cow-calf ratio horrible

[wawhitey]

so ive spent a lot of time trying to figure out a small local elk population. one specific mountain ive been looking at for a few years, from what i can tell, only has about a half dozen cows and a couple bulls. from what ive been getting on my camera it seems like there are only one or two elk calves (calfs?) with the group of cows. in this state hound hunting and bear baiting have been illegal since i think 96. turning into a predator hole. interested to hear observations of cow to calf ratios in states where coug and bear can be taken via hounds / bait? this just doesnt seem right to me. heres a couple pics from the spot. seems pretty obvious what the problem is. http://imgur.com/a/L4CfK

[Bullnuts]

You might want to check with your state's biologist to see what the calf mortality is from bears and lions in that area. Most of the time lions will have a pretty wide home area and won't allow other cats into it except to breed. So even if one lion is making a kill every other day (including deer and other game and non-game animals) the impact that on cat has on a herd is probably pretty low. And unless you're talking about herds of bears, the impact that they have on the size of the herd overall is probably low as well.
Colorado has an abundance of bears and lions, along with one of the largest elk herds in the country. We also have a recovering mule deer herd that probably wouldn't be around now if they were suffering the types of losses during fawning season from predation that would cause a noticeable difference in their numbers.
To sum it all up, I would say that since your cameras can only survey a small part of the country at one time, maybe you're missing something. And since your cameras ARE capturing elk, then maybe there are actually more elk there than you believe. You're photographing but a sliver of the area where you'll be hunting and who's to say that there weren't 200 elk standing behind the camera when it took the photos?
I like trail cameras, but there's really no substitute to boots on the ground scouting to verify what you're seeing on the camera.

[wawhitey]

oh ive been doing on the ground scouting on that mountain and surrounding mountains for a few years, and im confident the elk population there is very small. that specific area seems to have only a handful, and i think with the population so small, the predators are killing off the majority of the calves. and as far as herds of bears.... does 8 on one camera in one month qualify? and as far as cats being territorial, i found tracks in fresh snow from 5 different cougars that i could have drawn a 1/4 mile line between the sets. thats a pretty damn high cat density. i just dont think an isolated population of maybe a dozen elk can ever get bigger with the kind of predator numbers around. there are no large herds in this area, just small numbers spread out over a wide area, but from my observations this one small group that only has 1 or maybe 2 calves sticks around this specific mountain basically year round. i just dont see it getting any bigger without some serious predator reduction.

[Bullnuts]

You're right, that's a ton of bears and a high lion density! I think I would be more than a little nervous blowing on a cow call with all those lions around. The fact remains that there are elk in your spot, though, so the options are to either hunt it or move on and find something with a lot less predation. If the elk numbers there are staying fairly consistent over the years that would indicate that the predators aren't killing all the calves and youngsters, and with the high numbers of predators they must be relying on some other food sources to keep them there. Deer or domesticated animals must be making up the balance of the diet. Again, I would check with the area biologist to see what the predator mortality rate is in that area and I'd probably ask about other food sources in the area that would keep predator numbers that high. Then I think I'd buy a bear tag and do my part in controlling the population.

[wawhitey]

oh i will definitely be making an effort to fill bear and coug tags this year. and there are lots of whitetail and muleys aruond for them to eat too, and moose calves for that matter, but yeah, the elk are still there every year, just cant seem to increase their numbers. unfortunately im heading to north slope of alaska tomorrow and prob wont be getting back until right after the early arch elk season. so maybe ill get rifle season off, if not then hopefully the late arch season. either way, ill have some coug and bear time off, to try to do my part. heres a link to an album i just threw together of some of the other bears i got on cam in the area in the last month. theyre getting out of control. http://imgur.com/a/XCVOV

[Freebird134]

Bullnuts makes some good points. also, Have you considered that your cameras might be in a "bear hotspot" (for whatever reason), and the elk know it too....and are avoiding it? Camera traps--better known to hunters as trail cameras--are not great methods for population demographics or densities. They are terribly biased; there are reasons biologists use other methods to evaluate populations. I'm not saying you are wrong about the calves and preds, but just advising that they have limitations in drawing the conclusions you are looking for.

[wawhitey]

i understand the limitations and im not basing everything on a set of trail cam pics. as i said ive been putting in a lot of time trying to keep tabs on these elk over the last few years. lately ive found a couple more spots in the immediate area with some elk where i hadnt looked before, and didnt suspect. im very very far from having em totally figured out, but ive been learning a lot about them. and as for bear hotspot, man, this whole unit is a bear / cougar hotspot. everywhere you go, theyre there. everywhere. if bear shit was nickles id be a rich man. but aside from the obvious limitations of cameras, the fact that this group of cows on this mountain is pretty much calfless cant be disputed. and ive only seen one yearling cow around that group, probably the sole survivor from last season.