Elk are as much of an eastern species as a western species! Prior to colonization, the range of the American elk stretched nearly from coast to coast. Early European accounts describe elk occurring in “droves” or “hordes” in the east, sometimes alongside other “western” species like bison. Early accounts describe elk as a deer as emblematic (in many cases more emblematic) of eastern North America than the white-tailed deer. Two centuries after the first European accounts of elk, it was gone from