June 15, 2023 • 45 mins
Today on the show, Jason is joined by his buddy Brock to talk all things elk biology in part one of this two part series. In this episode they cover everything from moon phase to who really controls the herd -- the herd bull or the lead cow?
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Welcome back to cutting the distance. Today's guest comes to
us with a bunch of data, research and information on elk,
their biology, and their behavior. I want to see how
we may be able to take this information and use
it to our benefit during hunting season. See what makes sense,
what relates, what doesn't, and what you're seeing out there.
So Brock McMillan comes to us with a PhD in biology.
(00:33):
He was a professor professor of ecology at Minnesota State
University for nine years prior to joining the faculty as
Wildlife Ecologist at BYU for the past fifteen years. In
addition to all of his professional experience, he is also
an archery elkhunter, which I'm most excited about because we
get to jump in and talk about some of the
things that I've observed and if they have a biological
(00:56):
reasoning as well as what he's observed and maybe how
they relate how they're differ I also hoped to dive
into some of the research and see if it sheds
a little light on why and how come those questions
that I ask myself every September, and I find myself
trying to answer those every fall. So welcome to the show. Brock.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Thank you very much, Lisa.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
I appreciate having you here. I know you guys are
just like everywhere across the West. You're in the thick
a calving season. How's that going for you there in Utah?
Speaker 2 (01:27):
It's going great. We're right dead center. So yesterday we
collared our middle calf, meaning that half of our elk
that we have colored have given birth and half are
still waiting to give birth. And so yesterday was the
dead center day, gotcha.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
And that relates to timing, which we're definitely going to
jump into here in a little bit, you know, timing
of the rut and how that affects you know, drop
dates and whatnot. I know, you know, being from Washington,
we're up a little bit further north. I know they're
just kind of I think there may be a little
bit on the front end, and so we'll talk a
little bit about that and how latitude may affect that
may not affect it, in your opinion. I'm gonna actually
(02:03):
gonna go over to eastern Washington and help capture calves
here next week and then interview there biologists. So yeah,
it's it's that time of year. Really thankful to have
you here. So, like every podcast, we're going to start
with some listener questions, and for this episode, I went
to is it September Yet? It's a Facebook group, a
(02:26):
bunch of diehard Archel hunters. They live for that month
of September. So I'm excited to bring some of their
questions to you here, Brock And the first one that
we got from Dan Scalis from the from the is
it September Yet?
Speaker 2 (02:38):
Group?
Speaker 1 (02:39):
In your opinion, how does the moon phase affect the
rut and the elk behavior? You know, there's a lot
of built up I'm gonna I'm gonna elaborate on that.
There's a lot of talk about, you know, taking your
vacation around moon phases, are taking it, you know, just
on the backside of a full moon in your opinion
or not even your opinion. What does the science or
research say about full moon and how to affects the rut?
Speaker 2 (03:00):
Jason, I would love to be able to answer that question.
I don't know, and that's a bad answer, But we
have activity data right now from we've actually GPS colored
about one thy seven hundred elk and so we know
movement behavior for all of those animals and we're just
analyzing right now the effect of time of day, season,
(03:23):
moon phase. So I don't have a complete answer for that,
but undoubtedly it has some effect.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
Yeah, I'm going to roll a little bit of my information,
a little background on myself, Brock. You know, being an engineer,
I'm very data driven. It's why I like talking to
biologists because it's like, the data is what the data is.
You can read it and interpolate it however you want.
But one year, we set out a trail camera one
a one month cycle. We set out on October first
and we picked it up on September first. We then
(03:53):
went through and categorized every picture we got of bowls,
time of day, and what it related to the moon phase.
And all we saw was a slight shift in timing
when the moon was out, we would see those animals
coming out a little bit later if the moon wasn't.
And it didn't really seem to have an effect as
(04:13):
much as you would think. It was just a slight
a slight movement in time. Now that's you know, unscientific,
it's just me looking at one trail camera and one location.
But we did see, you know, the moon, whether it
relates to the brightness or their visibility. We did see things,
you know, leave earlier and come out later. I guess,
you know, at water, and this was at a water source,
(04:34):
so I need, I guess we need to preface that
as well as I also went back and looked at
you know, fifteen or twenty of my bowl kills that
I could remember days and times and whatnot. And one
thing that was actually contrary to what you hear. You
know a lot of what said is you know, following
a full moon is the best time to hunt, you know,
off of a full moon, going into no moon is
(04:57):
your best time to hunt. I'd actually killed the majoriy.
I think fourteen out of twenty of those bulls. We're
leading up to a full moon within that week of
the full moon. And so not that it's good data,
at least in my you know, circumstances, It didn't seem
to matter that much, right.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Jason so Well, The literature is the evidence that is
in the literature suggests that photo period is what drives
the hormone cycles on both male and female elk, and
so there can be an effective moon phase, and we
hope to be able to determine if there is an
effective moon phase, but the primary driver is photo period.
(05:36):
So as days under shortening, testosterone levels are increasing in
the bulls and the follicle stimulating hormone in the females
is leading them into estrus.
Speaker 1 (05:48):
Okay, yeah, we're gonna jump into that pretty heavy here
in a little bit, so we'll talk about photo period.
But this is really it's not non scientific. But I
get asked a lot of times, if you only could
take one week of vacation, when would you you hunt it.
It's really what you're looking at the hunt, whether you
want kind of that pre red action, whether you want
to be in the middle of the bagling, whether you
(06:08):
want to be on the post. But there's only so
many days in September. So in my position where I
can hunt a lot, I'm just hunting regardless of the
moon phase. But I don't and this is all opinion based.
I don't think it matters as much as we like
to think. But but it's real, you know. It's just
based on my experience when they're running.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
They're running, Jason, so I think that you're probably right there.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
Yeah, Okay. Our second question comes in from Thorn Monday.
Thorn Monday, excuse me, also from is it September yet
during a colon? You have a bowl all riled up
and the next thing that bowl rounds up his cows
and leaves. Is there is there biology involved there. We're
going to get deep into the coaling elk here in
a little bit, but I wanted to throw this question
up front. Yeah, and I guess there may not be
(06:56):
enough information. You know, Winding, did you get too close
or did that bowl feel threatened? But can you explain
that that scenario out in the field and what you
think maybe going through that bull's head that was involved
in the call in and willing to communicate with you
and then all of a sudden stops the communication.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
I don't have a biological explanation with that. I've had
that exact same experience several times. And maybe Jason, you're
a better color than I am, but my guess is
you've had that situation as well. I think every bull
has a different personality, and actually there's been some personality
work done lately, and that's true. They have different personalities.
(07:33):
Some are much more likely to take risks than others.
So I think that I don't know if you can
get too close, if they don't smell you. My experience,
and I don't know Jason be different. I go in
hard until I get pretty close, and then I try
to be quiet because Elkern amazing. You know that in
(07:54):
the woods, there's no reason to be timid getting close.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Yeah, no, I'm in that same boat. I feel, you know,
Number one, they don't smell you. Number two, you know
you obviously don't want to let them see you secondary,
but it's not as it's not as important as is
being scented. But I'm the same way. As long as
you're not gonna get picked off, getting as close as
possible has always been my game plan. I vegetation and
(08:18):
terrain allow it. I'm gonna I'm gonna get real, real tight.
Because we all know and and maybe elaborate on that
question why he rounds his bull or why that bull
rounds his cows up and leaves, it's it's that it's
that threat of losing it, losing his cows. You know,
These these bulls are out there with the sole purpose
(08:39):
to live and then recreate, you know, And and they've
got there for sure. Thing if a bull starts to
put pressure on them, or you do get too close
and his personality is such that he'd rather retain his
cows and not risk fighting. A new bullet showed up
for him, of course he's going to go the other way.
And and we talked about it on this podcast before,
and I've talked about it in some of my calling strategy.
(09:00):
Is this is why I sometimes start with different levels
of threat, like what a cow call have necessarily forced
him to leave right away? Or you know, and don't
get me wrong, I'm a heavy bugler, but you know,
it's it's sometimes tough to figure out why that bull
just just rounds up and leaves at a certain point
during the call in. We may not know, and it.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
Mind change during the rut, because you know, bulls may
lose thirty percent of their body masks. They may be
losing three hundred pounds during the rut when they're not
eating and they're fighting all the time. So early in
the rut, the dominant bull's there and he's saying, I'm
willing to fight anybody. But ten days later he may say,
I'm out of energy and I'm going to avoid any
(09:44):
conflict that I can.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
Yeah, it's a lot less energy expended to round his
cows up and leave versus dealing with a you know,
another mature bull. Okay, this one, And I apologize ahead
of time, Brock. These were the four questions I pulled
his user questions, so I didn't let you you kind
of review them, and I don't know if you'll have
an answer or not. But does so in the West,
(10:06):
we deal in Elk Country, we deal with a lot
of fire conditions, especially into September and especially as of late.
Is there any indication that smoky air, poor air quality
affects running bulls at all? Or is it strictly based
on photo period.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
I don't think anybody studied that, but I can't imagine
there's an effect.
