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A study of ways to increase winter use by elk of Pncliic bunchgrass foothill range in southeastern Washington employed fertilizing and rangehtnd burning, with and without spring cattle grazing. First-year response of elk to fertilizer applied in fall (56 kg N/ha) was a 49% increase ln use; however, no significant carry-over effect was noted in subsequent years. Fall burning to remove dead standing litter and enhance forage palatability provided no increase in elk use in winter. Intensive cattle grazing in spring to promote regrowth did not increase elk use. In fact, cattle grazing decreased winter elk use by 28% in 1 of the 3 yearsstudied. The cost effectlveness of increasing elk use by fertilizing appeared marginal except perhaps in special situations. A discussion of forage allocation to both elk and cattle is presented. Rocky Mountain elk (Cervus elaphus nelsoni)l have rapidly gained importance for providing hunting recreation and income revenues in the recent decade. About one-half million hunters harvest over 100 thousand elk annually in the 1 I Western States (Oertle 1977). Although demand for hunting is increasing, winter range is diminishing due to land development and poor range forage conditions (Klemmedson 1967). Studies have shown that animal distribution and forage production can be increased by rangeland fertilization (Smith and Lang 1958, Cook 1965, Geist et al. 1974). Rangeland burning has also been found to increase ungulate use (Duvall and Whitaker 1964, Kruse 1972) by improving quality (Aldous 1934) availability (Vogl 1965) and palatability (Daubenmire 1968) of forage. Improving big-game winter range by grazing cattle has been the subject of considerable debate. For example, investigators have suggested that grazing cattle in summer can improve forage for elk in winter (Anderson and Scherzinger 1975) and that heavy cattle grazing in fall attracts deer use in spring (Willms et al. 1979). Others have reported that cattle grazing in summer diminishes elk use (Blood 1966, Skovlin et al. 1968) and therefore may cause competition (Mackie 1970) or even be counterproductive to providing optimum elk winter range (Snyder 1969). Before human settlement, winter elk range included the valley lowlands and adjacent mountain foothills which are now in private ownership and used for crops or spring-fall cattle grazing. Public acquisition of critical winter range has often been used to reduce conflicts and assure sustained production of winter forage for elk. Typical of such a winter range in the interior Pacific Northwest is the William T. Wooten Habitat Management Area (Wooten area)z The authors are, respectively, range scientist, research wildlife biologist, and research wildlife biologist (retired), located at the Pacific Northwest Forest and Range Experiment Station, Range and Wildlife Habitat Laboratory, USDA-F% Route 2, Box 23 15, La Grande, Ore. 97850. The authors express their appreciation to the Washington State Department of Game for orovidina land. facilities. and maintenance of the research installation. Manuscript receded October 28, I98 I. 1 Formerly (Cervus canadensis nelsonii). *Formerly Wooten Wildlife Recreation Area and Wooten Game Range. 184 Fig. 1. The wooten Habitat Management Area lies along the transitio& foothill zone at the extreme northern end of the Blue Motmtaim. operated by the State of Washington Department of Game (Fig. 1). It is located in the northern foothills of the Blue Mountains in the extreme southeastern corner of Washington 24 km south of Pomeroy. In 1970, the Washington State Department of Game entered into a cooperative study with the Pacific Northwest Forest and Range Experiment Station to investigate techniques for making herbaceous forage on the Wooten area more attractive to wintering elk. Three rangeland treatments were compared: (I) annual spring cattle grazing, (2) a single fall application of fertilizer, and (3) a single fall prescribed burning treatment. This paper reports response of elk during 3 winters following treatment.

Elk Use of Winter Range as Affected by Cattle Grazing, Fertilizing, and Burning in Southeastern Washington