Teddy Roosevelt National Park to collar elk beginning Wednesday

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AP - Officials at Theodore Roosevelt National Park are moving into the next phase of an elk management program.

Superintendent Valerie Naylor says the park has finished reducing what was a bloated elk herd, and now it will monitor and maintain the population through the use of radio collars.

The National Park Service has contracted with an Idaho company to capture between 17 and 21 elk in the park's south unit and fit them with the collars. The work is set for Wednesday and Thursday.

The elk reduction effort began in 2010, when officials estimated the park herd at more than 1,200 animals. Park staff and hundreds of volunteer shooters in fall 2010 and fall 2011 killed nearly 870 elk to bring the herd to a level the park can sustain.

See Wednesday's Dickinson Press for more on the story.

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