Speaker 1 (10:28):
Okay, yeah, I'm I'm in that same boat, aside from
the effect that has on me trying to breathe and
you know, get around a little bit. Yeah, okay. And
that was from Marshall Buyer in there on is it
September yet? And then you may have some insight to
this when this is a little more technical question comes
from Michael Cummings from is it September yet? What does
a science say about shooting bulls versus cows for the
(10:50):
health of the herd? And I'm going to elaborate on
this question a little bit. Is sometimes you see areas
where herds are really i would say performing poorlion area,
or they're they're not meeting objectives, and then you get
frustrated with the Fish and Wildlife Commission or the you
know whoever it may be, that we're, dang it, we're
giving two bull takes out, but yet we still have
fifty cow takes in the unit. I'm gonna I'm gonna
(11:13):
ask that from a hunter's perspective, what does what does
in your opinion taking cows versus bulls, because and how
does that negatively or in it, you know, adversely, affect
it or does it in your opinion?
Speaker 2 (11:24):
So I hope this is something we get into because
I think this is a really complex question. If you're
a rancher, a cattle rancher, you don't want any bulls
in your herd because every bull you put in the
herd is is a lack of food for another cow
to produce a calf. And I think it's generally the
same for elk. You don't need very many bulls in
(11:48):
the herd to service all the cows and to service
them during their estress. I hear all the time. Well,
if you don't have enough, they go into a second estress.
We have no evidence of that whatsoever. Zero and so
and so the more bulls that you remove from the herd,
the more productive the herd's going to be. Now, there's
less bulls to see when you're hunting if you do that,
(12:10):
but the herd as a whole will be more productive.
The other kicker is Jason, and this is a big
one for us in Utah is as a population ages, say,
for example, you are not removing cows, and the average
age of the cow increases, the likelihood that that cow
becomes pregnant goes down with age, and so as a
(12:32):
herd ages as a whole, the productivity of that herd
goes down. Regardless of how many are on the landscape.
So there's a whole bunch of factors. If we have
too many miles on the landscape, production is going to
go down because nutrition drives whether whether a cow goes
into estress or not. If she's not fat enough, she
(12:53):
doesn't even go into estres and so pregnancy rates will
be low. Same thing if the herd's getting old and
see late, ray will be low and the herd just
won't be as productive as it was during the growth
phase for that herd. Does that make sense?
Speaker 1 (13:09):
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense, And we're going
to jump into herd dynamics and a little bit bold
of Cali ratio and some of that, and I've got
I've got a lot more questions we can expand on this, like, well,
what's a good management tool to make sure you're only
taking those those older cols or how do you determine that?
So I've got some questions from a hunter's perspective like
and a game manager's perspective like how do you even
manage that for the optimal hurt health? But we'll jump
(13:30):
into that. So No, I appreciate you answering that question,
and I'll kind of wrap up our listener questions today,
Brock And once again, if you have questions of your
own you'd like me or my guests the experts to
try to answer, feel free to email us at CTD
at phelpsgame Calls dot com, or reach out to us
on social and give us your questions and we'll try
(13:52):
to include him here. So can't thank the guys over
at is it September yet? Page enough for filling us
up with some questions, and the ones I didn't get to,
we're for sure going to get to in my conversation.
So next up, we're going to jump into my discussion here, Brock.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
Excellent.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
So I'm all, like I mentioned earlier, I'm excited when
I get to talk to biologists, researcher, scientists, people that
have hard data to look at when and you know, I,
I would say, I go out there as a guy
that just learned by trial and error this works, just
doesn't work. Maybe I have an opinion why or why
it doesn't, but there's no data right besides it happening
(14:41):
multiple times or not. And so very excited to talk
to you today, Brock and kind of run some scenarios, questions, issues,
whatever it may be by you to see if you
know what the what the science supports. I know we
had a great conversation a week ago, and I got
excited about some of the things you had talked about about,
like cows coming into Estrus, why you you know adjacent
units are doing good. So really excited to jump in here.
(15:03):
So I'm gonna I'm gonna break this all the way
down to the foundation, and I don't feel that any
of this is below elk hunters. But let's start with
the elkra in general. I want to build this whole
conversation off that foundation. Can you just go into the
generalities of the elkred as far as timing, you know,
bulls going to cows, cows going to bulls, like, as
(15:24):
far as the bulls run the herd for that amount
of time, or do the lead cows run the run
the herd?
Speaker 2 (15:29):
Like?
Speaker 1 (15:29):
Just give us a five minute snapshot of the elk
rat and what's taking place.
Speaker 2 (15:34):
So I think the el elkra is dictit yeh, I'm sorry,
is dictated by patrician is get dictated by birth. So
what's driving when the rut is is that that calf
has maximum new pretrition when it has maximum need, and
so the female the maximum energetic requirement is just prior
(15:59):
to weaning that calf. So the female gives birth like
right now the first of June, and for the next
three or four or sometimes six or seven months she's
nursing that young although she starts to wean in two
to three months, so she needs maximum food on the
ground in two to three months from right now to
(16:20):
help that calf grow as much as possible, and so
that dictates when the calf is born, and that's the
evolutionary force is going to drive that date. And then
gestation is two hundred and forty to two hundred and
fifty days, and so the rut has to happen two
hundred and forty to two hundred and fifty days before
that date for everything to be optimal. And so I
(16:43):
think that's what's driving when the rut happens. So if today,
which it is the peak of partrition on the unit
we're studying right now, were the peak Partrician, then like
the twenty fourth of September should have been the peak
of rut this last year.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
Do you feel that those those two hundred and forty
days is that variable amongst units or is it kind
of pre programmed, like you said, into that evolutionary data,
or is it two hundred and fifty days for a
certain unit and two hundred and thirty days for a
different unit.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
That's a great question. All we know about the gestation
is from captive ELK, and what we know in captive
ELK is gestation can vary from about two hundred and
forty to two hundred and sixty two days. I don't
think there's near that much variation. Those are the extremes.
I think that in general it varies from two hundred
(17:37):
and forty five to two hundred and fifty days. And
like humans, it's not everybody is exactly nine months. Some
come a couple of days shorter, some cold a couple
of days longer, in my case a week longer. And
I was eleven pounds that kind of thing.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
Yeah, yeah, so let me I don't want to to
miss interpret your your numbers, but you're saying that it's
a fairly tight range. Because if you're saying only twenty
two days is the extreme ranges of the envelope, does
that mean all these elk or all these cows are
being bred within a very very short time window. Or
(18:18):
I mean, because we've all been out there, right, and
so we've heard bols, bigel and you know, end of
August all the way to the beginning of October, larger
herds seem to take longer. Are those all is that
red activity happening outside of the breeding or or is
it are those like anomalies or outliers Why that bull stays,
you know, kind of active and those cows are entering
(18:39):
estrius those kind of off times outside of that twenty
two day window you kind of just mentioned.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
So so the twenty two day window is the gestation.
So that doesn't go oh, gotcha, gotcha. Yeah, that doesn't
dictate how long the red is because it we don't
have hard data yet. But what we think is happening
is a cow has to reach a certain condition level
before she can go into estress, and so healthy fat
(19:09):
cows come into estress earlier than poor condition cows, if
the poor condition cow comes into estress at all. And
so we had our first birth, Jason, nine days ago
now and we're already in the middle. But my guess
is that partrition our birthing will tell all the way
(19:31):
towards the end of June. And so yeah, absolutely, the
rout may start nine days before September twenty fourth start
going really good. So we're sitting at about September fifteenth
for these units here, and the majority of all the
animals are going to be bred by October fifth, but
(19:54):
there are some that were poor conditions that are still
trying to get to sufficient condition to go into estress,
and so it may lag. The rut may lag all
the way into the middle or even to the end
of October for those few straggler cows that are still
trying to get enough fat on their bones.
Speaker 1 (20:11):
So I'm just trying to reduce this data to areas
i've hunted. So if you're in, let's say, a unit
that doesn't have necessarily the best winning ground and so
those cows go back into spring and summer in poorer condition,
is that where you may see that rut going longer
just because it's taking them a little bit more. Their
health doesn't is good, and so you may see that
(20:31):
rut go longer in those more mountainous units Versus if
you're in a low lying unit that has easy winners,
you may see them all come in like you said,
middle of September and hit all at the same time,
where you get a high percentage of your cows all
at once, versus you know, different levels or a spread
out array of health.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
So that's a great question, and I don't know one
hundred percent of the answer. If I draw on deer
data so that they're a little different than elk, summer
habitat is way more important than winter habitat, And I
think it's true for elk too, unless they're feeding on
somebody'sself off al filled or haystack. And so what they
(21:11):
come out of winter in condition is dictated by the
condition they go into winter, and so what they have
to eat in the summer dictates more about it estross
than how mild the winters are where they're living, gotcha.
Speaker 1 (21:27):
So they can they can overcome that hard winter through
their their feed and hell through you know, late spring summer,
and then that will get them back to kicking their
estress off at the right time.
Speaker 2 (21:39):
Right because because their their condition is September is dictating
what is happening, and so they have the ability to
overcome anything that happened in winter. Every elk on the
landscape in an area that has real winters basically is
burnt through all of their energy reserves by the end
of winter, and and they're running on fumes, especially true
(22:03):
for deer, but elk two they're running on fumes by
by April. Gotcha.
Speaker 1 (22:08):
Okay, Yeah, I think that that's a great, great conversation,
and I'm sure there's a little little side pieces we
could pick at there or there for a long time.
