A cooperative study between the Wyoming Game and Fish Department (WGFD) and
the U.S. Forest Service’s Secure Rural Schools Resource Advisory Committee for the Medicine Bow National Forest will provide information on how hunters and elk use the forest and how that use may change throughout different stages of the mountain pine beetle epidemic. Baggs Game and Fish Wildlife Biologist Tony Mong says the study was implemented because of the potential impacts beetle kill will have on the way elk use the forest and hunters hunt in the forest.“The epidemic of mountain beetle kill within pine forests of the west has been well documented,” Mong said. “More than 1.5 million acres of forest in northern Colorado and southern Wyoming have been affected. This tree mortality is resulting in a drastically changing landscape that could impact elk and hunters in the Sierra Madre Portion of the Medicine Bow National Forest.” Mong says the Sierra Madre elk herd (SMEH) is one of the keystone elk herds in Wyoming, producing over 30,000 recreation days ($2.6 million in hunter expenditures) and averaging one of the highest elk harvest in the state over the last 10 years. The current herd is estimated to be approximately 8,000 animals, double the population objective of 4,200.
the U.S. Forest Service’s Secure Rural Schools Resource Advisory Committee for the Medicine Bow National Forest will provide information on how hunters and elk use the forest and how that use may change throughout different stages of the mountain pine beetle epidemic. Baggs Game and Fish Wildlife Biologist Tony Mong says the study was implemented because of the potential impacts beetle kill will have on the way elk use the forest and hunters hunt in the forest.“The epidemic of mountain beetle kill within pine forests of the west has been well documented,” Mong said. “More than 1.5 million acres of forest in northern Colorado and southern Wyoming have been affected. This tree mortality is resulting in a drastically changing landscape that could impact elk and hunters in the Sierra Madre Portion of the Medicine Bow National Forest.” Mong says the Sierra Madre elk herd (SMEH) is one of the keystone elk herds in Wyoming, producing over 30,000 recreation days ($2.6 million in hunter expenditures) and averaging one of the highest elk harvest in the state over the last 10 years. The current herd is estimated to be approximately 8,000 animals, double the population objective of 4,200.
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