{"id":74674,"date":"2020-01-31T17:17:20","date_gmt":"2020-02-01T00:17:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/what-to-do-about-southwest-colorados-ailing-elk-herds\/"},"modified":"2020-02-01T00:17:20","modified_gmt":"2020-02-01T00:17:20","slug":"what-to-do-about-southwest-colorados-ailing-elk-herds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/what-to-do-about-southwest-colorados-ailing-elk-herds\/","title":{"rendered":"What to do about Southwest Colorado\u2019s ailing elk herds?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Elk
Elk populations in Southwest Colorado have been ailing in recent years, and wildlife officials are still trying to figure out what is driving the population decline.<\/span>Durango Herald file<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

A series of public meetings in coming weeks will look at how to handle Southwest Colorado\u2019s declining and ailing elk herd populations.<\/p>\n

Every 10 years or so, Colorado Parks and Wildlife revises its management plans for big game wildlife across the state. This year, the agency will look at its plan for elk in Southwest Colorado, which hasn\u2019t been updated in more than a decade.<\/p>\n

The main goal, said Brad Weinmeister, a CPW biologist, is for the agency \u2013 with public input \u2013 to set population objectives for elk, then adjust management practices, such as how many hunting tags are issued each year.<\/p>\n

In Colorado, hunters are the main drivers of controlling wildlife numbers. If a region of the state wants to lower elk numbers, for instance, CPW will increase the number of available tags, Weinmeister said.<\/p>\n

In Southwest Colorado, it\u2019s likely the opposite will occur.<\/p>\n

Here, elk populations have declined in recent years<\/a>. Weinmeister said he expects the public process to call for bolstering their numbers, at the cost of hunting opportunities.<\/p>\n

Still, that might not solve the problem.<\/p>\n

The decline has been attributed to high calf mortality: About half the elk calves born in Southwest Colorado die within six months, and an additional 15% die before they reach a year old.<\/p>\n

In the absence of one clear cause such as disease \u2013 which was ruled out \u2013 wildlife officials don\u2019t know what\u2019s driving the deaths.<\/p>\n

Weinmeister said CPW is trying to determine why calves have died at high rates in study areas around Montrose and Trinidad. But research has been slow because expandable radio collars put on the calves keep falling off.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re getting a little better,\u201d he said. \u201cBut it\u2019s not happening as fast as we want.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the meantime, wildlife officials are looking at other possible causes of the decline.<\/p>\n

Recently, CPW limited tags for archery hunters. Whereas tags used to be unlimited, Weinmeister now may lower or raise the number of hunting tags based on conditions on the ground.<\/p>\n

Weinmeister said the new process reduces the number of elk killed each year by hunters and decreases the number of hunters who disrupt breeding habits.<\/p>\n

Each year, about 13,000 hunters trek into the San Juan Mountains to hunt the Hermosa and San Juan units, which are home to an estimated 26,000 elk.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom the hunters I talk to, most are willing to make that sacrifice,\u201d Weinmeister said.<\/p>\n

CPW also is looking for ways to offset the impact of habitat loss. As Colorado\u2019s population grows and development reaches rural areas, elk lose areas to thrive. And on top of that, recreation is encroaching into the last wild places.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you add all this up together, we\u2019re losing a lot of habitat each year,\u201d Weinmeister said. \u201cAnd it\u2019s hard to put more animals on the landscape when they have less places to live.\u201d<\/p>\n

And there are the factors involving climate, such as drought, which has plagued Southwest Colorado.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not an easy solution by any means,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

jromeo@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Colorado Parks and Wildlife to host series of meetings asking public for input<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":74675,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,2009,199,603],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-74674","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-hunting","tag-san-juan-national-forest","tag-wildlife"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74674","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74674"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74674\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/74675"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74674"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74674"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74674"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=74674"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}