So during that rut, in your opinion, you know, at
least in my area up in the mountains, you know,
the bulls like to hang out together through July most August,
and then towards the end of August. In the middle
(22:30):
of August, we can start to see these bulls split
up and the cows have hung out by themselves, maybe
some immature bulls. And you're is there or data that
supports the bulls going to the cows or the cows
going to the bulls. As you know, let's say you're
running trail cameras and you've got all these pictures of
bulls and they disappear. Should I go to the nearest
location of cows or what what's going on there during
(22:52):
the rut?
Speaker 2 (22:53):
So so, we have about seven years of data on
this question. We haven't looked at it pecifically the way
you're asking here, but it appears that when bulls lose
the velvet, they start heading for traditional running grounds, and
the cows do too, and so they have areas that
(23:16):
they meet and it may be very different than where
they've spent the whole summer, either of them. If that
makes sense.
Speaker 1 (23:23):
Yeah, I would say, just in my observation, the cows
seem to be closer to that running area, because it
always seems like my bulls will up and leave, you know,
go a mile in a direction. But I know that
there was a majority of cows over there, and that's
one of the reasons I always like when I'm scouting,
not necessarily look for elk, not necessarily look for sign
at the time, but like, where are the rubs? The
(23:44):
rubs were like a great indicator of where they're running
and where they're going to spend that September. But yeah,
if they both move, I could see that. But I've
always just assumed that the bulls are going to leave
their location to go find the cows. But you're saying
that there is some research or indication that those cows
also may leave their area and go to like a
neutral spot or a meetup spot.
Speaker 2 (24:05):
So the cow calf nursing grounds are often very similar
to the running grounds, and so you're already going to
find cows that are often but cows will move to
those grounds as well.
Speaker 1 (24:16):
Gotcha. That wins up real well with what I've seen,
and a lot of people get frustrated with only having
cows on their cameras and like, well, unless you're looking
for specific bulls like just hang out there, because I
think those bulls will eventually show.
Speaker 2 (24:31):
In that area.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
They may just be hanging out in the secluded type
basin or whatnot, or non visible.
Speaker 2 (24:36):
They may be three, four, ten miles away. We have
some that move. I think we have one bull that
I looked at in particular that went seventeen miles from
like the twentieth of August to the tenth of September.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
Yeah, that's amazing. You know, it does you no good
to scout there, And that's why we always recommend scouting
is absolutely close to your season as possible because things
are going to change, you know, in addition to pressure
on the landscape, you know, elk are just going to
move regardless.
Speaker 2 (25:06):
Absolutely, and Utah archery season is like August fifteenth to
September seventeenth. And the bulls that are there, you know
as well as me, you scout them all summer and
you go, I'm gonna start opening day this canyon and
that's about the time they start losing velvet and there
they may be there one or two days and then
every one of them disappears from that canyon. You've scouted
(25:29):
it all summer.
Speaker 1 (25:30):
Yep, we've got some good, good intel from guys that
pay a lot of attention, like in Nevada. You know,
they've got such an early season where he saw fifty
plus mature bowls within a tight little pocket, and they're
there so early that he said, as you see the
rut like wind up. By time it was over, there
were like two of those fifty bulls were left there
(25:50):
or even in adjacent canyons. They just they all that
was their spot to you know, sit in the velvet
and eat the best green or whatever they had going.
And then instantly the starts and they all filtered out
of there, besides a couple of bulls. And so you know,
we got some good data that those things just literally disappear.
Speaker 2 (26:08):
There's really good biological reasons for that, and it's been
studied quite a bit. So cows of bulls have very
different selective pressures. Cows are generally selecting habitat where they
can feed their offspring, but also where their offspring are
protected from predators, and bulls don't really worry about predators
near as much, so they always go to the absolute
(26:30):
best habitat that they confind to put on mass. And
so because of those two different selective pressures they're offering
separated in the summer.
Speaker 1 (26:56):
I'm gonna ask one more question here on just stuff
that I want to know about the elkrat and what
I've perceived. And the question is which elk runs the herd?
Is it? Is it the bowl the herd bowl, or
is it that lead cow? Or is it dual duty?
Because in my opinion, i've seen like dual duty. But
I'm going to listen to your answer and then maybe
(27:18):
throwing some of my experience there.
Speaker 2 (27:20):
That's a great question, and I don't know the answer.
I do know that when they're not together, it's that
lead cow. Of course. In fact, we have we have cows.
Their social structures pretty fluid, meaning that the groups that
are living together. You may have these fifteen together today
and four of them pick up and move over and
join this group. And that's what I mean by fluid.
(27:42):
They change who they're with regularly. And we have out
the migrate in the winter, and where they migrate to
is dictated by the lead cow. So I have we
have cows we've been monitoring for five years and they
go to a different place every single winter, and it's
based on who they're with, and so I the a
(28:04):
dope female is very or the matriarch, whoever, the dominant
female in the group is the one that drives a
lot of it. I'm not sure about males. I think
it's got to be a combination because of that matriarchal
lineage is so wrong.
Speaker 1 (28:21):
Yeah, And that's that's what I've seen, is it seems
like as long as everything's going the way the bull
wants it to, and he's not being pestered by satellite
cows or he's not being pressured by people, hunters, predators,
the lead cow kind of leads the herd back into
their bedding area. She kind of leads them out to feed.
She's the one that you know, gets up when it's
(28:42):
time to leave bed and come back out to feed.
And all of those what I would call just you know,
the daily decisions that that herd is making and what
they're going through with Now where I see the bull,
there have been times where you know, he rounds his
cows up and pushes them, you know, he gets force full,
He uses you know, horns, uses his stature or whatever
he needs to, and he will times force that herd
to go where he wants them to, whether it's to
(29:03):
escape danger, get him away from other bulls, whatever it
may be. I've also seen like the bull push the
cows off so that he can come back and either
check out a bowl or confront a bowl that's pestering him.
So I feel like it's a dual relationship. But I
think if we weren't to interject, and if we weren't
to spook the bowl or predators weren't, the lead cow
(29:24):
is going to do the majority of the leading and
that herd, even during the rut, until that bull feels
pestered enough where there's a reason enough he wants to
move those cows, he physically does.
Speaker 2 (29:34):
So I think that's generally true, that's supported by I mean,
nobody's really looked at who's driving it that I know
of anyway, nobody's really looked at who's driving their movement
or their behavior during the rut. But during the rest
of the year it's the lead cow, and I just
I find it hard to think that that's how it
goes for forty seven months of the year and then
(29:57):
five months of the year bull comes in and takes over. Ultimately,
ultimately the cow chooses to be with the bull or
to let the bull there. I mean, yep, she's the
final choice whether she's gonna mate with that bull or not.
He may be the dominant bull and not let any
of the bulls, but she only has to take one
step if she doesn't want to make may with him. Yep, yep.
Speaker 1 (30:21):
No, that just some general questions about the Elkret kind
of what I've thought. And so now we're going to
run into rut timing, which is I botched the gestational
period there in the last time. Now we're really talking
about rut timing and when things start to get going,
and a lot of it may be perceived. There may
be people thinking the rut's going cranking at the end
(30:41):
of August when we all know that's not happening, but
they're here in Beagle, so they is perceived that the
rut's you know, going at that time. So in my opinion,
it's based on photo period. But I'm going to let
you kind of jump in and and you kind of
already answered this, I guess above when we're talking about
you know, getting that cap on the around at the
optimal time and then going backwards based on gestation from that.
(31:05):
But in your opinion is that kicked off by photo period,
which we you know, I think is a general consensus
which lets them know that they're two hundred and fifty days,
you know ahead, like that's their their their clock or
what other factors affect kicking off the rut.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
So how it works JSON is is the evolutionary selective pressure.
If the female gives birth at the right time of year,
she's more likely to have an offspring survived, and if
a female gives birth at the wrong time of year,
she's less likely. And so if the successful female continues
(31:41):
to be successful pretty soon that timing becomes the main
timing because she's had all the calves and the ones
at other times haven't. That's what drives that partriition timing,
and that's what drives the timing of the rut. So
it is. But but they don't say, oh, I need
to give birth on June first, so I'm going to
(32:03):
count back two hundred and fifty days. Of course they
don't do that, So they've tied it to what's called
a zite gaber that's zeit ge b e er, which
is a German word that means timekeeper, and all animals
you and I have an internal clock. You're younger than me,
but I wake up every morning at like five minutes
(32:25):
after six, and that's an internal clock in me. And
that internal clock in mammals is regulated. In general, the
primary thing that's regulated by is photo period. The zite
gaber or the timekeeper or the clock setter is photo period.
(32:46):
It can be resources, it can be a few other things,
but the primary thing in mammals is photo period. And
so that is what the brain is using to tell
a bull elk and his testosterone levels should increase. And
when his testosterol levels increase, that's when his antler's harden
(33:08):
and he sheds the velvet, and that's when he starts
into his test he's in large and he starts searching
for potential mates. And so yeah, it absolutely can happen
at the end of August that he starts searching for
potential mates when there's none available.
Speaker 1 (33:27):
Gotcha. And then to wind it back a little bit,
we talked about cows and their health affecting that are
the cows they know by based on I'm not going
to even try to resay the word you did it
sound like lightsaber.
Speaker 2 (33:44):
Light?
