LOGAN, W.Va. — West Virginia’s welcome mat for the official return of elk to the Mountain State is laid out. The only thing left to do it would appear is to find some elk.
The DNR recently closed up negotiations on a land purchase which secured more than 32,000 acres of prime habitat in the middle of the Elk Management Zone to restart the species. The agency already held roughly 10,000 acres of the land in the Laurel Lake and Big Ugly Wildlife Management Areas, but only through long term lease agreements. The deal secured ownership of both WMA’s and thousands more additional acres of land surrounding them for wildlife management.
Additionally, DNR personnel have completed some habitat enhancement with the sewing of 27 acres of grass on the Tomblin Wildlife Management Area. Another plot is expected to be seeded in the spring. Also, volunteers recently helped put together the holding pens which will be required when the elk do finally arrive.
“Yeah, we’re ready for the most part,” said Randy Kelly, DNR Biologist charged with overseeing the elk restoration project. “We’re hopeful we can work something out in the near future to get some animals. We stand ready, willing, and hopeful.”
The state’s proposed Elk Management Plan called for the reintroduction to begin in the winter or spring of 2016. Kelly admitted that might be ambitious considering they are in line behind Wisconsin to get elk from the state of Kentucky.
“At this point in time I think something would have to drastically change for us to turn something loose that soon, but at the same time I can’t fully rule that out,” he said. “We’re hopeful to at least get something on the ground in 2016.”
Kentucky has become the most desirable source herd for West Virginia and many other states for elk reintroduction. However, folks in the Bluegrass don’t part easily with their animals. There’s a limit on how elk Kentucky will disperse to other states each year and for the time being, Wisconsin is ahead of West Virginia in that line.
“We’ll have to deal with that as another obstacle to the project,” said Kelly. “Kentucky remains willing to work with us in the future and maybe hopefully after this year we can swing Wisconsin our way to share a little, but who knows. Meanwhile, we’re exhausting all avenues to finding elk.”
Kelly said there’s a chance West Virginia might be able to access some animals from western Kentucky in the Land Between the Lakes. They’ve also made contact with a few western states to see what could be available.
Meanwhile, the mild temperatures in December helped the new grasses sewn in the elk release area to germinate and sprout quickly. The project was aided by a donation from the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation. Meanwhile, the second major project was December 19th when more than 30 volunteers from the local area showed up to assist with the construction of the holding pens in the release area. The pens were donated to West Virginia by the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries, which they used when reestablishing their herd.
Kelly said he was impressed with the progress made by the volunteers in just one day of work. The pens will serve as an area which will allow elk to acclimate to their surroundings when they first arrive in the West Virginia coalfields.
“We’ll actually bring them into West Virginia and release them into this enclosure and give them time to get the adrenaline out of their system so they don’t run off,” he said. “We’ll keep them in there for seven to 14 days maybe, then slowly open the gates and let the meander off into the countryside. It seems to be a very effective way to handle a release.”
However, for now, when the meandering will begin remains the biggest question in southern West Virginia.