Elk questions

We have been raising elk for over 10 years and they are much easier to raise than Whitetails.  To answer your questions, We feed our elk some grain at certain times of the year, much like we did the whitetail, when we had them.  We use a protein mix of about 16% during the growing seasons and about 12% during the off season or if they have available pasture, nothing at all during the off seasons.  We usually feed our cow's about 4 lbs of grain per day, when needed and if you have good pasture, you may not need anything.  Just watch the body condition.  We usually feed our bulls about 7 to 9 lbs per day during the antler growing season and if we velvet them, they just get pasture, after velveting.  Again, just watch the body condition.  If you have hard horn bulls, they can be hard on the fencing, I don't know how they would be if you have tree's in the pens as we don't have any, but as long as they have something to rub on, they will rub.  As far as hardiness, they seem to be better than whitetail.  We worm ours about 3 times a year and use no vaccines.  If you calve in the same pen, year after year, you can run into some problems, but if you don't overload the pen, you should be fine.  As far as the elk market, it may be a good time to get into the game.  The velvet prices have gone back up, the meat animals, shooters and breeding stock are in good demand and the number of elk out there has gone way down.  If you would like to talk more, please feel free to pm me or call me at 920-36-8871.


 


Troy

Any sites like this one for elk farmers.

yes wapiti.net

I think elk would be fun. I also love the bugle from a bull. I've kicked around the idea of getting a pair (cow and bull). Any idea on prices?

Cows are running anywhere from $1,000, as high as $5,000, but you should be able to get some good genetics for under $2500.  As far as bulls, alot depends on age and genetics.  You should be able to buy young bulls for $1,000 to $3,000, but you can spend considerably more if you want too.  I hope this helps and is not to vague.

Good info. Just looking for a ball park estimate

my next door neibor  has two cows and a good bull but we have never heard him bugle for three years now guess they need more cows and another bull ? Troy T&S

Our elk bulls never bugled. They were in a pen were they can all see each other at all times. Our bulls only squealed similar to a cow but was more aggressive sounding, we live in North East Kansas and we had wild elk we actually seen during the day 50 yards from one of our bull pens. I'm sure the wild elk were right by the bulls at night when we weren't there. You'll enjoy elk. They were a blast . All of ours were bottle fed so we pet on them and had guest out to look and pet them. We got rid of elk about 8 years ago due to someone who killed our breeder bull and stole his head and left his body lay.