Speaker 1 (33:45):
There you go, there you go there. The elks lightsaber,
So if you were to look at that, they know
they need to you know, based on that, which is
a lot to do with photo period and the light
that they're getting. They know they need to try to
be you know, two hundred and forty to two hundred
and fifty days ahead. But then their health also affects that,
so right, so it's a little bit of a balance,
(34:06):
like they know they need to come in now, but
it may take five, ten, fifteen, twenty days based on
them getting their health to a certain point. So they're
just constantly trying to their bodies telling them too, but
they just can't. Is that how that works?
Speaker 2 (34:18):
So yes, yes, and no, so they don't ever make
a conscious decision. Evolution has dictated that when days are
this long, that's the optimal time to go into estress,
and so or actually, when nights are this long, uninterrupted
darkness is what really regulates it. So when nights are
(34:38):
this long, that's what the optimal time to go into estress.
But if a female carried a calf the whole summer,
or she nursed a calf the whole summer, she's still
trying to recover and so she may be delayed if
she was successful in raising a calf. Same thing. If
you're living in a marginal habitat and you had to
(34:59):
really severe winner and you had a calf, you're going
to be delayed a little bit. If you're older, you're
always in poorer condition, and maybe it delayed a little bit.
So evolution is dictated the optimal, but there's a lot
of other forces pushing them off the optimal.
Speaker 1 (35:15):
Gotcha that makes that makes a lot of sense there
in your opinion, And I know we see it a
lot more drastic in the deer population. But is the
rut timing based you know, we've already talked about it
being based on photo period, Which does that coordinate directly
with latitude or does latitude itself have anything to do
(35:37):
with that aside from the days being shorter or longer
than you know, a different latitude.
Speaker 2 (35:43):
Sure, we we don't have a strong analysis on the
effect of latitude for ELK, although we've just developed a
mathematical model where we can look at timing of partration
based on movement patterns and so we can look at that.
But definitely in deer, uh, there is a strong Latin
(36:05):
latitudinal effect. So you would expect it to be similar
in Elk as well, and that is as you go north,
the rut becomes earlier, which I have a little counterintuitive maybe
for some people.
Speaker 1 (36:20):
Yeah, and and I mean it's very noticeable and deer
you know, I was down in Mexico Cus deer hunting
this year in the end of January, and the Cus
deer were, you know, going crazy down there still, you know,
or I like the Arizona over the counter archery taking
meal deer rutting into December through the middle of January,
and our ruts, you know, two months gone. But it
(36:40):
doesn't It seems like I can go down to New
Mexico and Elk hunt and the ruts the same same,
you know, about the same spot as they are up
here in Washington. Maybe a few days either way. But
I was I've always been curious if there's anything that
supports that latitude difference like it does on the deer side.
Speaker 2 (36:57):
So yeah, I don't know. Have me back next year
and I should be able to answer that question more completely.
Even in Utah, from northern part of the state to
the southern part of the state, there's a full two
weeks difference in deer yep. With the northern part of
the state, peak partraition is about June fifth for deer,
(37:20):
and in the southern part of the state it's like
June twenty third, June twenty second, So you bacnate from that,
and so that I mean, that's that's a huge difference latitudinal.
I would expect there's some of that in elk, but
I don't know for sure.
Speaker 1 (37:36):
Yeah, to wrap up rut timing, are there any other
factors that are you know, that correlate high enough that
that's worth talking about. Is it really just based on
that photo period and in the length of the night?
Speaker 2 (37:50):
No. I think the one factor that that we haven't
touched on maybe enough. We have a pretty popular unit
in Utah. It's called the Book Cliffs. It's a really
it's a limited entry deer unit, and it's a limited
entry elk unit, and it's what I would call summer
range limited habitat and get in effect, it's marginal habitat.
(38:13):
There's just not a lot of summer range for elk,
and in dry years, elk are in relatively poor condition,
and only in the best of best years are they
in good condition. But the cool thing if if the
herd in general is in poor condition, the rut will
be much more spread out, and if the herd is
(38:35):
in really good condition, the rut will be much more punctuated.
Speaker 1 (38:39):
Does that make sense, Yeah, yeah, so that the the
elk don't have to spread out to find resources and
find food and you know, and spread out the cows.
They're they're all able to kind of be in that
prime prime area.
Speaker 2 (38:52):
That but I think it's because they're all in good
enough condition to come into astris at the optimal date,
whereas in poor condition, they're just they're just straggling in
getting to that critical condition they need to go into estrs.
And so let me give you an example. One year,
we had forty forty bursts that we were monitoring, and
(39:13):
all forty of those bursts occurred I believe between May
twenty fifth and like June twenty ninth, and the next
year bursts started on May fifteenth, and they all they
went all the way into the middle of July. They
were spread out over two full months, and that they
were in really bad condition the previous rut season. And
(39:36):
so I just think that it can be spread out
a lot more in herds that are old or in
herds that are living in marginal habitat.
Speaker 1 (39:48):
That makes sense. Not that I would necessarily apply for
units around that that idea, but it's it's great to
note that it does exist. And you know, you know,
if you if you had an October season that went
into some of these marginal units, you may still hit
the rut. You know, I wouldn't say in the peak,
but more in the height versus if you were in
a unit that has great summer habitat, the rut is
(40:09):
over earlier. And now that we're talking about this, really
nobody ever believes me when I talk about Southwest Washington.
We set our muzzle atter season on the first Saturday
of October. Our rut is. You can literally slam the
door on our rut for the most part by the
end of like the end of September, first of October.
(40:31):
And it's because we're in a rainforest, right. These elk
don't migrate their local herds. They've got all the food
in the world with clearcuts and all the greenage around here.
But yet I firmly believe our rut is dang near
over on October first, Versus you go up in the
mountains or if I go, I'm like, man, the rut
(40:51):
goes so much longer out of state, you know, and
these other units are up in the mountains, and so
that really correlates with what I've seen on the ground
versus what I've seen in my backyard.
Speaker 2 (41:00):
That's interesting. That's I mean, I I dare hunt usually
the third week of October, and the rut is regularly
still going at least dragglers in our mountains of Utah.
Speaker 1 (41:10):
Yep, yeah, I mean I called a bull my wife's
first bowl. I called in on October twenty ninth, called
it in. And but it was in the mountains, you know,
central mountains, the east slope of the Cascade Mountains, and
it's just different unit, different area, bigger herds, a migratory
unit that has to live on feed grounds, you know,
in the winter versus our care have always just been done.
(41:32):
So that that's that makes sense on maybe why that correlates.
Speaker 2 (41:36):
So I can't remember. We're going to talk about it,
but are we going to talk about pregnancy rates, which
would drive how strong the rut is?
Speaker 1 (41:44):
Yeah, we were going to talk a little bit. I
know I have a note coming on on perceived strength
of the rut and then the cow is coming into estrus.
You know, sometimes only fifty percent of them. So we'll
get into that. Yeah, yeah, in just a little bit.
But matter of fact, the only question I have in
between those two, I wanted to ask about, you know,
one of the perceived things. We're out there hunting. We've
had a couple of good, high pressure days in a row,
(42:06):
ruts really going good. It seems to be getting better
and better, and then you get a rain squall come
in and uh, it shuts the rut down, or that's
what's perceived the rut. The activity seems to be different,
whether it's your hunters get lazier, they're not working as
hard in your opinion, or or when I say your opinion,
is there data that supports the research that supports whether
(42:27):
and how it affects the rut?
Speaker 2 (42:30):
So not that I know of. Uh, again, that's a
question that we're asking right now. Absolutely, weather, it is
going to affect activity patterns. I would say in my
hunting experience, it's exactly the opposite. The worse the weather,
the more it's going. Really and so yeah, if the weather,
maybe because it's so warm here and the elk are
(42:54):
just overheated on during the rut September super hot. Still
they if it's a hot day by early morning, they're
back in the dark timber on the north slopes and
they're bedded down. But if it starts snowing, they're active
all day long.
Speaker 1 (43:09):
Yeah, that makes itse I was told by an old
timer that I used to hunt with or hung around
and got some tips and tricks from. He believed that
the rain washes away all the scent that's on the ground.
I don't know if I believe that or not, but
it was one of those things where it's like you
kind of scratch your head. Is that true? You know,
if cows are you know, close or they're pean you know,
(43:30):
all over the landscape, does that get that bowl fired
up and so he's bugling more as he travels around
or not? I don't know. I've I just kind of
put that in there as far as the weather affecting
the rut and potentially supports what I've seen, But but
it sounds like you've seen the opposite, So it's it's
not necessarily maybe a factor.
Speaker 2 (43:48):
So yeah, definitely. Old factory is the way that el
communicate and tell each other that I'm I'm approaching estris
or I'm an estress or I just ovulated. That's how
That's how they're communicating with each other. So anything that
changes the amount of old factory communication on the landscape
(44:10):
is going to change behavior. Having said that, they have
a pretty keen sense of smell, and I'm not once
the rut's going, I'm not sure that they're using scent
marking as much as before the rut. I think that
they've started to gather up their animals and they're checking
their animals regularly. They have a fleming behavior like bison
(44:33):
where they it's called a lip curl where they can
open up a whole bunch of receptors olfactory receptors in
their nose and they can tell whether that female is
approaching asters or not. But they check them individually by.
Speaker 1 (44:48):
Them yep, yep, yeah, where you see that bowl, get
up and go nudge every cow out of her bed checker,
scent checker, and then move on.
Speaker 2 (44:55):
To the next one.
