RE: Escaped elk may have red deer genes.
 

Progress has actually been better than some people are aware.
Idaho Department of Fish and Game spokesman Niels Nokkentved said he’s been told that 36 of Rammell’s elk have been killed, with another 61 captured and in quarantine.I imagine wolveswill eliminate some of the escaped leftovers. The worst part is depending on what story you read there is no way to know the exact number of escaped elk. wyotimberghost your absolutely correct. This is a disaster!

RE: Escaped elk may have red deer genes.
 

Sounds like you need to change the camo for a nice plad kilt.

RE: Escaped elk may have red deer genes.
 

Just curious... Why are these elk "genetically inferior"?

RE: Escaped elk may have red deer genes.
 

They need to ban these game farms so crap like this does not happen

RE: Escaped elk may have red deer genes.
 

ipsc, they have been mixed with red deer so the horns will grow much bigger, even though we would all love to kill a world record, mixing those genes within the wild free roaming elk may be disasterous. Red deer have evolved within their natural environment, which is not the rockie mountains. Through natural selection and evolution( sorry hard liner christians) red deer have evolved to surivive in the environment in which they live. Now that genes may be passing on to the elk which live in the rockies, new traits may be bred into the herd thus changing the genetic makup and the traights that help wild elk survive in the rockies.

In my opinion, this would be messing with natures way, and setting back the time clock of evolution. All of this happened in the name of the all mighty dollar. It sounds like most of the elk were rounded up and that is great, less chances for inpurities. This issue goes far beyond the chance of diseases being transferred to the wild elk, but even that could be disasterous too.

I think the word genetically inferior does not mean that one is inferior to the other, but relates more to the genes within the environment. I hope that I did not make this as clear as mud!!!

RE: Escaped elk may have red deer genes.
 

Holding wild game such as elk and or deer in captivity justfor the sake ofa farm raisedversion of wild meat will only deterioate that gene pool enough to whereas it would beas easy as shooting some grouse from a road or out of some tree.

RE: Escaped elk may have red deer genes.
 

Would shooting an elk out of a tree be unethical???? ;0)

RE: Escaped elk may have red deer genes.
 

I'm no expert on red deer, but I did see hundreds from the train in the scotish highlands. Most had antlers no bigger than a good 4 pt mulie buck.
None could have grossed over 200.
tz


ORIGINAL: Elkcrazy8

ipsc, they have been mixed with red deer so the horns will grow much bigger, even though we would all love to kill a world record, mixing those genes within the wild free roaming elk may be disasterous. Red deer have evolved within their natural environment, which is not the rockie mountains. Through natural selection and evolution( sorry hard liner christians) red deer have evolved to surivive in the environment in which they live. Now that genes may be passing on to the elk which live in the rockies, new traits may be bred into the herd thus changing the genetic makup and the traights that help wild elk survive in the rockies.

In my opinion, this would be messing with natures way, and setting back the time clock of evolution. All of this happened in the name of the all mighty dollar. It sounds like most of the elk were rounded up and that is great, less chances for inpurities. This issue goes far beyond the chance of diseases being transferred to the wild elk, but even that could be disasterous too.

I think the word genetically inferior does not mean that one is inferior to the other, but relates more to the genes within the environment. I hope that I did not make this as clear as mud!!!
[/quote]

RE: Escaped elk may have red deer genes.
 

Its certainly not a disaster. At least not genetically. Maybe pollitically, but the genetics will sort it self out.

If the esacaped elk carry benifical red deertraits and those traitsare spread sufficiantly before the captive elk are removed from the breeding poolthen they will strengthen the native gene pool. If that were to happen it would likely be in some way that was undetectableshort of PCR. Does anyone here know if you can tell visually a difference in the elk carring red deer genes? Do the racks have red deer traits?

If the captive elkcarry negitive traits for the elk in their nativeenvironment time and selection will slowly remove those traits.

Interbreeding between species happens and when fertile, the offspring commanly arn't as well suited to the native environment as the parents and don't long survive.

RE: Escaped elk may have red deer genes.
 

elkslayer, are there really emu roaming around in MI? the mainland or UP? thats crazy!