2002-2003 WINTER COUNT OF NORTHERN YELLOWSTONE ELK

The Northern Yellowstone Cooperative Wildlife Working Group conducted its annual winter survey of the northern Yellowstone elk population on December 24, 2002. A total of 9,215 elk were counted, including 6,897 elk (75 percent) within Yellowstone National Park and 2,318 elk (25 percent) north of the park boundary. Biologists used four fixed-wing aircraft to count elk through the entire northern range during the 1-day survey. The northern Yellowstone elk herd winters between the northeast entrance of Yellowstone National Park and Dome Mountain/Dailey Lake in the Paradise Valley.

This year's count of 9,215 elk was below the 11,969 elk counted during December 2001. Yellowstone National Park wildlife biologist P.J. White said that "despite poor counting conditions this year, the long-term trend in counts of northern Yellowstone elk suggests that their abundance has decreased since 1988." Factors that contributed to this decrease likely include predation, drought-related effects on pregnancy and calf survival, periodic substantial winter-kill owing to severe snow pack (e.g., winters of 1988-89 and 1996-97), and human harvest during the Gardiner area late hunt. That hunt was designed to reduce elk abundance outside Yellowstone National Park so that elk numbers do not cause long-term changes in plant communities or decrease the quality of the winter range. Tom Lemke, biologist for Montana Fish, Wildlife, and Parks, indicated that "as total elk numbers and migrations outside the park have decreased, we have reduced the number of elk permits for the Gardiner area late hunt from approximately 3,000 in 1997 to 2,200 this winter."

Poor counting conditions this year likely contributed to an under-count of the actual number of elk in the northern Yellowstone population. Lack of snow cover created a brown background on the landscape and made elk difficult to detect. Also, elk were widely dispersed at higher elevations owing to the lack of snow pack and mild winter. "We do not have an estimate of the extent of the under-count of elk because the current survey methodology does not enable us to adjust for differences in factors (snow cover, habitat type, group size, elk behavior) that influence our ability to detect elk within and among surveys," said P.J. White. "However, a similar low count of 9,456 elk was obtained in 1991, while 14,829 elk were counted during good counting conditions in the previous year (1990) and 12,859 elk were counted during the following year (1992).

The Working Group will continue to monitor trends of the northern Yellowstone elk population and evaluate the relative contribution of various components of mortality, including predation, environmental factors, and hunting. The Working Group was formed in 1983 to cooperatively preserve and protect the long-term integrity of the northern Yellowstone winter range for wildlife species by increasing our scientific knowledge of the species and their habitats, promoting prudent land management activities, and encouraging an interagency approach to answering questions and solving problems. The Working Group is comprised of resource managers and biologists from the Montana Fish, Wildlife, & Parks, National Park Service (Yellowstone National Park), U.S. Forest Service (Gallatin National Forest), and U.S. Geological Survey-Northern Rocky Mountain Science Center, Bozeman.

Information provided by the NPS

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