Bull elk bugling in Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado, USA

A beast on the bugle

The distinctive call of the bull elk – known as a bugle – is a familiar sound each fall here in Colorado’s Rocky Mountain National Park. Human visitors often describe the vocalizations as eerie and haunting, but if you’re a cow elk, they’re downright dreamy. Bugling is a key element of elk mating rituals, and every bull does it differently, weaving high-pitched whistles with throaty grunts to create compositions all their own. Bugles are complex and able to convey a variety of messages – but usually the gist is, ‘Hey ladies, look at me!’