Thousands of elk find refuge on Fort Hall Indian Reservation
Shoshone-Bannock Tribes Fish & Game collar elk for counts.
By LORI ANN EDMO
Sho-Ban News
FORT HALL — Shoshone-Bannock Fish and Game Department staff are busy this winter dealing with thousands of elk that have found refuge on the Fort Hall Indian Reservation.
Department staff recently did a count and found 6,500 elk are wintering on the rez from Lincoln Creek to Two and Half Mile Road. The number doesn’t include Arbon Valley where more can be found.
Fish and Game Captain Tom Wadsworth said the counts and elk collaring are a cooperative effort with the State of Idaho to determine where the elk are coming from and where they are going. “It helps mitigate what needs to be done with the problems we’re having on the interstate,” he said where elk have been crossing. “It has to do with habitat fragmentation – recent fires have burned winter ranges all around us.”
Fish & Game get ready to collar elk.
Brett Haskett, Fish and Game manager, said not all the elk wintering on the rez are resident elk. The rez is the only place left for them to go with development and wind farms impacting their habitat.
Wadsworth said the state is wanting to know why the elk are coming on the rez too, “It will help with management on both sides. When the elk leave the rez, the state will have to think how to deal with that many elk.
There is some feeding of elk happening on the rez but a lot are eating winter wheat. The state also has some feeding programs.
The department collared 25 head of elk between Lincoln Creek and Two and Half Mile on February 27. The also collared five in Arbon Valley February 28. Wadsworth said they netted the elk from a helicopter, a ground crew on snowmobiles secured them, the elk were blindfolded then hobbled to put the collars on. Then the biologists come in and take measurements.
Wadsworth encouraged the public to remember the elk are still in wintering mode so give them their space. “Leave them alone as much as possible – the efforts we’re putting forth is for herd safety and the safety of the community.”
