July 19, 2011 Program - National Elk Refuge

Our program was presented by Rotarian Steve Kallin. The National Elk Refuge is just completing a 9 year study on the effects of winter feeding of elk on the Refuge. Over 11,000 comments have been received. The Refuge is highly aware of the potential for disease that results from concentrating animals on a feedline, and so has just completed installing an irrigation system that will expand the irrigated acreage on the Refuge from 900 to 4300 acres. This should help provide natural forage and reduce the need for alfalfa pellet feeding.

The Refuge also participated in a program to get hunters on the Refuge to use non-lead bullets, in order to reduce the amount of lead poisoning in ravens and eagles, which results when the birds feed on the bullet-fragment laced carcasses left by hunters. The program has been successful - in 2010, ravens showed a 47% reduction in lead in their blood.

The draft comprehensive plan for the Refuge will be released in the Spring of 2012. For more information, go to www.fws.gov/nationalelkrefuge.