Speaker 1 (44:56):
Yeah. So that's part one of our podcasts here with
Brock McMillan on ELK. Stay tuned for part two coming
at you next time on cutting the distance
Welcome back to cutting the distance. Today's guest comes to
us with a bunch of data, research and information on elk,
their biology, and their behavior. I want to see how
we may be able to take this information and use
it to our benefit during hunting season. See what makes sense,
what relates, what doesn't, and what you're seeing out there.
So Brock McMillan comes to us with a PhD in biology.
(00:33):
He was a professor professor of ecology at Minnesota State
University for nine years prior to joining the faculty as
Wildlife Ecologist at BYU for the past fifteen years. In
addition to all of his professional experience, he is also
an archery elkhunter, which I'm most excited about because we
get to jump in and talk about some of the
things that I've observed and if they have a biological
(00:56):
reasoning as well as what he's observed and maybe how
they relate how they're differ I also hoped to dive
into some of the research and see if it sheds
a little light on why and how come those questions
that I ask myself every September, and I find myself
trying to answer those every fall. So welcome to the show. Brock.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Thank you very much, Lisa.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
I appreciate having you here. I know you guys are
just like everywhere across the West. You're in the thick
a calving season. How's that going for you there in Utah?
Speaker 2 (01:27):
It's going great. We're right dead center. So yesterday we
collared our middle calf, meaning that half of our elk
that we have colored have given birth and half are
still waiting to give birth. And so yesterday was the
dead center day, gotcha.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
And that relates to timing, which we're definitely going to
jump into here in a little bit, you know, timing
of the rut and how that affects you know, drop
dates and whatnot. I know, you know, being from Washington,
we're up a little bit further north. I know they're
just kind of I think there may be a little
bit on the front end, and so we'll talk a
little bit about that and how latitude may affect that
may not affect it, in your opinion. I'm gonna actually
(02:03):
gonna go over to eastern Washington and help capture calves
here next week and then interview there biologists. So yeah,
it's it's that time of year. Really thankful to have
you here. So, like every podcast, we're going to start
with some listener questions, and for this episode, I went
to is it September Yet? It's a Facebook group, a
(02:26):
bunch of diehard Archel hunters. They live for that month
of September. So I'm excited to bring some of their
questions to you here, Brock And the first one that
we got from Dan Scalis from the from the is
it September Yet?
Speaker 2 (02:38):
Group?
Speaker 1 (02:39):
In your opinion, how does the moon phase affect the
rut and the elk behavior? You know, there's a lot
of built up I'm gonna I'm gonna elaborate on that.
There's a lot of talk about, you know, taking your
vacation around moon phases, are taking it, you know, just
on the backside of a full moon in your opinion
or not even your opinion. What does the science or
research say about full moon and how to affects the rut?
Speaker 2 (03:00):
Jason, I would love to be able to answer that question.
I don't know, and that's a bad answer, But we
have activity data right now from we've actually GPS colored
about one thy seven hundred elk and so we know
movement behavior for all of those animals and we're just
analyzing right now the effect of time of day, season,
(03:23):
moon phase. So I don't have a complete answer for that,
but undoubtedly it has some effect.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
Yeah, I'm going to roll a little bit of my information,
a little background on myself, Brock. You know, being an engineer,
I'm very data driven. It's why I like talking to
biologists because it's like, the data is what the data is.
You can read it and interpolate it however you want.
But one year, we set out a trail camera one
a one month cycle. We set out on October first
and we picked it up on September first. We then
(03:53):
went through and categorized every picture we got of bowls,
time of day, and what it related to the moon phase.
And all we saw was a slight shift in timing
when the moon was out, we would see those animals
coming out a little bit later if the moon wasn't.
And it didn't really seem to have an effect as
(04:13):
much as you would think. It was just a slight
a slight movement in time. Now that's you know, unscientific,
it's just me looking at one trail camera and one location.
But we did see, you know, the moon, whether it
relates to the brightness or their visibility. We did see things,
you know, leave earlier and come out later. I guess,
you know, at water, and this was at a water source,
(04:34):
so I need, I guess we need to preface that
as well as I also went back and looked at
you know, fifteen or twenty of my bowl kills that
I could remember days and times and whatnot. And one
thing that was actually contrary to what you hear. You
know a lot of what said is you know, following
a full moon is the best time to hunt, you know,
off of a full moon, going into no moon is
(04:57):
your best time to hunt. I'd actually killed the majoriy.
I think fourteen out of twenty of those bulls. We're
leading up to a full moon within that week of
the full moon. And so not that it's good data,
at least in my you know, circumstances, It didn't seem
to matter that much, right.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Jason so Well, The literature is the evidence that is
in the literature suggests that photo period is what drives
the hormone cycles on both male and female elk, and
so there can be an effective moon phase, and we
hope to be able to determine if there is an
effective moon phase, but the primary driver is photo period.
(05:36):
So as days under shortening, testosterone levels are increasing in
the bulls and the follicle stimulating hormone in the females
is leading them into estrus.
Speaker 1 (05:48):
Okay, yeah, we're gonna jump into that pretty heavy here
in a little bit, so we'll talk about photo period.
But this is really it's not non scientific. But I
get asked a lot of times, if you only could
take one week of vacation, when would you you hunt it.
It's really what you're looking at the hunt, whether you
want kind of that pre red action, whether you want
to be in the middle of the bagling, whether you
(06:08):
want to be on the post. But there's only so
many days in September. So in my position where I
can hunt a lot, I'm just hunting regardless of the
moon phase. But I don't and this is all opinion based.
I don't think it matters as much as we like
to think. But but it's real, you know. It's just
based on my experience when they're running.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
They're running, Jason, so I think that you're probably right there.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
Yeah, Okay. Our second question comes in from Thorn Monday.
Thorn Monday, excuse me, also from is it September yet
during a colon? You have a bowl all riled up
and the next thing that bowl rounds up his cows
and leaves. Is there is there biology involved there. We're
going to get deep into the coaling elk here in
a little bit, but I wanted to throw this question
up front. Yeah, and I guess there may not be
(06:56):
enough information. You know, Winding, did you get too close
or did that bowl feel threatened? But can you explain
that that scenario out in the field and what you
think maybe going through that bull's head that was involved
in the call in and willing to communicate with you
and then all of a sudden stops the communication.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
I don't have a biological explanation with that. I've had
that exact same experience several times. And maybe Jason, you're
a better color than I am, but my guess is
you've had that situation as well. I think every bull
has a different personality, and actually there's been some personality
work done lately, and that's true. They have different personalities.
(07:33):
Some are much more likely to take risks than others.
So I think that I don't know if you can
get too close, if they don't smell you. My experience,
and I don't know Jason be different. I go in
hard until I get pretty close, and then I try
to be quiet because Elkern amazing. You know that in
(07:54):
the woods, there's no reason to be timid getting close.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Yeah, no, I'm in that same boat. I feel, you know,
Number one, they don't smell you. Number two, you know
you obviously don't want to let them see you secondary,
but it's not as it's not as important as is
being scented. But I'm the same way. As long as
you're not gonna get picked off, getting as close as
possible has always been my game plan. I vegetation and
(08:18):
terrain allow it. I'm gonna I'm gonna get real, real tight.
Because we all know and and maybe elaborate on that
question why he rounds his bull or why that bull
rounds his cows up and leaves, it's it's that it's
that threat of losing it, losing his cows. You know,
These these bulls are out there with the sole purpose
(08:39):
to live and then recreate, you know, And and they've
got there for sure. Thing if a bull starts to
put pressure on them, or you do get too close
and his personality is such that he'd rather retain his
cows and not risk fighting. A new bullet showed up
for him, of course he's going to go the other way.
And and we talked about it on this podcast before,
and I've talked about it in some of my calling strategy.
(09:00):
Is this is why I sometimes start with different levels
of threat, like what a cow call have necessarily forced
him to leave right away? Or you know, and don't
get me wrong, I'm a heavy bugler, but you know,
it's it's sometimes tough to figure out why that bull
just just rounds up and leaves at a certain point
during the call in. We may not know, and it.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
Mind change during the rut, because you know, bulls may
lose thirty percent of their body masks. They may be
losing three hundred pounds during the rut when they're not
eating and they're fighting all the time. So early in
the rut, the dominant bull's there and he's saying, I'm
willing to fight anybody. But ten days later he may say,
I'm out of energy and I'm going to avoid any
(09:44):
conflict that I can.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
Yeah, it's a lot less energy expended to round his
cows up and leave versus dealing with a you know,
another mature bull. Okay, this one, And I apologize ahead
of time, Brock. These were the four questions I pulled
his user questions, so I didn't let you you kind
of review them, and I don't know if you'll have
an answer or not. But does so in the West,
(10:06):
we deal in Elk Country, we deal with a lot
of fire conditions, especially into September and especially as of late.
Is there any indication that smoky air, poor air quality
affects running bulls at all? Or is it strictly based
on photo period.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
I don't think anybody studied that, but I can't imagine
there's an effect.
