It’s the music of the Western mountains, and this is the only time we get to hear it. It has a hollow sound, as though a flute were a foot thick and 12 feet long, and it is the lonely call of the bull elk.

It starts in early September and by October becomes more of a war chant. When winter shuts down the breeding season, the bulls go quiet once again, and pal up with other bulls to face winter together.