Back in the day, (while assigned to Ft Carson, CO) every year the wild life folks would request Army helicopters to take their folks out and do wildlife population counts. That was a mission everyone wanted to fly. Elk are truly beautiful animals and I hear they are also pretty tasty. I'm not a hunter so, I haven't ever taken one but, I have been offered elk meat from other hunters who some how knew where to find to those elk.
Not sure how that happened and I'm sticking to that story.

I've encountered several deer in my life with not so good results to my cage and even worse for the deer. Almost hit a few on my bike but, I'd really hate to hit an elk. Who won might be hard to tell.
Edited: Oh, BTW, my wife feeds to 3 to 8 deer every evening in our back yard.

There are some things I'll never understand. What the deer spill, the squirrels, birds, racoons, geese or other wildlife clean up. It's expensive being married to Mother Nature.

Rams