The results will be compared to an area without intensified hunting efforts, and one completely closed to hunting. Zager said the study is not an attempt to reduce bear and lion populations across the region, but a localized research project designed to answer a long-standing dispute over the role predation plays on elk calf survival. Elk populations in the Clearwater River Basin have struggled for the past five years. The department lays most of the blame on habitat conditions that have deteriorated over the past few decades because of fire suppression and a reduction in logging. Fire causes forests to revert to early successional stages.
Elk prefer to graze on rich brush and grasses that follow disturbances such as fire and logging.
But some hunters have complained that predation on elk calves from black bears and mountain lions is preventing the elk herds from rebounding. They often cite department research showing that as few as 5 percent of the elk calves born in the study area have survived and, of those that died, up to 95 percent were killed by predators. The sportsmen have asked the department to do a better job of balancing predator and prey populations. Outfitters agreed to help the department reduce predator populations in the study area after the department abandoned a plan to use federal trappers from the Wildlife Services agency to do the work. Under that plan, government trappers would have shot and snared the bears.