A few more elk have been reportedly poached, with two cow elk killed in Hunt Area 100, about a mile and a half north west of Exit 136 on I-80, along Black Butte Road.
The two elk were found and reported Oct. 25 and were believed to have been shot early that morning or the night before.
“Both elk carcasses were less than 100 yards from the road; one was easily visible on top of a small hill and the other was a short distance away in some brush,” Andy Roosa, a game warden with the Wyoming Department of Game and Fish said. “Blood trails indicate the elk were very near, or even on the roadway, when they were shot and they traveled a short distance before expiring.”
Two more elk were killed at Hunt Area 104, northeast of Cokeville. One of the elk, an antlered bull, was found one day after the antlered elk season closed in the area.
Both elk were shot near the Big Park Road at Grindstone Creek. According to a release from the WGFD, elk harvests have been slow and someone likely knows of someone coming in home Oct. 25 with a cow elk from the Cokeville area.
“A witness described two male suspects in a white pickup truck, possibly a Ford, with a 4-wheeler in the back, loading the cow elk into the truck after dark at around 8 p.m., on Wednesday night,” Game Warden Niel Hymas said. “At least one of the suspects appeared to be in his late 50s.The bull elk was laying in plain sight within 10 yards of the cow elk gut pile and was not salvaged or reported. It was apparent that the bull was intentionally abandoned and allowed to go to waste.”
With the death of the bull elk, the total number of poached elk in southwestern Wyoming totals 11 animals, a number the WGDF calls both unusual and unacceptable.
“It is getting difficult to keep them apart at times for me,” Lucy Diggens-Wold, information and education specialist for the WGFD in Green River, said. “I don’t remember ever having this many elk poached in one season in my career.”
Other poaching instances occurred in the Little Mountain area and include one elk wearing a special radio collar and was believed to have been shot and left by a hunter who thought they had done something wrong in killing the animal and left it.
Other hunters and residents are often the ones holding valuable information in poaching cases and information, no matter how seemingly trivial, can lead to an arrest.
The WGFD encourages anyone with information to call the Stop Poaching Hotline at 877-943-3847 or the Green River Game and Fish Office at 307-875-3223. Residents can also text tips to the WGFD by texting information to 847-411.
A cash reward my be eligible for people providing tips that lead to a conviction.
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