Town of Grafton elk are headed to rural Saukville

Grafton elk farmer Paul Jaffke is moving his herd to the Town of Saukville. This month, the Town Board approved an ordinance change to allow that.

The change added elk to the list of animals that farmers can keep on town agricultural lots.

Jaffke, who has run Lakewinds Elk Farm for 14 years, said he is moving the herd to his home in Saukville because the Town of Grafton land will be used for residential property.

Lakewinds has a freezer at Witte’s Vegetable Farm and often has stands at area farmers markets, where Jaffke and his daughter sell elk meat, as well as antlers for dog bones and decorations. 

But the big money is in selling bulls to hunting preserves, Jaffke said.

When he sells to preserves, he said, he gets a check for the bull right away, instead of waiting for the money to trickle in like when he sells meat.

An elk bull can sell from $5,000 to $45,000, depending on the size of its antlers, Jaffke said. He sells the bulls when they are 5 years old or older.

A bull’s antlers can grow 40 to 60 inches each season when they come back, Jaffke said, so seeing how promising young bull antlers turn out each year “is always exciting.”

Jaffke is the vice president of the Wisconsin Commercial Deer & Elk Farmers Association, so he tries to sell to preserves in Wisconsin.

However, the demand is nationwide, especially in the western states.

“Year-round I get messages from preserves in Texas, Colorado, West Virginia,” he said. 

The large farms, driven shut by increasing regulation and costs or owners simply aging out have left small operations like Lakewinds to pick up the slack, Jaffke said.

Elk are picky eaters, Jaffke said. Every day they eat premium hay with minerals supplemented with grain.

Overall, he said, they are easy to take care of once you have the essential equipment like a hydraulic squeezer to hold the elk in place for veterinary checks and antler cutting.

Elk are not much more aggressive than cattle, Jaffke said. Like cattle, they are most dangerous during rut season for bulls and after birth for cows.

“These guys are around people, they are still technically wild animals but they were born and raised here,” he said.

An elk cow usually weighs about 600 pounds and bulls about 800. Although, Jaffke said, he’s had some giants weigh in close to 1,200.

Jaffke operates a landscaping company. The farm has always been a hobby, he said.

“It took five to six years to become an actual hobby that sustained itself,” he said. “Do I make a little bit? Yeah, maybe.”

The antlers grow from March to July and then harden for four to six weeks into bone. Then, around Labor Day, he cuts them off and sells them as dog bones.

“They’ve become very popular over the last 10 years because people are realizing the other things on the market are not that good for their dogs,” he said.

“People ask what I do. I cut them off and let them dry.”

The Grafton farm is in the trust of the late Tim Kaul, who started the farm in 1996 and transferred the herd to Jaffke shortly before his death in 2010. Kaul had gone to high school with Jaffke’s father and had employed Jaffke when he was a teenager.

“Tim knew he was not well, so he asked me to take it over,” Jaffke said. “A week later, he asked me to do the chores and he never did the chores again. It was quick — cancer.”

Jaffke said Kaul’s relatives, who are beneficiaries of the trust, finally want to use the land for something other than elk farming.

“Everybody likes this side of the county. It’s quiet but close to everything,” he said.

When Jaffke took over, the farm had 17 elk. He worked that number up to about 75 at one point, which has dropped to 49.

Due to Saukville’s restrictions on animals per acre, Jaffke will be limited to 16 elk. He plans to sell and butcher the herd down to that size before the move.

Jaffke said he should be able to find buyers pretty easily.

“Right now, the elk market is really strong. Guys are buying animals,” he said.

Jaffke said elk farms can scare some people who associate the animal with chronic wasting disease. 

But, he said, the disease is more susceptible for deer and hasn’t been found in an elk in Wisconsin for 20 years.

“CWD scares so many people,” he said. “Really it’s a cancer. It’s just there. We test any animal that we butcher or that dies here.

“It’s everywhere. It’s out in the wild.”

He thinks the most likely way his elk could get it is from raccoons or birds carrying the disease.

Jaffke said Lakewinds elk have been sold to zoos, including Milwaukee Deer Park in Wisconsin Dells, Shalom Wildlife Zoo in Washington County and the Milwaukee County Zoo.

Part of the charm of raising elk is the uniqueness of it, Jaffke said, which makes them a crowd pleaser.

“Everybody likes to look at them, but nobody wants to take care of them,” he said.

Jaffke said he plans to put fencing all the way up to his house in Saukville so he can look at them.

He said Lakewinds is a family operation, between him, his daughter, son in law and three boys.