We have a pretty popular unit
Speaker 2: in Utah. It's called the Book Cliffs. It's a really
Speaker 2: it's a limited entry deer unit, and it's a limited
Speaker 2: entry elk unit, and it's what I would call summer
Speaker 2: range limited habitat and get in effect, it's marginal habitat.
Speaker 2: There's just not a lot of summer range for elk,
Speaker 2: and in dry years, elk are in relatively poor condition,
Speaker 2: and only in the best of best years are they
Speaker 2: in good condition. But the cool thing if if the
Speaker 2: herd in general is in poor condition, the rut will
Speaker 2: be much more spread out, and if the herd is
Speaker 2: in really good condition, the rut will be much more punctuated.
Speaker 1: Does that make sense, Yeah, yeah, so that the the
Speaker 1: elk don't have to spread out to find resources and
Speaker 1: find food and you know, and spread out the cows.
Speaker 1: They're they're all able to kind of be in that
Speaker 1: prime prime area.
Speaker 2: That but I think it's because they're all in good
Speaker 2: enough condition to come into astris at the optimal date,
Speaker 2: whereas in poor condition, they're just they're just straggling in
Speaker 2: getting to that critical condition they need to go into estrs.
Speaker 2: And so let me give you an example. One year,
Speaker 2: we had forty forty bursts that we were monitoring, and
Speaker 2: all forty of those bursts occurred I believe between May
Speaker 2: twenty fifth and like June twenty ninth, and the next
Speaker 2: year bursts started on May fifteenth, and they all they
Speaker 2: went all the way into the middle of July. They
Speaker 2: were spread out over two full months, and that they
Speaker 2: were in really bad condition the previous rut season. And
Speaker 2: so I just think that it can be spread out
Speaker 2: a lot more in herds that are old or in
Speaker 2: herds that are living in marginal habitat.
Speaker 1: That makes sense. Not that I would necessarily apply for
Speaker 1: units around that that idea, but it's it's great to
Speaker 1: note that it does exist. And you know, you know,
Speaker 1: if you if you had an October season that went
Speaker 1: into some of these marginal units, you may still hit
Speaker 1: the rut. You know, I wouldn't say in the peak,
Speaker 1: but more in the height versus if you were in
Speaker 1: a unit that has great summer habitat, the rut is
Speaker 1: over earlier. And now that we're talking about this, really
Speaker 1: nobody ever believes me when I talk about Southwest Washington.
Speaker 1: We set our muzzle atter season on the first Saturday
Speaker 1: of October. Our rut is. You can literally slam the
Speaker 1: door on our rut for the most part by the
Speaker 1: end of like the end of September, first of October.
Speaker 1: And it's because we're in a rainforest, right. These elk
Speaker 1: don't migrate their local herds. They've got all the food
Speaker 1: in the world with clearcuts and all the greenage around here.
Speaker 1: But yet I firmly believe our rut is dang near
Speaker 1: over on October first, Versus you go up in the
Speaker 1: mountains or if I go, I'm like, man, the rut
Speaker 1: goes so much longer out of state, you know, and
Speaker 1: these other units are up in the mountains, and so
Speaker 1: that really correlates with what I've seen on the ground
Speaker 1: versus what I've seen in my backyard.
Speaker 2: That's interesting. That's I mean, I I dare hunt usually
Speaker 2: the third week of October, and the rut is regularly
Speaker 2: still going at least dragglers in our mountains of Utah.
Speaker 1: Yep, yeah, I mean I called a bull my wife's
Speaker 1: first bowl. I called in on October twenty ninth, called
Speaker 1: it in. And but it was in the mountains, you know,
Speaker 1: central mountains, the east slope of the Cascade Mountains, and
Speaker 1: it's just different unit, different area, bigger herds, a migratory
Speaker 1: unit that has to live on feed grounds, you know,
Speaker 1: in the winter versus our care have always just been done.
Speaker 1: So that that's that makes sense on maybe why that correlates.
