Coudersport Rotary Club was pleased to invite Ben Porkolab from the Keystone Elk Country Alliance to our December 16, 2024, meeting at A&W West End Grill.

Ben taught at Cameron County schools for 22 years, as well as 2 years in Alaska and Nevada. He grew up in Kane. He has worked as a fishing guide in Alaska for 10 summers. He has taught Hunter Education for 17 years (and mentioned that Emporium Rotarian Denny Neal has taught this for 53 years!)

He is now Conservation Education Director for the Keystone Elk Country Alliance. Last year there were 260,000 visitors to the Elk Country Visitor Center. There are programs at the Center on weekends year round.

Penn State Dubois student interns to the Center get 2 credits and a paid stipend. The Alliance gives 3 scholarships each year to high school students and they reach over 6,000 students per year, from first-graders to high school biology students.

The Alliance also works on habitat enhancement for the elk, which includes mowing fields, liming, and planting. The elk need protected acreage to graze. 80% of the PA elk herd is on 1,000 square miles of public land, including in Costello, Wharton and Austin. An effort is made to plant hundreds of acres of clover in such a way as to lure the elk away from farms to reduce crop damage. This also benefits deer, bear, turkey and pollinators.

Ben told us that elk were once native to Pennsylvania. The last of the Eastern Woodland Elk subspecies was killed in 1867 in elk county. Rocky Mountain Elk have been reintroduced. There are now about 1500 elk in PA today. This has created a multi-billion-dollar industry. Tourists coming to see the elk stay at hotels, air
b –and -b’s, shop in stores, and eat at restaurants.

Thank you Ben for your very informative and interesting presentation!