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.
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 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.
Thank you very much, Lisa.
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?
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.
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 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 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?
Group?
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?
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, moon phase. So I don't have a complete answer for that, but undoubtedly it has some effect.
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 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 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, 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 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.
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. 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.
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 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.
They're running, Jason, so I think that you're probably right there.
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 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.
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. 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 the woods, there's no reason to be timid getting close.
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 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 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. 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.
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 conflict that I can.
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, 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.
I don't think anybody studied that, but I can't imagine there's an effect.
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 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 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?
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 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, 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 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 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?
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
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 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.
Excellent.
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
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.
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 far as the bulls run the herd for that amount of time, or do the lead cows run the run the herd?
Like?
Just give us a five minute snapshot of the elk rat and what's taking place.
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
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 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
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.
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.
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 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.
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 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 estrius those kind of off times outside of that twenty two day window you kind of just mentioned.
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 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 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 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.
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 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.
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 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.
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.
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 for deer, but elk two they're running on fumes by by April. Gotcha.
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 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 the rut?
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 they meet and it may be very different than where they've spent the whole summer, either of them. If that makes sense.
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 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.
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.
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.
In that area.
They may just be hanging out in the secluded type basin or whatnot, or non visible.
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.
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.
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 it all summer.
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
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.
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
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.
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 throwing some of my experience there.
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. 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 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.
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 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 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 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.
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 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.
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 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.
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.
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 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 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 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. 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 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.
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.
Light?
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, 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?
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 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 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.
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 with that aside from the days being shorter or longer than you know, a different latitude.
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 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.
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 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.
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, 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.
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?
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. 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 in really good condition, the rut will be much more punctuated.
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.
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 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 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.
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
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. 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 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.
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.
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. So that that's that makes sense on maybe why that correlates.
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?
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,
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 and how it affects the rut?
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 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.
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, 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.
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 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 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.
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.
To the next one.
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