Speaker 2: So I can't remember. We're going to talk about it,
Speaker 2: but are we going to talk about pregnancy rates, which
Speaker 2: would drive how strong the rut is?
Speaker 1: Yeah, we were going to talk a little bit. I
Speaker 1: know I have a note coming on on perceived strength
Speaker 1: of the rut and then the cow is coming into estrus.
Speaker 1: You know, sometimes only fifty percent of them. So we'll
Speaker 1: get into that. Yeah, yeah, in just a little bit.
Speaker 1: But matter of fact, the only question I have in
Speaker 1: between those two, I wanted to ask about, you know,
Speaker 1: one of the perceived things. We're out there hunting. We've
Speaker 1: had a couple of good, high pressure days in a row,
Speaker 1: ruts really going good. It seems to be getting better
Speaker 1: and better, and then you get a rain squall come
Speaker 1: in and uh, it shuts the rut down, or that's
Speaker 1: what's perceived the rut. The activity seems to be different,
Speaker 1: whether it's your hunters get lazier, they're not working as
Speaker 1: hard in your opinion, or or when I say your opinion,
Speaker 1: is there data that supports the research that supports whether
Speaker 1: and how it affects the rut?
Speaker 2: So not that I know of. Uh, again, that's a
Speaker 2: question that we're asking right now. Absolutely, weather, it is
Speaker 2: going to affect activity patterns. I would say in my
Speaker 2: hunting experience, it's exactly the opposite. The worse the weather,
Speaker 2: the more it's going. Really and so yeah, if the weather,
Speaker 2: maybe because it's so warm here and the elk are
Speaker 2: just overheated on during the rut September super hot. Still
Speaker 2: they if it's a hot day by early morning, they're
Speaker 2: back in the dark timber on the north slopes and
Speaker 2: they're bedded down. But if it starts snowing, they're active
Speaker 2: all day long.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that makes itse I was told by an old
Speaker 1: timer that I used to hunt with or hung around
Speaker 1: and got some tips and tricks from. He believed that
Speaker 1: the rain washes away all the scent that's on the ground.
Speaker 1: I don't know if I believe that or not, but
Speaker 1: it was one of those things where it's like you
Speaker 1: kind of scratch your head. Is that true? You know,
Speaker 1: if cows are you know, close or they're pean you know,
Speaker 1: all over the landscape, does that get that bowl fired
Speaker 1: up and so he's bugling more as he travels around
Speaker 1: or not? I don't know. I've I just kind of
Speaker 1: put that in there as far as the weather affecting
Speaker 1: the rut and potentially supports what I've seen, But but
Speaker 1: it sounds like you've seen the opposite, So it's it's
Speaker 1: not necessarily maybe a factor.
Speaker 2: So yeah, definitely. Old factory is the way that el
Speaker 2: communicate and tell each other that I'm I'm approaching estris
Speaker 2: or I'm an estress or I just ovulated. That's how
Speaker 2: That's how they're communicating with each other. So anything that
Speaker 2: changes the amount of old factory communication on the landscape
Speaker 2: is going to change behavior. Having said that, they have
Speaker 2: a pretty keen sense of smell, and I'm not once
Speaker 2: the rut's going, I'm not sure that they're using scent
Speaker 2: marking as much as before the rut. I think that
Speaker 2: they've started to gather up their animals and they're checking
Speaker 2: their animals regularly. They have a fleming behavior like bison
Speaker 2: where they it's called a lip curl where they can
Speaker 2: open up a whole bunch of receptors olfactory receptors in
Speaker 2: their nose and they can tell whether that female is
Speaker 2: approaching asters or not. But they check them individually by.
Speaker 1: Them yep, yep, yeah, where you see that bowl, get
Speaker 1: up and go nudge every cow out of her bed checker,
Speaker 1: scent checker, and then move on.
Speaker 2: To the next one.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So that's part one of our podcasts here with
Speaker 1: Brock McMillan on ELK. Stay tuned for part two coming
Speaker 1: at you next time on cutting the distance