Missing elk puts family on horns of a dilemma
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The family spent months searching winding back roads in Greene County, following his tracks.
Friends called to say he turned up in their yard. But by the time the family arrived, he had run off, leaving only snapshots to prove he was there.
"Last winter, I bet we spent clean up through March on the back roads looking for it," Sharon Richter said.
Now, the missing elk that wandered off the Richters' 121-acre farm last year has turned up in West Virginia, and two states' wildlife officials can't agree on whether it can go home.
The 3-year-old elk and two other elk escaped the Aleppo farm on Jan. 4, when a former family friend recording footage of sheep on the Richters' property accidentally left the gate open, Ms. Richter said.
For months they scoured the area until last November, when they got word that the elk moved across state lines, about 17 miles away in Pleasant Valley, W.Va., in the state's northern panhandle.
The elk is roaming around Pleasant Valley and being fed by locals, said Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture spokeswoman Samantha Krepps. The West Virginia Department of Natural Resources officials wanted it returned to Aleppo, but agriculture department officials here have denied that request.
"We told them, no, they couldn't bring the animal back," Ms. Krepps said.
A West Virginia Department of Natural Resources spokesman did not return phone messages Thursday.
At the heart of the issue is the potential for chronic wasting disease, a highly contagious and fatal neurological disease that attacks and creates holes in an animal's brain.
It's not known to be harmful to humans, but it can linger in the environment even after an animal has left, leaving members of the deer family at risk. "So this animal that has escaped and been on the run" could have been susceptible to spreading the disease, said Gerald Feaser of the Pennsylvania Game Commission.
First Published February 3, 2012 12:00 am
