DIET

During the summer or growing season elk are found high in the mountains. During this time they graze on various grasses and fords and browse on tender seedlings and twigs. In the late summer, when the grasses are dried and yellowed, they browse on saplings, berries and mushrooms. One of the reasons illness occurs is because elk go into winter without eating enough quality forage during the summer growing season to build up the required fat reserves (Ference 2000).

In the west during the winter, elk eat dried grass, pawed from beneath the snow. They also browse on trees such as aspen, maple, fir and berry bushes. Elk also eat bark from trees as shown in Fig. 6. If the snow is too deep for these types of forage or if the surface is crusted the elk cannot use these as a food source. The results are starvation making the animal very susceptible to diseases, such as pneumonia (Ference 2000).