Elk farm divide

Standing sentinel over a snow-covered meadow, two trophy bull elk watched as Gary Queen’s pickup pulled to a halt about 100 yards downhill. Unlocking a gate along the 8-foot-tall, high-tensile fence that surrounds the field, Queen pulled up to a bin, unloaded several stacks of hay and a few protein blocks, while the animals cautiously moved down a fenced shoot.

Here on the mountainous, 144-acre Rose Lake Elk Ranch that Queen manages in the Fourth of July Creek Valley east of Lake Coeur d’Alene, his livelihood is tied to the health of each of the 150 elk that roam the divided property. Like most elk farmers, most of his income comes from a variety of elk products, with Queen’s mainly derived from the jutting, jagged antlers of bull elk that sprout out every spring. The velvet antler is most often pulverized and used in a line of pills, creams and health remedies for arthritis and other uses, as well as in traditional Chinese medicines.

“What a unique animal to raise domestically,” Queen said, referring to the diversity the herds offer elk farmers, with a majority selling their lean, low-fat meat.

On a handful of prearranged visits each year, however, Queen allows hunters – mostly the disabled or handicapped – to track and “harvest” a trophy bull. Although he doesn’t consider his business a so-called “shooter bull” operation, the harvests not only bring in extra income, but Queen believes they offer an experience for a segment of hunters that would be otherwise unattainable.

Domestic elk issue divides Idahoans

But the issue of domestic elk is as dividing in the Gem State as the herds at the Rose Lake ranch, where high-tensile fences split the domestic stock from their wild counterparts. It’s an image mirrored in the state’s legislature, where legislative bills, counter proposals and loose-talk over voter initiatives – most recently to ban new domestic elk farms and the hunting of elk on existing farms – bubble up on a yearly basis. There are 10 elk harvest facilities scattered around the state, according to the Idaho Department of Agriculture, which oversees all 79 domestic cervidae farms that include elk, fallow deer and reindeer, 57 of which are elk-raising operations. Herd sizes for cervidae farms range from one to 923 animals, with elk harvest ranches ranging from 250 to 11,000 acres.

Since transferring departmental hands more than a decade ago from Idaho Fish and Game to the Department of Agriculture, the debate surrounding domestic elk hasn’t let up. With the topic touching on everything from private property rights and hunting ethics, to licensing and disease spread, neither side along the lawmaking aisle seems likely to reach an agreement anytime soon.

“It’s a very gray area,” said Mark Bell, president of the Idaho Sportsmen’s Caucus Advisory Council. Asked if he thinks an agreement appears likely, Bell said, “Is it going to get better? I don’t think so.”

In most nearby states, including Washington, Wyoming, Oregon and Montana, elk farms have seen strong restrictions put in place, or have been outright banned, said Sen. David Langhorst, D-Boise, who’s been one of the most vocal elk farm opponents in recent years.

For Langhorst, Bell and many members of the sportsmen’s caucus advisory council, the very definition of hunting, as well as the state’s history of hunting free-range, wild elk, are at stake. “That’s our tradition. We are not animal rights activists. The fact is, when you go hunting, those animals are free-range,” Langhorst said. On the other hand, he added, at shooter bull operations, “you know that those elk are in there. Most of those places even offer a 100 percent guarantee. That should not even be called hunting …We are going to do everything we can to stop that from being our definition of hunting.”

Supporter: “This is where my heart lies”

However, elk farm supporters offer a different take. In addition to the economic boost the often-wealthy hunters give the state by traveling to the area, buying supplies and paying to shoot bulls, some ranch operators offer personal accounts for why they got in the business.

In the hilly, wooded terrain outside of Athol, Ben Dorn is set to open later this year his more than 200-acre Broken Arrow Elk Ranch, where the impetus behind building the operation was his father, a quadriplegic who was crippled by a logging accident and was in a wheelchair for 27 years. Dorn, owner of Clearwater Log Homes and a home builder by trade, has spent the last eight years at a cost of more than $1 million turning a long-held dream into a reality.

“The reason I started the elk ranch is I could never figure out a way to get my dad elk hunting,” he recalled, adding that his father’s bulky chair made it virtually impossible. At the Broken Arrow site, Dorn has set out to offer a hunting environment for the disabled, which he hopes will include a partnership with Safari Club International and Camp Patriot to bring in wounded Iraq War veterans. Dorn’s hunting clients will stay in hunting cabins, where they can either bugle the elk, or hunt the bulls by somewhat-guided four-wheeler expeditions out into the forested land.

