Elk in Alaska are limited to island habitats with temperate, maritime climates. They feed on a variety of plants at different times of the year. During the summer months, they favor grasses, forbs, willows, and other leafy greens while in the winter they munch on branches and twigs of trees and shrubs. The last native elk were found in interior Alaska during the “Ice Age” and died out many thousands of years ago. Modern elk populations were derived from Washington and Oregon elk being transplanted to islands in southeast Alaska and Kodiak.