Watching mature bull elk up close can be an exhilarating experience. But seeing them in a busy metropolis home to more than a million people can be dangerous for both animals and humans alike.
“We can’t have big mature bull elk roaming around in the city,” Scott Root, Utah Division of Wildlife Resources (DWR) spokesman, told KSL.com. “At nighttime, you don’t want to run into one of those with those antlers and big bodies. It’s a very definite safety concern to have big animals like that roaming around.”
Two bull elk wandered into Salt Lake City and made themselves at home, prompting the police to issue an alert. DWR officers took action as well. They found the animals and tranquilized them. Once down, officers determined the spread of their antlers was so big that they would not fit into the division’s trailer, so they cut them off. That action does not harm the elk since they usually shed their antlers in late winter or early spring anyway.
A DWR video shows the successful release of the two bulls into the mountains of Utah County.
(Photo credit: Salt Lake City Police)