The Pennsylvania Elk Herd - where to find them

Being a 40 year old Pennsylvania girl, I am a little embarassed to admit that about 2 years ago someone mentioned the PA elk herd and I replied with "there are elk in Pennsylvania?" I've always been somewhat of an outdoor girl, camping, fishing, hiking, etc. How could I not know this? My thought was that they must be really elusive, right? Well, this past fall my husband came home from a day with friends and asked if I'd like to go for a Sunday drive. Now need to ask me twice, my answer is always the same, yes, where to? Elk county was the response. In conversation someone mentioned that they would be making their yearly trek to find some elk in the Pennsylvania woods. Of course I thought it would be a day of simply driving around aimlessly but, I was in just the same.

I started to do some research on the area as I always do and I came across the Elk Country Visitor Center. I became quite obsessed for a few days, just amazed that these creatures are from my home state and I didn't know, where have they been hiding? We started our trip on interstate 80, going west. We thought we would stay on I80, then turn North and head toward the center. We decided to take a detour, I guess we were getting bored on the highway, and ended up on route 144 then on to 120 to 555 into Benezette. Route 144 was an incredibly long ride. It was a beautiful, don't get me wrong it is miles and miles and miles and miles of mountains, no civilization in sight, however, it would have been best explored if we had more than 1 day for this adventure. The best route for our trip would been the more direct approach of our original plan, I80 to 153 north then to 255 to 555. If you plan on taking this trip, this is the most direct route off of Interstate 80.

Once we reached civilization, my husband shared his knowledge learned from his conversations with his friends. Keep a look out in yards and fields, they can be anywhere. Ever excited, I kept a vigil watch, which began to fade after no sightings, until we reached visitors center. We turned up the drive toward the center and there was an elk cow laying about 15 feet off the edge of the road. Now, I have seen these animals on occasion in zoos and such but, seeing them in there natural habitat is a completely different experience. This thing was huge, no wonder they call them cows, their body mass is certainly comparable to one. We pulled in the parking lot and made our way to the visitors lodge, an impressive log cabin building, with displays, gift shop, viewing area, educational equipment, and my favorite, a fireplace. We decided on our plan for the best viewing options. First we would walk back to the elk cow in the driveway and take a closer look at her. By this time she was joined by 3 other females. An awe inspiring sight, they lay just feet from us and the thought crossed my mind that they could easily stomp us if they so chose. After this, back to the fireplace for a few minutes to warm up. Next we would stroll some of the many paths leading to the observation areas. Listening to people around us discuss the lack of sightings, these places are usually excellent places for viewing but, it just was not meant to be for us. We headed back to lodge for another warm up, (I DO NOT like to be cold) and in the distant we heard a sound. If I was alone in the forest and didn't know what this was, I would be terrified, it was an elk bugling. I was too cold to stop and try to listen where it was coming from so we went in the lodge and started looking at some of the displays. We could still hear the bugling as we were inside looking around and I was so disappointed that we didn't see more.

We walked around the observation room reading some plaques and I happened to look up at the field adjacent to the building. At the exact moment I looked up, out of the scenery stepped a bull elk. I could not believe the size of this thing. It looked like it was carrying 2 small trees on the top of it's head. Everyone scurried outside to take pictures and along came another, and another, well you get the picture, soon the field was full of these marvels, bulls, cows and calves alike. To our great pleasure, it was time for us to go for our tour. We stepped aboard our horse draw wagon and headed for the fields. They take you right up close and personal with the elk, pointing out facts about the land, conservation and, of course, the elk. One interesting thing that I learned, Pennsylvania Elk are actually extinct. The government began a project to reintroduce elk to this state, I believe in the 1970's. Rocky Mountain elk were brought in and these descendants of the Rocky Mountain elk are what we now refer to as the Pennsylvania Elk herd. Many times our escorts stopped in the fields so that everyone would be able to take advantage of the once in a lifetime photo opportunities at hand. It was a long ride, almost an hour and I was frozen, but, I wouldn't have missed it for the world. It was definitely my favorite activity of the day.

So concluded our journey and began our long ride home. On our way back to the interstate, about 2 miles from the center, we spotted a massive bull elk grazing in someone's backyard. Impressive, I think we will be going again next year, maybe this time we'll check out the area and stay a day or two.