No Bull !

[windymtnman]

I'm fortunate to have retired in So. Central Colorado, on our 49 acre horse ranch, which is surrounded on 3 sides by Federal land. That's the good part. The not so good part, is how few Bull Elk there are around here. 3 weeks ago, we went out and put our trail camera out in a Wintering area. Enroute, we saw 25 Elk, and not an antler in the entire bunch. Not even a spike.
Today, I rode a horse back to the area to put the camera out again. This time, I busted a herd of about 40 Elk (+ -). I zoomed up the photos I got, and saw one spike and one modest sized branch antlered Bull amongst them. That was it.
I managed to get some photos and a video before they all disappeared over the ridge, so here's a couple pics of them. Frankly, I'm very disappointed in the Bull/Cow ratios around here. I'm out in the backcountry year around, and think I see/know what's out there as much as any Div. of Wildlife folks.

 

[fez]

Bulls are usually by themselves or in bachelor groups this time of year. Not unusual to see spikes and small raghorns running with the cows

 

[James Riley]

Bulls are usually by themselves or in bachelor groups this time of year. Not unusual to see spikes and small raghorns running with the cows

Bingo.

And the bulls, in my experience, hang higher, further back and in more timber until later, going back in earlier. Hunger or being fed can change that, but as a general principle . . .

 

[.280 Remington]

Yeah, don't expect them in with the cows unless you're at the feed lot in Wyoming

 

[putm2sleep]

uh
you need to stick around a while there greenhorn on big ranch..living the dream...
white man who say no bull elk live there
no ti ti.......

 

[Straight Arrow]

"Armchair wildlife biologist" ... 'just another of my pet peeves, to go arm-in-arm with the "wannabee rancher" phenom.

Typical armchair rationale, "Because I don't see them, the bull elk don't exist in my unit."

 

[hank4elk]

Yesterday I watched couple dozen cows,calves,spike leave my place around 8am.

10:30 am 3 -6x bulls stroll thru going someplace different,not a care in the world.
I just happened to be looking that way at the time.

 

[ScottP]

I used to live smack in the middle of an elk wintering ground, and would do elk surveys occasionally for my biologist wife. There would be 1000+ animals in several large groups, but nearly all with antler were spike or raghorns, but most were cow/calf. Only time I saw any of the bigger bulls was when the snow piled up, but still just a couple here and there. I picked up the sheds on the fringe of the wintering grounds...so my guess is the bulls are there in your area, but as others have pointed out, just in a bit more marginal areas. The CPW flies aerial surveys to count elk on winter range, so they do know how many elk there are (more or less) and have a good estimate for bull/cow.

 

[Jwill]

http://cpw.state.co.us/thingstodo/Pages/HerdManagementPlans.aspx

Some good info here about the Herd Management Plans in CO, scroll down and look-up your area.