Morgan Hughes, Utah State University
Life Sciences
Elk feeding stations are used throughout the Western US as a means to prevent depredation on private lands (Smith,2001). Many of the unintended effects of such artificial congregation remain unexamined. In many species, increased densities result in increased parasite loads (Dietz, 1988) adding physiological stress to individual animals and reducing the economic value of the animal to sportsmen (Choquette, 1956). Through laboratory analysis of fecal float samples, I will monitor changes in the number of parasite eggs for elk at Hardware Ranch feeding station over the winter season. This is to discover if there may be negative implications of feeding stations which should be further examined. Increased prevalence of parasites could also indicate an increased danger for transmission of other diseases which are a threat to domestic livestock (Williams, 2002).