Jennifer Murrow sat on the bumper of the pickup and leaned back against the grill, still a little winded.
“I rounded a bend and just ahead of me, I could see two big white rumps and one little white rump. I yelled for Steve to come running. The elk looked back at me and they were outta there.”

It was another bittersweet moment of what had been an emotional roller coaster of a weekend. Murrow, a University of Tennessee doctoral student, is head researcher and field leader of the Great Smoky Mountain National Park’s experimental elk release.

Earlier last week, I had made arrangements with Murrow to accompany her as she made her routine rounds using telemetry (radio tracking) to monitor the elk that had been released into Cataloochee Valley last February. When I arrived at the Cataloochee ranger station last Saturday morning, it was easy to see it was not a routine day. At the station were Murrow, her assistant Carrie Schumacher, Dr. Joe Clark, project leader from the University of Tennessee, three other UT student volunteers, Ken Wilson, elk project photographer for GSMNP, and Rebecca Schiflett, a photographer for the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation. Way too many people to ride around in a pickup locating elk with a telemetry antenna.

Murrow clued me in.

“We think number 12 has calved,” she said.

Eight of the 25 elk released last February were pregnant at the time. As of last Saturday (July 14), there had been three documented births. Those calves were collared and tagged. The extra manpower was present Saturday to help find, collar and document number 32, the fourth calf.

Jennifer briefed everyone at the ranger station, and we headed to the field. That was the last bit of “normal” for the weekend. As soon as the antenna was turned on things began to get a bit odd.
Vaginal implants had been placed in the eight pregnant cows. The idea was that when the cows gave birth, the implants would be forced out, producing a different radio signal and alerting researchers to the birth to help them find the calf.

Friday evening, Schu-macher recorded elk number 12 and the implant on the south side of the road. Saturday morning, number 12 was on the south side of the road but the implant was on the north side.

Murrow and Clark decided to “walk-in” on number 12 using the telemetry unit. We waited by the roadside. After an hour or so, we were waved across the field. Number 12 had been located, but she had spooked and begun to move, staying just ahead of the researchers.

Puzzled by the moving implant, we searched the area between the stream and the edge of the field. We found nothing. Murrow decided to find the implant.

Following the radio receiver, we crossed the field on the north side of the road and entered the woods. We found the implant in an area where the elk frequently bed down. There were no signs of birth. We hiked back to the road. It was mid-afternoon.

Number 12 had returned to the same area, where she had first been located. Murrow said this would be expected if she indeed had a calf. She would have left it hidden when they walked in on her and then returned to it later.

They decided to pinpoint the location of the cow and try again. To pinpoint the location, one person tunes the antenna till its pointing directly toward the signal; a second person lines up behind the antenna and, using a compass, takes a bearing. Researchers move a few tenths of a mile and repeat the procedure. Then they plot the two bearings on a map. The location is the point where the two lines intersect.

After triangulating the location of number 12, researchers walked in again. Once again, the cow eluded them.

After a knee-deep stream crossing, we were in the area where the cow had been bedding down. We lined up five feet apart and swept a grid around the area. We found nothing. Murrow decided to halt the search until Sunday morning.

Elk calves are camouflaged with white spots, like white-tailed deer fawn. Their defense against predators is to remain motionless. They can present quite a challenge to find. Murrow said it took 15 hours to find the first calf.

Sunday morning we began anew. The troops had thinned. Murrow, Steve Dobey, Wilson, Schiflett and I were present. Number 12 was back in her regular haunt. Murrow and Dobey triangulated her position and walked in.

We waited streamside. After about an hour, Dobey motioned us across the stream. They had found the birthing site. Murrow said they had never found such a recent calving site. She said it may have only been 12 to 15 hours old. The fact that the placenta was still there was telling. Cows generally consume the placenta and meticulously clean the calf soon after birth as a precaution against predators.

Because the birth was so recent, Murrow decided not to search for the calf to avoid stressing either the mother or the baby. She decided to check on another elk, number 18, whose birthing date was imminent.
Dobey and Murrow triangulated number 18’s location. They walked in near her. They could see her moving through the woods. They separated, and that’s when Murrow came upon the trio of rumps.
Murrow has captured calves a day or two old when they were found with their mother. But she said the little rump she saw Sunday was much too fast.

She speculated the calf could belong to number 5, a wary, older cow that researchers have had little luck getting visuals on. She left Cattaloochee Valley, Sunday with tag number 32 still in her pocket and the unsolved mystery of the “walking implant.”

But it wasn’t such a bad weekend. She was able to document the fact that there have been at least five births this summer in Cattaloochee. Three calves are tagged and known to be doing well. One appears to be trying out for the Olympics, and maybe number 32 will be tagged any day now.

The herd is becoming more visible in the valley meadows. Most activity is early and late. Wilson said he recently watched a group of young bulls head butting and mock fighting. Number 11 and her calf have been seen regularly in Mulls meadow.

(Don Hendershot can be reached at don@smokymountainnews.com)

 

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