Speaker 1 (10:28):
Okay, yeah, I'm I'm in that same boat, aside from
the effect that has on me trying to breathe and
you know, get around a little bit. Yeah, okay. And
that was from Marshall Buyer in there on is it
September yet? And then you may have some insight to
this when this is a little more technical question comes
from Michael Cummings from is it September yet? What does
a science say about shooting bulls versus cows for the
(10:50):
health of the herd? And I'm going to elaborate on
this question a little bit. Is sometimes you see areas
where herds are really i would say performing poorlion area,
or they're they're not meeting objectives, and then you get
frustrated with the Fish and Wildlife Commission or the you
know whoever it may be, that we're, dang it, we're
giving two bull takes out, but yet we still have
fifty cow takes in the unit. I'm gonna I'm gonna
(11:13):
ask that from a hunter's perspective, what does what does
in your opinion taking cows versus bulls, because and how
does that negatively or in it, you know, adversely, affect
it or does it in your opinion?
Speaker 2 (11:24):
So I hope this is something we get into because
I think this is a really complex question. If you're
a rancher, a cattle rancher, you don't want any bulls
in your herd because every bull you put in the
herd is is a lack of food for another cow
to produce a calf. And I think it's generally the
same for elk. You don't need very many bulls in
(11:48):
the herd to service all the cows and to service
them during their estress. I hear all the time. Well,
if you don't have enough, they go into a second estress.
We have no evidence of that whatsoever. Zero and so
and so the more bulls that you remove from the herd,
the more productive the herd's going to be. Now, there's
less bulls to see when you're hunting if you do that,
(12:10):
but the herd as a whole will be more productive.
The other kicker is Jason, and this is a big
one for us in Utah is as a population ages, say,
for example, you are not removing cows, and the average
age of the cow increases, the likelihood that that cow
becomes pregnant goes down with age, and so as a
(12:32):
herd ages as a whole, the productivity of that herd
goes down. Regardless of how many are on the landscape.
So there's a whole bunch of factors. If we have
too many miles on the landscape, production is going to
go down because nutrition drives whether whether a cow goes
into estress or not. If she's not fat enough, she
(12:53):
doesn't even go into estres and so pregnancy rates will
be low. Same thing if the herd's getting old and
see late, ray will be low and the herd just
won't be as productive as it was during the growth
phase for that herd. Does that make sense?
Speaker 1 (13:09):
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense, And we're going
to jump into herd dynamics and a little bit bold
of Cali ratio and some of that, and I've got
I've got a lot more questions we can expand on this, like, well,
what's a good management tool to make sure you're only
taking those those older cols or how do you determine that?
So I've got some questions from a hunter's perspective like
and a game manager's perspective like how do you even
manage that for the optimal hurt health? But we'll jump
(13:30):
into that. So No, I appreciate you answering that question,
and I'll kind of wrap up our listener questions today,
Brock And once again, if you have questions of your
own you'd like me or my guests the experts to
try to answer, feel free to email us at CTD
at phelpsgame Calls dot com, or reach out to us
on social and give us your questions and we'll try
(13:52):
to include him here. So can't thank the guys over
at is it September yet? Page enough for filling us
up with some questions, and the ones I didn't get to,
we're for sure going to get to in my conversation.
So next up, we're going to jump into my discussion here, Brock.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
Excellent.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
So I'm all, like I mentioned earlier, I'm excited when
I get to talk to biologists, researcher, scientists, people that
have hard data to look at when and you know, I,
I would say, I go out there as a guy
that just learned by trial and error this works, just
doesn't work. Maybe I have an opinion why or why
it doesn't, but there's no data right besides it happening
(14:41):
multiple times or not. And so very excited to talk
to you today, Brock and kind of run some scenarios, questions, issues,
whatever it may be by you to see if you
know what the what the science supports. I know we
had a great conversation a week ago, and I got
excited about some of the things you had talked about about,
like cows coming into Estrus, why you you know adjacent
units are doing good. So really excited to jump in here.
(15:03):
So I'm gonna I'm gonna break this all the way
down to the foundation, and I don't feel that any
of this is below elk hunters. But let's start with
the elkra in general. I want to build this whole
conversation off that foundation. Can you just go into the
generalities of the elkred as far as timing, you know,
bulls going to cows, cows going to bulls, like, as
(15:24):
far as the bulls run the herd for that amount
of time, or do the lead cows run the run
the herd?
Speaker 2 (15:29):
Like?
Speaker 1 (15:29):
Just give us a five minute snapshot of the elk
rat and what's taking place.
Speaker 2 (15:34):
So I think the el elkra is dictit yeh, I'm sorry,
is dictated by patrician is get dictated by birth. So
what's driving when the rut is is that that calf
has maximum new pretrition when it has maximum need, and
so the female the maximum energetic requirement is just prior
(15:59):
to weaning that calf. So the female gives birth like
right now the first of June, and for the next
three or four or sometimes six or seven months she's
nursing that young although she starts to wean in two
to three months, so she needs maximum food on the
ground in two to three months from right now to
(16:20):
help that calf grow as much as possible, and so
that dictates when the calf is born, and that's the
evolutionary force is going to drive that date. And then
gestation is two hundred and forty to two hundred and
fifty days, and so the rut has to happen two
hundred and forty to two hundred and fifty days before
that date for everything to be optimal. And so I
(16:43):
think that's what's driving when the rut happens. So if today,
which it is the peak of partrition on the unit
we're studying right now, were the peak Partrician, then like
the twenty fourth of September should have been the peak
of rut this last year.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
Do you feel that those those two hundred and forty
days is that variable amongst units or is it kind
of pre programmed, like you said, into that evolutionary data,
or is it two hundred and fifty days for a
certain unit and two hundred and thirty days for a
different unit.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
That's a great question. All we know about the gestation
is from captive ELK, and what we know in captive
ELK is gestation can vary from about two hundred and
forty to two hundred and sixty two days. I don't
think there's near that much variation. Those are the extremes.
I think that in general it varies from two hundred
(17:37):
and forty five to two hundred and fifty days. And
like humans, it's not everybody is exactly nine months. Some
come a couple of days shorter, some cold a couple
of days longer, in my case a week longer. And
I was eleven pounds that kind of thing.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
Yeah, yeah, so let me I don't want to to
miss interpret your your numbers, but you're saying that it's
a fairly tight range. Because if you're saying only twenty
two days is the extreme ranges of the envelope, does
that mean all these elk or all these cows are
being bred within a very very short time window. Or
(18:18):
I mean, because we've all been out there, right, and
so we've heard bols, bigel and you know, end of
August all the way to the beginning of October, larger
herds seem to take longer. Are those all is that
red activity happening outside of the breeding or or is
it are those like anomalies or outliers Why that bull stays,
you know, kind of active and those cows are entering
(18:39):
estrius those kind of off times outside of that twenty
two day window you kind of just mentioned.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
So so the twenty two day window is the gestation.
So that doesn't go oh, gotcha, gotcha. Yeah, that doesn't
dictate how long the red is because it we don't
have hard data yet. But what we think is happening
is a cow has to reach a certain condition level
before she can go into estress, and so healthy fat
(19:09):
cows come into estress earlier than poor condition cows, if
the poor condition cow comes into estress at all. And
so we had our first birth, Jason, nine days ago
now and we're already in the middle. But my guess
is that partrition our birthing will tell all the way
(19:31):
towards the end of June. And so yeah, absolutely, the
rout may start nine days before September twenty fourth start
going really good. So we're sitting at about September fifteenth
for these units here, and the majority of all the
animals are going to be bred by October fifth, but
(19:54):
there are some that were poor conditions that are still
trying to get to sufficient condition to go into estress,
and so it may lag. The rut may lag all
the way into the middle or even to the end
of October for those few straggler cows that are still
trying to get enough fat on their bones.
Speaker 1 (20:11):
So I'm just trying to reduce this data to areas
i've hunted. So if you're in, let's say, a unit
that doesn't have necessarily the best winning ground and so
those cows go back into spring and summer in poorer condition,
is that where you may see that rut going longer
just because it's taking them a little bit more. Their
health doesn't is good, and so you may see that
(20:31):
rut go longer in those more mountainous units Versus if
you're in a low lying unit that has easy winners,
you may see them all come in like you said,
middle of September and hit all at the same time,
where you get a high percentage of your cows all
at once, versus you know, different levels or a spread
out array of health.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
So that's a great question, and I don't know one
hundred percent of the answer. If I draw on deer
data so that they're a little different than elk, summer
habitat is way more important than winter habitat, And I
think it's true for elk too, unless they're feeding on
somebody'sself off al filled or haystack. And so what they
(21:11):
come out of winter in condition is dictated by the
condition they go into winter, and so what they have
to eat in the summer dictates more about it estross
than how mild the winters are where they're living, gotcha.
Speaker 1 (21:27):
So they can they can overcome that hard winter through
their their feed and hell through you know, late spring summer,
and then that will get them back to kicking their
estress off at the right time.
Speaker 2 (21:39):
Right because because their their condition is September is dictating
what is happening, and so they have the ability to
overcome anything that happened in winter. Every elk on the
landscape in an area that has real winters basically is
burnt through all of their energy reserves by the end
of winter, and and they're running on fumes, especially true
(22:03):
for deer, but elk two they're running on fumes by
by April. Gotcha.
Speaker 1 (22:08):
Okay, Yeah, I think that that's a great, great conversation,
and I'm sure there's a little little side pieces we
could pick at there or there for a long time.
So during that rut, in your opinion, you know, at
least in my area up in the mountains, you know,
the bulls like to hang out together through July most August,
and then towards the end of August. In the middle
(22:30):
of August, we can start to see these bulls split
up and the cows have hung out by themselves, maybe
some immature bulls. And you're is there or data that
supports the bulls going to the cows or the cows
going to the bulls. As you know, let's say you're
running trail cameras and you've got all these pictures of
bulls and they disappear. Should I go to the nearest
location of cows or what what's going on there during
(22:52):
the rut?
