Wild Elk was lastly sighted in the year 1875. Randy Kelley and his staff in the Wester Virginia Division of Natural Resources always keeps an eye on the state Elk’s sight. Not a single day goes that they don’t look for a single sight of the Wilf Elk. Kelley who is a state biologist has been the project leader on this since it started in 2015. Kelly and his team of other biologists along with the wildlife managers of divisions of natural resources are replacing the expired GPS collars and also placing some on the young elk to track the state Elk. They started replacing this year on the month of February and March.
One day,Kelley along with his crew member went on to a ride to sight of some elk in the wildlife. Wildlife technician Jake Wimmer assisted him on this. Kelley with his impressive looking dart gun loaded it and hid himself into a blind to dart an Elk after he sees it. Kelley waited for a long time to sight it and it was a great test of patience for him and his crew members that day. Jake Wimmer who was assisting Kelley said that it was just like hunting an Elk that day, but the intention was to change the GPS collars which would have expired. The crew members with Kelley had a great experience in this and shared their experiences with Kelley to help him sight and dart the Elk. They all waited for a long time sharing their personal job experiences. Suddenly during this conversation was going on, Kelley sighted and Elk and darted it with his gun loaded with CO2. After the young elk was darted, Kelley along with his officials gathered around the unconscious elk and began their process. They rolled thebull elk onto his chest so that he can breathe properly, They closed his eyes with a hood so that he can feel less stress. All the crew members were assigned a specific task as they didn’t have the whole day with the Bull elk and he might get unconscious any time. They took its DNS sample for testing, checked its teeth, and placed a new GPS collar on the bull for tracking. Team said that in March the air is much colder and it is the best time to dart the elk and replace the expired GPS collar. The warmer the weather the heater the elk will feel and might damage its health.
The whole process of darting, testing, collecting the sample and replacing the collar took about 15 minutes. After that Kelley gave elk, a drug to counteract the tranquilizer so that the elk could wake up. After giving the drug, the big animal stood on its feet and then started walking with little drowsiness. But everything seemed fine as the experience person said that the elk usually feel so. The moment when the elk walked some distance and then turned back to take a look at Kelley and his crew member was pretty astonishing.
