ELK HERD COUNTS IN COASTAL DEL NORTE AND NORTHERN HUMBOLDT
COUNTIES OF CALIFORNIA
By
NAME REDACTED
Final Project
GSP 101, Fall 2016
Humboldt State University
INTRODUCTION
Elk, Cervus canadensis, are a species of conservation and management concern in
Northern California. There are various reasons that elk are a focus of wildlife management in the
area, and most of the management actions require the knowledge of how many elk herds occupy
the Northern California landscape, as well as how many individuals make up each herd. For
example, elk are a big draw for tourists in the area. The tourism website redwoods.info has a
whole page dedicated to seeing the elk in Humboldt County. Conversely, the elk cause
significant property damage on occasion and are considered a pest to home and business owners.
Recently, there was a large showing of concerned residents at a Del Norte County Board of
Supervisors meeting who spoke up about their desire to be included in decisions regarding the
management of the growing elk population (Welter 2015). Elk are also important because of
their status as a big game animal. In 2016, 15 bull tags were allocated to the public from the
California Department of Fish and Wildlife as a lottery, and additionally, elk tags are often used
as an incentive for private land owners to cooperate in habitat management and conservation of a
variety of species. Not to mention the fact that these elk have a unique ecological niche and they
play an important role in their natural communities. The elk of Northern California are a
subspecies known as Roosevelt elk, Cervus canadensis roosevelti, are the largest extant
subspecies of elk, and are the second largest member of the deer family in North America (only
the moose, Alces alces, is larger).
Management decisions relating to all of these issues cannot be made responsibly without
knowledge of elk abundance in the area. When considering how to deal with property damage
caused by elk, reducing the number of elk in an area is often an option. However, it is risky to
cull a herd of elk without a confident estimate of the size of the herd to begin with. If too many
animals are removed, the herd may not be able to sustain itself. Elk gain protection from living in
a herd, including increased vigilance for predators and less probability of being attacked by a
predator, so reducing the size of the herd may make it harder for the remaining animals to
survive. Managers also have to weigh the concern about property damage with the benefits of
tourism and hunting, and the role the elk play in the ecosystem. As far as hunting is concerned,
managers want there to be more elk available to hunt so that hunters are happy, but also because
hunting is a crucial source of funding for wildlife conservation and management. For instance,
elk tags sold by CDFW for the 2016 hunt were $445.61 for residents and $1,361.20 for
nonresidents (CDFW 2016). The larger the elk population is, the more tags CDFW can sell
without threatening the health of the population.
DATA COLLECTION METHODS
In order to get an idea of how many elk are in the local population, I began doing road
surveys for CDFW in June of 2016. These road surveys consisted of driving specified routes,
searching for elk visible from the road, and stopping to count the elk when they were
encountered. The survey routes included stretches of Highway 101 and other roads between Big
Lagoon and just North of the Oregon border. Each time I saw elk, I would pull over to the
shoulder to record information. I would record the start time, and starting conditions including
cloud cover, wind, and precipitation, then I would count the elk. I used a spotting scope or
binoculars, depending on how far away the elk were, in order to get the most accurate count
possible. I would record the number, of bulls, cows, calves, and spikes (males with unbranching
antlers) as well as the location using a Garmin GPS unit. After all the elk were counted, I would
record the ending conditions (cloud cover, wind, precipitation) and the end time. For the
purposes of this report, I used the data from June-December 2016 and found an average total
number of elk for each herd, and chose the point where each herd was most often spotted. I then
joined the elk count averages with the GPS points.
RESULTS
The other volunteers and I have so far completed at least 157 surveys from June 8th
through November 27th that were included in the dataset for my map. From the survey records, I
have identified eleven distinct elk herds including Orick, Bald Hills 1, Bald Hills 2, Ocean View,
Tolowa, Big Lagoon, Davidson Road, Crescent Beach, School House, Rowdy Creek, and Gold
Bluffs Beach. The herd that was seen the fewest times was the Gold Bluffs Beach herd, which
was only seen one survey (but was only served a few times), and the herd that was most often
encountered was the Davidson Road herd which was counted at least fourteen times. The most
elk ever seen in one herd was 100 elk counted on one survey of the Tolowa herd. The Tolowa
herd also had the highest mean herd count at 69 individuals. On average, the smallest herd was
the Rowdy Creek herd, the Northern most herd, with a mean herd count of seven individuals.
Figure 1. Mean herd size of Roosevelt elk, Cervus canadensis roosevelti, herds in coastal
northern California (Humboldt and Del Norte Counties), based on survey data from June through
November, 2016. Base map NAIP 2012, Natural Color, California RGB.
DISCUSSION
The results of the surveys were mostly what was expected based on previous knowledge
of the elk herds in coastal Humboldt and Del Norte Counties. The elk herds were spending most
of their time in the locations that we expected them to, and we found about the number of herds
that we expected to find. There were some reports of elk in places where we did not see them
consistently, though. These groups of elk seemed to use much more wooded areas, and came into
open spaces less, than the rest of the herds. These herds were also smaller than most of the other
herds, so it is probable that they are truly out there, but that they weren’t seen on a survey. In
addition, our surveys were limited to areas visible by public roads. This meant that there were
some large areas that were not surveyed due to lack of accessibility, so there are likely herds that
occupy land that was simply not part of our survey area.
In the future, there are a few changes I would make to the design of this study. To begin
with, I would make the protocol for the surveys narrower. Currently, the only time restriction on
the protocol is that surveys were not to be conducted before sunrise or after sunset. However, I
found that there were some herds that were only active in the early morning (within an hour of
sunrise), some that were usually only seen during the middle of the day (10:00-16:00), and some
that seemed to only be active in the afternoons or evenings (15:00-sunset). With that in mind, I
would want to make sure that each route was surveyed on at least a few occasions during each of
those three time windows. That would help to ensure that we weren’t missing elk because of the
time of day.
Furthermore, I would try to recruit more volunteers, or have a full-time paid intern, so
that more time can be dedicated to surveys. There were only a handful of surveys done South of
Humboldt Bay mostly due to the limited people and time available. There are definitely elk
living in Southern Humboldt, but the number of individuals and the number of herds there
remains unknown. This information is very valuable, and our methods would be easily adaptable
for this region if we had the people and time to do it.
Now that we have a better idea of how many elk herds are living in coastal northern
Humboldt and Del Norte Counties, we can make decisions about other projects and studies
involving these elk. The CDFW and Humboldt State University are working together to radio
collar some of the elk in order to learn more about their home ranges, health, activity patterns,
reproduction, and survival. In order to radio collar elk, they must be tranquilized first. This is not
as simple a process as it might seem, and knowing where the elk herds live is important in
planning the collaring process. For example, elk that live close to water will be trickier to
tranquilize because we need to make sure they won’t be able to run into the water after they are
darted or else they will drown. In some cases we might be able to set up a corral trap so that we
have more control over where the elk go. However, these traps need bait, and we can only use
bait to lure in the elk in areas that do not have many bears, since bears will also be attracted to
the bait and would scare off, or potentially injure, the elk. Fortunately, having our target elk
herds mapped out will be a huge help in making sure we take all of these factors into account
when planning the next stages of our project.
REFERENCES
California Department of Fish and Wildlife. 2016. Hunting licenses and tags.
https://www.wildlife.ca.gov/Licensing/Hunting Accessed 07 December 2016.
Welter, Laura J. 30 June 2015. County seeks role in elk policy. The Triplicate
http://www.triplicate.com/csp/mediapool/sites/Triplicate/News/story.csp?cid=4397018&sid=923
&fid=151 Accessed 07 December 2016.