Speaker 2 (22:53):
So so, we have about seven years of data on
this question. We haven't looked at it pecifically the way
you're asking here, but it appears that when bulls lose
the velvet, they start heading for traditional running grounds, and
the cows do too, and so they have areas that
(23:16):
they meet and it may be very different than where
they've spent the whole summer, either of them. If that
makes sense.
Speaker 1 (23:23):
Yeah, I would say, just in my observation, the cows
seem to be closer to that running area, because it
always seems like my bulls will up and leave, you know,
go a mile in a direction. But I know that
there was a majority of cows over there, and that's
one of the reasons I always like when I'm scouting,
not necessarily look for elk, not necessarily look for sign
at the time, but like, where are the rubs? The
(23:44):
rubs were like a great indicator of where they're running
and where they're going to spend that September. But yeah,
if they both move, I could see that. But I've
always just assumed that the bulls are going to leave
their location to go find the cows. But you're saying
that there is some research or indication that those cows
also may leave their area and go to like a
neutral spot or a meetup spot.
Speaker 2 (24:05):
So the cow calf nursing grounds are often very similar
to the running grounds, and so you're already going to
find cows that are often but cows will move to
those grounds as well.
Speaker 1 (24:16):
Gotcha. That wins up real well with what I've seen,
and a lot of people get frustrated with only having
cows on their cameras and like, well, unless you're looking
for specific bulls like just hang out there, because I
think those bulls will eventually show.
Speaker 2 (24:31):
In that area.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
They may just be hanging out in the secluded type
basin or whatnot, or non visible.
Speaker 2 (24:36):
They may be three, four, ten miles away. We have
some that move. I think we have one bull that
I looked at in particular that went seventeen miles from
like the twentieth of August to the tenth of September.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
Yeah, that's amazing. You know, it does you no good
to scout there, And that's why we always recommend scouting
is absolutely close to your season as possible because things
are going to change, you know, in addition to pressure
on the landscape, you know, elk are just going to
move regardless.
Speaker 2 (25:06):
Absolutely, and Utah archery season is like August fifteenth to
September seventeenth. And the bulls that are there, you know
as well as me, you scout them all summer and
you go, I'm gonna start opening day this canyon and
that's about the time they start losing velvet and there
they may be there one or two days and then
every one of them disappears from that canyon. You've scouted
(25:29):
it all summer.
Speaker 1 (25:30):
Yep, we've got some good, good intel from guys that
pay a lot of attention, like in Nevada. You know,
they've got such an early season where he saw fifty
plus mature bowls within a tight little pocket, and they're
there so early that he said, as you see the
rut like wind up. By time it was over, there
were like two of those fifty bulls were left there
(25:50):
or even in adjacent canyons. They just they all that
was their spot to you know, sit in the velvet
and eat the best green or whatever they had going.
And then instantly the starts and they all filtered out
of there, besides a couple of bulls. And so you know,
we got some good data that those things just literally disappear.
Speaker 2 (26:08):
There's really good biological reasons for that, and it's been
studied quite a bit. So cows of bulls have very
different selective pressures. Cows are generally selecting habitat where they
can feed their offspring, but also where their offspring are
protected from predators, and bulls don't really worry about predators
near as much, so they always go to the absolute
(26:30):
best habitat that they confind to put on mass. And
so because of those two different selective pressures they're offering
separated in the summer.
Speaker 1 (26:56):
I'm gonna ask one more question here on just stuff
that I want to know about the elkrat and what
I've perceived. And the question is which elk runs the herd?
Is it? Is it the bowl the herd bowl, or
is it that lead cow? Or is it dual duty?
Because in my opinion, i've seen like dual duty. But
I'm going to listen to your answer and then maybe
(27:18):
throwing some of my experience there.
Speaker 2 (27:20):
That's a great question, and I don't know the answer.
I do know that when they're not together, it's that
lead cow. Of course. In fact, we have we have cows.
Their social structures pretty fluid, meaning that the groups that
are living together. You may have these fifteen together today
and four of them pick up and move over and
join this group. And that's what I mean by fluid.
(27:42):
They change who they're with regularly. And we have out
the migrate in the winter, and where they migrate to
is dictated by the lead cow. So I have we
have cows we've been monitoring for five years and they
go to a different place every single winter, and it's
based on who they're with, and so I the a
(28:04):
dope female is very or the matriarch, whoever, the dominant
female in the group is the one that drives a
lot of it. I'm not sure about males. I think
it's got to be a combination because of that matriarchal
lineage is so wrong.
Speaker 1 (28:21):
Yeah, And that's that's what I've seen, is it seems
like as long as everything's going the way the bull
wants it to, and he's not being pestered by satellite
cows or he's not being pressured by people, hunters, predators,
the lead cow kind of leads the herd back into
their bedding area. She kind of leads them out to feed.
She's the one that you know, gets up when it's
(28:42):
time to leave bed and come back out to feed.
And all of those what I would call just you know,
the daily decisions that that herd is making and what
they're going through with Now where I see the bull,
there have been times where you know, he rounds his
cows up and pushes them, you know, he gets force full,
He uses you know, horns, uses his stature or whatever
he needs to, and he will times force that herd
to go where he wants them to, whether it's to
(29:03):
escape danger, get him away from other bulls, whatever it
may be. I've also seen like the bull push the
cows off so that he can come back and either
check out a bowl or confront a bowl that's pestering him.
So I feel like it's a dual relationship. But I
think if we weren't to interject, and if we weren't
to spook the bowl or predators weren't, the lead cow
(29:24):
is going to do the majority of the leading and
that herd, even during the rut, until that bull feels
pestered enough where there's a reason enough he wants to
move those cows, he physically does.
Speaker 2 (29:34):
So I think that's generally true, that's supported by I mean,
nobody's really looked at who's driving it that I know
of anyway, nobody's really looked at who's driving their movement
or their behavior during the rut. But during the rest
of the year it's the lead cow, and I just
I find it hard to think that that's how it
goes for forty seven months of the year and then
(29:57):
five months of the year bull comes in and takes over. Ultimately,
ultimately the cow chooses to be with the bull or
to let the bull there. I mean, yep, she's the
final choice whether she's gonna mate with that bull or not.
He may be the dominant bull and not let any
of the bulls, but she only has to take one
step if she doesn't want to make may with him. Yep, yep.
Speaker 1 (30:21):
No, that just some general questions about the Elkret kind
of what I've thought. And so now we're going to
run into rut timing, which is I botched the gestational
period there in the last time. Now we're really talking
about rut timing and when things start to get going,
and a lot of it may be perceived. There may
be people thinking the rut's going cranking at the end
(30:41):
of August when we all know that's not happening, but
they're here in Beagle, so they is perceived that the
rut's you know, going at that time. So in my opinion,
it's based on photo period. But I'm going to let
you kind of jump in and and you kind of
already answered this, I guess above when we're talking about
you know, getting that cap on the around at the
optimal time and then going backwards based on gestation from that.
(31:05):
But in your opinion is that kicked off by photo period,
which we you know, I think is a general consensus
which lets them know that they're two hundred and fifty days,
you know ahead, like that's their their their clock or
what other factors affect kicking off the rut.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
So how it works JSON is is the evolutionary selective pressure.
If the female gives birth at the right time of year,
she's more likely to have an offspring survived, and if
a female gives birth at the wrong time of year,
she's less likely. And so if the successful female continues
(31:41):
to be successful pretty soon that timing becomes the main
timing because she's had all the calves and the ones
at other times haven't. That's what drives that partriition timing,
and that's what drives the timing of the rut. So
it is. But but they don't say, oh, I need
to give birth on June first, so I'm going to
(32:03):
count back two hundred and fifty days. Of course they
don't do that, So they've tied it to what's called
a zite gaber that's zeit ge b e er, which
is a German word that means timekeeper, and all animals
you and I have an internal clock. You're younger than me,
but I wake up every morning at like five minutes
(32:25):
after six, and that's an internal clock in me. And
that internal clock in mammals is regulated. In general, the
primary thing that's regulated by is photo period. The zite
gaber or the timekeeper or the clock setter is photo period.
(32:46):
It can be resources, it can be a few other things,
but the primary thing in mammals is photo period. And
so that is what the brain is using to tell
a bull elk and his testosterone levels should increase. And
when his testosterol levels increase, that's when his antler's harden
(33:08):
and he sheds the velvet, and that's when he starts
into his test he's in large and he starts searching
for potential mates. And so yeah, it absolutely can happen
at the end of August that he starts searching for
potential mates when there's none available.
Speaker 1 (33:27):
Gotcha. And then to wind it back a little bit,
we talked about cows and their health affecting that are
the cows they know by based on I'm not going
to even try to resay the word you did it
sound like lightsaber.
Speaker 2 (33:44):
Light?
Speaker 1 (33:45):
There you go, there you go there. The elks lightsaber,
So if you were to look at that, they know
they need to you know, based on that, which is
a lot to do with photo period and the light
that they're getting. They know they need to try to
be you know, two hundred and forty to two hundred
and fifty days ahead. But then their health also affects that,
so right, so it's a little bit of a balance,
(34:06):
like they know they need to come in now, but
it may take five, ten, fifteen, twenty days based on
them getting their health to a certain point. So they're
just constantly trying to their bodies telling them too, but
they just can't. Is that how that works?