“That’s where my heart lies,” he said, though adding that he’ll have to allow able-bodied hunters in to pay the bills.

Still, he said, the focus will be on slow hunts with the disabled. “I don’t care about being in a hurry; I’m not in this to make a lot of money. I just want to make them feel like a normal person for a day or two. … That’s what we are going to focus on.”

As for the conditions surrounding hunting trophy bulls, Dorn laid out what he and other elk ranchers call purposeful lies and mistruths made to distort the public’s perception. There will be no luring the animals in, nor will they be tied up, waiting for a kill shot. The bulls are free to roam the property, living off the land’s natural food and water supplies. “Nothing could be farther from the truth,” he said. “It’s not as easy as they want to portray it in the paper.”

Other than the issue of hunting ethics, a current debate swirls around licensing proposals and private property rights.

The Idaho Department of Agriculture requires a step-by-step approval process for elk farms. During the state’s last legislative session, there was a schism in the elk breeders association over a plan that would have licensed elk farms, with some members willing to allow it as a compromise. The association ultimately blocked it, citing a violation of private property rights.

“Where do they stop after that?” said Kristy Sternes, president of the Idaho Elk Breeders Association, adding that many elk farm owners believe such measures are the first step in their opponents trying to shut them down, or risk having their farmland seized under a “takings” law. “That’s why wouldn’t give them an inch, because we knew that was the purpose behind the bill.”

Elk farmers noted that, with a host of meticulous and government-tracked restrictions already in place, including check-ups that certify herds are disease free, twice-a-year shots and each elk death logged with the state, they feel there is enough red tape to wade through.

“To me, licensing was just taking away more of my private property rights with nothing in return,” Dorn said.

Worries over diseases

Still, opponents such as Bell believe licensing the farms is a necessary step, especially when it comes to monitoring the transfer of diseases, such as chronic wasting disease, tuberculosis and brucellosis, between domestic and wild herds. While chronic wasting disease, a transmissible, progressive and fatal disease, has never been found in an Idaho elk farm, Bell and Langhorst said it is only a matter of time until it surfaces, as many elk farms are located along wild game corridors.

“It’s not a matter of will it come here, it’s a matter of when,” said Bell, adding that elk have tested positive in Montana, South Dakota, Wyoming and the Canadian provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan. Bell said that since nose-to-nose contact is a possibility and wild animals can sometimes cross into elk farm property on a high snow drift or through a damaged fence, added restrictions should be enforced, whether as a second fence line surrounding the original, or a licensing requirement.

Without a license, “you have no way to control good or bad players in the system,” he said. “Would it solve all the problems? No, but it’s a step in the right direction to control” some of those issues.

Elk ranchers, however, argue that domestic herds aren’t a threat to wild populations, and there isn’t any statewide scientific evidence to back up either wild elk crossing fence lines, or the spreading of diseases from wild to domestic herds, especially since no one knows how chronic wasting disease is transmitted. Those claims, Sternes said, are disease scare tactics. “That’s why it’s important to get the truth out there,” she said, adding that even if a domestic elk escapes, it’s no different than cattle getting out.

Keeping a healthy herd is, in fact, an elk rancher’s utmost concern, said Queen, since they are “our livelihood.”

“As far as the disease issues, if you stop and think about it, we test these animals every two years for TB and brucellosis, and also for CWD when the elk die. The fear should be on our side of the fence, that we are going to get something from outside the fence,” he said. “My opinion is that they ought to be treating us like a canary in a coal mine.”

And the idea, not to mention added cost, of building a second fence line, Sternes said, is an attempt to “price us out of business.” While quick to point out she doesn’t have any personal grudges against opponents on the other side of the issue, she said the elk breeders association will do everything in its power to educate the public on the true nature of elk farms, their varied purposes and benefits to the state and economy, including by proposing a recent bill that would create a cervidae council.

“It’s about what’s best for the industry. Whether or not the bill goes through, we’ll come up with something because we value our land and we are not going to sit back and let them take it,” she said. “What’s important right now is surviving.”

With no end to the debate in sight, Langhorst said there remains the possibility of a voter initiative to ban new domestic farms and hunting on existing ranches, since he said the legislature in Idaho won’t pass more stringent bills. While the senator credited the domestic elk industry for taking steps to “clean itself up,” the issue, he said, “I don’t think it’s going away anytime soon.”