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Little Foggy




Rio7

That's pretty cool. Never a dull moment around your place!

Are they free range?

I have heard that are a few bison in TX also, most likely on game ranches

Awesome Rio7 !

Unless they escaped, there are no free ranging Bison left in TX. Most are privately owned on Ranches.

Our State Parks have some herds, but they are still worked and managed like cattle.

Closest I know of to me is there are a few free range elk in southcentral Llano county in the Cedar mountain area. They showed up on old family friends ranch (low fence)after the big flood in 2005. They still have anfew that just won’t leave the mountain. Ranch owner says they still show up on his hunters game cameras. They seem to like the mountain!

And apparently there are several now up in northern Burnet county, as someone somehow allowed several to escape off my cousins exotic ranch. These were some of the red deer crosses. I haven’t spoken to couz as of yet for the whole skinny on that situation.

I wasn’t hating just asking. I thought after I read what I posted it sounded a little rough. Not my intention

There’s a free ranging herd of Elk out in the Ft Davis Mountains area of West TX that escaped many many years ago. Every once in a while you will hear of a hunter taking one.
Originally, Elk were native to TX, and said to be pretty numerous out on the plains.

The pic's of Elk I posted are not free range, they are in aa 20,000 acre high fence. Rio7

Buddy of mines Ranch I hunt in Coleman County has a neighboring high fenced Ranch with a pretty good sized herd of Elk. It’s weird to be whitetail hunting in TX early morning and hear an Elk bugle.

I think the elk are doing pretty well in free range West Texas. I see them occasionally around Alpine, between Ft Stockton and Marathon, the Van Horn area, and Ft Davis as you mentioned. The huge Longfellow between Marathon and Sanderson has a well established herd too.

Thanks JG. Good to know they’re still out there.

There are lots of elk scattered in West Texas.....the NM herd continues to creep south too....

There is or was a free ranging herd in the Guadalupe Mts. They had elk there previously but were exterminated sometime around the turn of the last century. They were re-introduced in the 1920s or 30s and thrived but by the 1970s they were getting inbred. Not sure of the current status. I hope some NM elk have moved in to revitalize this heard.

A friend shot one last month in chihuahua desert country near Sanderson. Maybe it came from the Longfellow Ranch. I found a shed of a 360 class bull in the same area, unfortunately only one antler. Surprising that they can thrive in such arid and rough terrain. Parks and wildlife wrongly insists they are non native and wants to get rid of them.

We harvested two this past year just east of Fort Stockton. We have seen them on the property for three or four years. They are out there and they are free range elk.

A biologist told me that the free ranging elk were competing with the Bighorn population, and impeding restocking efforts. Hence, the push to eliminate all elk in West Texas.

There was a cow elk taken by a hunter here in GA 10-12 years ago. A truck pulling a stock trailer loaded with elk was involved in an accident on I75 between Atlanta and Chattanooga and some escaped. Most were recaptured, but it was during hunting season and some guy shot what he thought was a huge whitetail doe. Until he got closer and realized it wasn't a deer. He self reported the incident, but it was not illegal. He was allowed to keep the meat.

That is news to me. Interesting as every legislative session they (TPWD, RMEF) keep trying to make Elk a game animal and under TPWD to regulate the season and taking of the animal. If they really wanted to get rid of them, they would want to keep them as an exotic which are unregulated. If any thing, I would think those pesky Aoudad would be competing with the Big Horn Sheep

Just this weekend an elk was struck and killed by a vehicle on hwy 136 between Fritch and Amarillo.

This is true in the Glass Mts. and Elephant Butte but there are many areas with Elk and no sheep. I would like to see more of both. Elk are grazers and browsers and do not impact Bighorn sheep much where their ranges over lap except possibly winter time concentrations of elk. These areas usually don't overlap the bighorns winter range. But maybe different with the more marginal desert habitat where they both subsist on Sotol and Lechugia when other forbes aren't available.

TX voted not to consider elk a game animal. You can shoot them when you find them.
Kinda like wolves and coyotes around here.

They are in the Austin city limits.

Wait until someone busts one of them with a Prius!

Not to worry, the city has posted "Elk Crossing" signs.

LOL! The stories I can tell from my 12 years in Traffic operations, Austin district, TxDOT!

Especially dealing with animal crossing signs!

I hunt in Burnet county, we have them on cameras from time to time. I heard a Bull two years ago, pretty cool for the first 100 times. Got annoying after a while.

I've seen a couple of pics of a bull killed last year near Alpine that went over 400". I've seen some pics fro other hunters of free range elk between Sheffield and the Dryden gas plant off FM 349. they haven't gotten close to my lease yet, but I sure wish they would.