I have been wondering why there is a general absence of Elk in the Okanogan area of E. WA? It seems this area would be a prime location for elk...
This has been a nagging question for me for years. Has that area ever supported Elk? and if so what happened to them?

I've never seen any Elk in the area before either. I'm headed out Friday to Naches area my hunting buddy and myself got drawn for cow tags with a muzzleloader.

fireguy-
good luck over there -I picked up a .50 cal 700MLS Remington- good gun so far. curious to see how it worksout in the field - that will be the real test. Good luck in Naches area. I plan on hunting Naches next year after i get a couple elk hunting buddies lined up. I don't see myself packing out an Elk solo this year - if i got so lucky that is...

Lofty,
I was looking at the same gun, was thinking about giving up my knight 54 cal. to something alittle smaller. I was reading some posts about the Remmington 700ml , kinda sounded like some people where having problems having it not firing. I hope they have fixiing that for your sake. Take a look at this web site under the muzzleloading area it has some real good information and some pictures of some nice animals www.mostermuleys.com

If your going to hunt the naches area, you don't have to worry all that much about having a pack mule(sorry hunting buddy) to help you pack out an animal. There are alot of roads in that area , I sometimes have a hard time getting away from them. My Parents used to live over there, so I know the area really well. I've taken 4 elk and 1 deer with my muzzleloader there so far, soon to be 5 elk .

Ive bumped into Elk twice at the upper end of eight mile creek in 18 years of bowhunting over there and I know the local farmers in the valley between early winters and winthrop see them every now and then. I think there are just a few and very few small herds around there. It allways seems to me were the mule deer herds are realy strong the elk herds are not and vice versa. So being that the largest mule deer herds in the state are in okanogan that could be the reason for the lack of Elk and like you said it is great habitat for elk. But none realy to speak of. Any other opinions out there. by the way how about all the bear over there. I think the hound ban has made it great for us guy's hew don't have dogs to get a shot at a real trophy. I've seen alot of nice bears in the past several years. And if they start to over populate let us take 2 on the east side. just my 2 cents.

There used to be Elk there but they where killed off years ago. The game dept. does not have a management plan to allow them to come back because of the muledeer herds. If you pop over the border into BC and Alberta youwill find a ton of elk. I have a friend who's granpa used to telll us stories about Elk swimming the Snake river near Little goose dam. to get into the wheat country around Pullman. Elk where a prarie animal until pressue from man hunting them pushed them into the mountains. There used to be as many Elk as buffalo.

The Elk are in Okanogan but just not many and most i've seen have been on the methow side of the Chilowist.

When you do see them they are usually smaller antlered but nice body size.

How about the cougar population?
Is okanogan known for coug?

WDFW doesn't want any elk North of the Wenatchee River. There's elk all over the Colville Indian Res, and on the "north half" also. I've got friends/family in Omak that have scored on elk on occasion, but off of the res they get hammered pretty quickly.

As for cats and bears, they're THICK!!! We've always had them, with or without hound hunting. And we've had years where you could kill 2 bears. They're pests!!!! Come on over and kill bruins...they're really hard on the fawns and elk calfs.