Wildly scattered members of the elk herd start to converge on the tiny town of Benezette and its surrounding lands after a summer of segregation.

In Elk County, Pennsylvania, the bulk of the state’s wild elk herd roam the old reclaimed strip mines and rugged mountains. And visitors know that now is the time to see the event-of-the-year here.

The distinctive mating calls of the wild bull elk of the Benezette area will bring the place alive. They have heard that sound for years and know it’s the arrival of the wild elk rut. (Editor’s Note: This story was excerpted from a feature story by Tataboline Enos, Pennsylvania Wilds.It’s Fall and old-timers know that the winds in the Elk County mountains waft with a new sound these days. “There is recognition of the area as a travel destination,” he noted. “The possibility of seeing an elk or bear in our everyday travels does not grow old.”ĭave Morris, president of the Pennsylvania Wilds Tourism Marketing Corporation and head of the Great Outdoors Visitor Bureau, said elk tourism has continued to grow and improve the region’s economy. The Keiters bought 40 acres with a scenic view and transformed an abandoned house into two rental suites. “We sold our home and business and moved to Cameron County to escape the rat race.” “After visiting relatives in the area and seeing the elk for ourselves, we decided this was the area we wanted to live in,” Evelyn Keiter explained. Mark and Evelyn Keiter started Misty Pines, a cabin rental in Cameron County, a few years ago after Mark got laid off from a steel mill in southeastern Pennsylvania. It’s not just ‘come see the elk’ anymore.”Īnd the foot traffific spills into neighboring towns and counties, creating opportunities there. “There’s a lot more businesses popping up – gift shops, wineries, new restaurants, horse-back riding,” Kunes said. A few doors away, Brian Kunes and Matt Castle have transformed the Benezette Hotel from a town bar into a family-friendly restaurant. A block away, Doug and Sylvia Ruffo, longtime visitors to the area, opened Benezette Wines in a remodeled garage. The economic impact goes well beyond the center’s front doors.Īt the base of Winslow Hill in Benezette, the Old Bull Café opened this summer in a renovated church. The center’s gift shop supports elk conservation as well as many local artisans and vendors. In the three years since it opened, annual attendance has grown from 80,000 to 200,000. DCNR built the visitors’ center atop Winslow Hill using $6 million in tax dollars and another $6 million in private-sector donations. Poachers and farmers upset about crop degradation took a heavy toll on what elk there were. “Not many people knew they were here and even fewer cared.” “When I came here in ’82, we had about 100 elk,” said Cogan, who used to work as a biologist for the Game Commission. That’s the nonprofifit conservation group that runs the new Elk Country Visitor Center for the Pa. The herd made a comeback, but by the early 1980s things did not look good, according to Rawley Cogan, president of the Keystone Elk Country Alliance (KECA). They were hunted to extinction in the late 1800s and gone from the state’s landscape completely for about 50 years when, in 1913, the Pa. Pennsylvania’s elk weren’t always a draw. In the villages that surround the Elk Country Visitor Center near Benezette, and in the larger towns beyond its immediate shadow, small locally owned businesses are popping up or expanding to meet the growing demand of elk tourism.

With public interest in Pennsylvania’s elk herd rapidly expanding, it’s obvious that conserving and developing this resource was a good idea for the region’s economy. But when these animals appeared at the Elk Country Visitors Center on Winslow Hill it was a golden opportunity for shutterbugs. There’s no way of predicting where members of the Pennsylvania elk herd might show up.