Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Elk hunt by camera
PONCA — The year was coming to a close — not any elk seasons of which I was aware — but we decided to take our grandson and his dad to see the elk around Ponca on the second to last day of 2023, and this elk hunt, unlike many others, proved to be successful.
Being somewhat lazy hunters — OK, I’ll speak for myself — we didn’t set off to arrive in Boxley Valley at the crack of dawn. My excuse was that I’d tried that before, only not to see a single elk until midafternoon. Instead, we left Gentry well after the crack of dawn and drove in the daylight for the entire trip.
Descending the steep grade coming into Boxley Valley from Kingston midmorning, we followed Arkansas 21 to the south end of the valley and then turned around and followed Arkansas 21 and 43 north to Ponca. There were no elk to be seen in the valley, and I was thinking to myself that I should have gotten everyone up earlier and arrived at dawn to see elk still grazing in the valley before finding a place in the forest to bed down for the day.
Elk or no elk, Boxley Valley is still one of the prettiest places on earth, and the trip was well worth it just to see the valley and mountains again and show off the place to a son who hadn’t seen it.
And, of course, we had planned to drive over the mountains to Jasper for lunch at the Ozark Cafe, another place that has never been a disappointment.
After a more-than-a-fellowshould-eat lunch, a visit with some locals on the street and in my grandson’s favorite rock shop, we headed back over the mountains to Ponca and visited the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission Nature Center, where we saw elk, bear and other critters about as stuffed as I was after finishing my Ozark Burger in Jasper.
That way, we would at least see an elk or two, even if they hadn’t moved an inch since our last visit there. The woman manning the Nature Center counter (I know, my writing style may appear sexist since I probably couldn’t write that a man was womaning the counter without getting into worse trouble) told us other visitors were reporting elk in the valley, so we figured to have a look-see.
And we did see elk. The first herd was in a pasture along Arkansas 43, a mile or two south of Ponca. We watched them for a while and took a few photos, but they were a considerable distance away. But at least we saw some elk down in the valley; we had accomplished our goal.
We drove on and, when we came to the junction with Arkansas 21, we decided to continue a bit further south, just in case there were more — and there were!
A group of a dozen or more (I didn’t count them) was grazing in a pasture only a few hundred yards away.
We stopped again and got out to take a couple of photos — OK, more than 100 — and, instead of retreating to the trees and the river, they slowly meandered closer and closer, grazing as they went.
Needless to say, we went away feeling like we had a successful elk hunt, even if it was only with a point-and-shoot zoom-lens digital camera and smartphones, which, by the way, can be a lot more difficult than a traditional elk hunt but is so much easier when it comes to the time to pack out. And for those hunting with a camera, Boxley Valley is a great place to go.
And, did you know that eastern elk, which were native to Arkansas, disappeared from the state in the 1840s, and the present herd of approximately 600 animals was introduced in the 1980s from elk herds in Kansas and Nebraska after failed attempts to reintroduce elk from Colorado herds?
For more information on the elk in Boxley Valley or the best times and places to view them, contact or visit the Ponca Nature Center, 4642 Arkansas 43 in Ponca, (501) 710-6347.