A park warden explained that there had been too many bad human/elk encounters and that they’d had to resort to “hazing” the elk. In the case of the town’s two schools, this involved having Park personnel arrive at the school playgrounds at 7 a.m. Several people would walk around with flags, conveniently attached to broomsticks or hockey sticks, held high above their heads. Elk don’t like to be around things that are taller than they are. If things got too bad, the humans would set off small firecrackers.

(I had learned in Jasper, that other Canadian jewel of a park, that it’s OK to meet up with elk if you are on horseback. I did that by meeting up with some elk while I was on horseback. Sure enough, they left.)

The whole idea is to piss off the animals so that they’ll go somewhere else–without hurting them. It shouldn’t have to cost a half million dollars. I’m betting the Banff elk hazing program cost a good deal less than that, and it worked.