No good deed?
How something that started with a salt block and some water became an “elk nutrition program.”
This was my fourth year on the Divide. The elk were plentiful the first winter, but over time they avoided our pasture, which made me a little sad. Then, a long drought left vegetation sparse and water even scarcer. So when I noticed some elk cows in the horse pasture during the last days of winter, I figured I’d give them some help. I used the overflow from my water storage tank to fill some stock tanks for them and put out a big salt block, thinking the drought probably made it hard for them to find both water and salt.
This was partially correct. Early morning on the Thursday before Easter, I checked on my main pasture, where I put out a $160 six-string, eight-foot big bale (1,200 pounds) every week. There was my old Arabian, Silver, contentedly sharing the remains of the bale with some elk cows.
I know of no harm that can come from this interspecies mingling, but I felt it best to put out some separate hay for the elk girls. At first just a few cows came around, but soon 10 to 20 elk joined in the feeding frenzy, gobbling up five small bales in two days. At that rate, elk food would cost close to $1,000 a month. So I headed down along the Rio Grande to shop for a cheaper way to feed the beautiful creatures who shared our mountain. I came home with another big bale, but it was no bargain: This bale cost $150—$10 less than my horse bale—but it was only two-thirds of the weight of my horse hay bales.
The elk underscored my poor planning by going through the bale in two days, pushing my estimated monthly elk feeding costs up into the $2,000 to $2,500 range. Clearly, I needed to rethink my elk nutrition program.
My new strategy was to switch from
alfalfa to Bermuda grass bales, hoping the elk girls would consume it at a slower, more affordable, rate. And the plan seemed to work at first. On April 10, I put out two $25 three-string Bermuda grass bales from Arizona. Five days later, on April 15, I put out three more Bermuda bales, two of which remained intact a couple of days later. So far, so good, I thought.
Then on Thursday, April 18, I checked the horses’ stock tanks, which I had filled with 600 gallons only four days earlier, and found them near-dry. Were six horses really each drinking 25 gallons of water daily, instead of the usual 12 to 15 gallons? The answer was revealed the next morning: Apparently the head elk girl had told her herd, “To heck with this Bermuda BS! Back to the horse pasture for some real food, and while we’re there we can drink our fill too.” Thus the “disappearing water” mystery and my folly in trying to substitute Bermuda grass for alfalfa were both exposed. I brought home more $25 threestring Arizona bales, but alfalfa this time.
These are all females, except for an occasional yearling boy staying with his mother for a second year. The bachelors, those adult males unable to secure their own cows, run in a pack of their own and are far too wary to come close to humans. The giant bull who claims these cows moves in his own world, of which I have only occasional magical glimpses.
I probably should just let the elk eat and drink with the horses, but I am a little obsessive about monitoring the horses’ food and water intake, which is thwarted when the elk share in the provisions. So it’s back on the road in the morning with a big truck to get more Arizona alfalfa bales. I will just have to manage the extra expense until the rain falls and the green grasses return.
I knew about being horse-poor (my normal condition) but being elkimpoverished is a new sensation. I suppose I’ll get used to it given that, the way I see it, there’s no other choice. Pray for rain, and for the elk, and pray for fools like me.