Speaker 2 (34:18):
So yes, yes, and no, so they don't ever make
a conscious decision. Evolution has dictated that when days are
this long, that's the optimal time to go into estress,
and so or actually, when nights are this long, uninterrupted
darkness is what really regulates it. So when nights are
(34:38):
this long, that's what the optimal time to go into estress.
But if a female carried a calf the whole summer,
or she nursed a calf the whole summer, she's still
trying to recover and so she may be delayed if
she was successful in raising a calf. Same thing. If
you're living in a marginal habitat and you had to
(34:59):
really severe winner and you had a calf, you're going
to be delayed a little bit. If you're older, you're
always in poorer condition, and maybe it delayed a little bit.
So evolution is dictated the optimal, but there's a lot
of other forces pushing them off the optimal.
Speaker 1 (35:15):
Gotcha that makes that makes a lot of sense there
in your opinion, And I know we see it a
lot more drastic in the deer population. But is the
rut timing based you know, we've already talked about it
being based on photo period, Which does that coordinate directly
with latitude or does latitude itself have anything to do
(35:37):
with that aside from the days being shorter or longer
than you know, a different latitude.
Speaker 2 (35:43):
Sure, we we don't have a strong analysis on the
effect of latitude for ELK, although we've just developed a
mathematical model where we can look at timing of partration
based on movement patterns and so we can look at that.
But definitely in deer, uh, there is a strong Latin
(36:05):
latitudinal effect. So you would expect it to be similar
in Elk as well, and that is as you go north,
the rut becomes earlier, which I have a little counterintuitive maybe
for some people.
Speaker 1 (36:20):
Yeah, and and I mean it's very noticeable and deer
you know, I was down in Mexico Cus deer hunting
this year in the end of January, and the Cus
deer were, you know, going crazy down there still, you know,
or I like the Arizona over the counter archery taking
meal deer rutting into December through the middle of January,
and our ruts, you know, two months gone. But it
(36:40):
doesn't It seems like I can go down to New
Mexico and Elk hunt and the ruts the same same,
you know, about the same spot as they are up
here in Washington. Maybe a few days either way. But
I was I've always been curious if there's anything that
supports that latitude difference like it does on the deer side.
Speaker 2 (36:57):
So yeah, I don't know. Have me back next year
and I should be able to answer that question more completely.
Even in Utah, from northern part of the state to
the southern part of the state, there's a full two
weeks difference in deer yep. With the northern part of
the state, peak partraition is about June fifth for deer,
(37:20):
and in the southern part of the state it's like
June twenty third, June twenty second, So you bacnate from that,
and so that I mean, that's that's a huge difference latitudinal.
I would expect there's some of that in elk, but
I don't know for sure.
Speaker 1 (37:36):
Yeah, to wrap up rut timing, are there any other
factors that are you know, that correlate high enough that
that's worth talking about. Is it really just based on
that photo period and in the length of the night?
Speaker 2 (37:50):
No. I think the one factor that that we haven't
touched on maybe enough. We have a pretty popular unit
in Utah. It's called the Book Cliffs. It's a really
it's a limited entry deer unit, and it's a limited
entry elk unit, and it's what I would call summer
range limited habitat and get in effect, it's marginal habitat.
(38:13):
There's just not a lot of summer range for elk,
and in dry years, elk are in relatively poor condition,
and only in the best of best years are they
in good condition. But the cool thing if if the
herd in general is in poor condition, the rut will
be much more spread out, and if the herd is
(38:35):
in really good condition, the rut will be much more punctuated.
Speaker 1 (38:39):
Does that make sense, Yeah, yeah, so that the the
elk don't have to spread out to find resources and
find food and you know, and spread out the cows.
They're they're all able to kind of be in that
prime prime area.
Speaker 2 (38:52):
That but I think it's because they're all in good
enough condition to come into astris at the optimal date,
whereas in poor condition, they're just they're just straggling in
getting to that critical condition they need to go into estrs.
And so let me give you an example. One year,
we had forty forty bursts that we were monitoring, and
(39:13):
all forty of those bursts occurred I believe between May
twenty fifth and like June twenty ninth, and the next
year bursts started on May fifteenth, and they all they
went all the way into the middle of July. They
were spread out over two full months, and that they
were in really bad condition the previous rut season. And
(39:36):
so I just think that it can be spread out
a lot more in herds that are old or in
herds that are living in marginal habitat.
Speaker 1 (39:48):
That makes sense. Not that I would necessarily apply for
units around that that idea, but it's it's great to
note that it does exist. And you know, you know,
if you if you had an October season that went
into some of these marginal units, you may still hit
the rut. You know, I wouldn't say in the peak,
but more in the height versus if you were in
a unit that has great summer habitat, the rut is
(40:09):
over earlier. And now that we're talking about this, really
nobody ever believes me when I talk about Southwest Washington.
We set our muzzle atter season on the first Saturday
of October. Our rut is. You can literally slam the
door on our rut for the most part by the
end of like the end of September, first of October.
(40:31):
And it's because we're in a rainforest, right. These elk
don't migrate their local herds. They've got all the food
in the world with clearcuts and all the greenage around here.
But yet I firmly believe our rut is dang near
over on October first, Versus you go up in the
mountains or if I go, I'm like, man, the rut
(40:51):
goes so much longer out of state, you know, and
these other units are up in the mountains, and so
that really correlates with what I've seen on the ground
versus what I've seen in my backyard.
Speaker 2 (41:00):
That's interesting. That's I mean, I I dare hunt usually
the third week of October, and the rut is regularly
still going at least dragglers in our mountains of Utah.
Speaker 1 (41:10):
Yep, yeah, I mean I called a bull my wife's
first bowl. I called in on October twenty ninth, called
it in. And but it was in the mountains, you know,
central mountains, the east slope of the Cascade Mountains, and
it's just different unit, different area, bigger herds, a migratory
unit that has to live on feed grounds, you know,
in the winter versus our care have always just been done.
(41:32):
So that that's that makes sense on maybe why that correlates.
Speaker 2 (41:36):
So I can't remember. We're going to talk about it,
but are we going to talk about pregnancy rates, which
would drive how strong the rut is?
Speaker 1 (41:44):
Yeah, we were going to talk a little bit. I
know I have a note coming on on perceived strength
of the rut and then the cow is coming into estrus.
You know, sometimes only fifty percent of them. So we'll
get into that. Yeah, yeah, in just a little bit.
But matter of fact, the only question I have in
between those two, I wanted to ask about, you know,
one of the perceived things. We're out there hunting. We've
had a couple of good, high pressure days in a row,
(42:06):
ruts really going good. It seems to be getting better
and better, and then you get a rain squall come
in and uh, it shuts the rut down, or that's
what's perceived the rut. The activity seems to be different,
whether it's your hunters get lazier, they're not working as
hard in your opinion, or or when I say your opinion,
is there data that supports the research that supports whether
(42:27):
and how it affects the rut?
Speaker 2 (42:30):
So not that I know of. Uh, again, that's a
question that we're asking right now. Absolutely, weather, it is
going to affect activity patterns. I would say in my
hunting experience, it's exactly the opposite. The worse the weather,
the more it's going. Really and so yeah, if the weather,
maybe because it's so warm here and the elk are
(42:54):
just overheated on during the rut September super hot. Still
they if it's a hot day by early morning, they're
back in the dark timber on the north slopes and
they're bedded down. But if it starts snowing, they're active
all day long.
Speaker 1 (43:09):
Yeah, that makes itse I was told by an old
timer that I used to hunt with or hung around
and got some tips and tricks from. He believed that
the rain washes away all the scent that's on the ground.
I don't know if I believe that or not, but
it was one of those things where it's like you
kind of scratch your head. Is that true? You know,
if cows are you know, close or they're pean you know,
(43:30):
all over the landscape, does that get that bowl fired
up and so he's bugling more as he travels around
or not? I don't know. I've I just kind of
put that in there as far as the weather affecting
the rut and potentially supports what I've seen, But but
it sounds like you've seen the opposite, So it's it's
not necessarily maybe a factor.
Speaker 2 (43:48):
So yeah, definitely. Old factory is the way that el
communicate and tell each other that I'm I'm approaching estris
or I'm an estress or I just ovulated. That's how
That's how they're communicating with each other. So anything that
changes the amount of old factory communication on the landscape
(44:10):
is going to change behavior. Having said that, they have
a pretty keen sense of smell, and I'm not once
the rut's going, I'm not sure that they're using scent
marking as much as before the rut. I think that
they've started to gather up their animals and they're checking
their animals regularly. They have a fleming behavior like bison
(44:33):
where they it's called a lip curl where they can
open up a whole bunch of receptors olfactory receptors in
their nose and they can tell whether that female is
approaching asters or not. But they check them individually by.
Speaker 1 (44:48):
Them yep, yep, yeah, where you see that bowl, get
up and go nudge every cow out of her bed checker,
scent checker, and then move on.
Speaker 2 (44:55):
To the next one.
Speaker 1 (44:56):
Yeah. So that's part one of our podcasts here with
Brock McMillan on ELK. Stay tuned for part two coming
at you next time on cutting the distance
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