Oh, what a grunt tube can do

Some people are coming to Reno this weekend just to make noise. Big noise. “When I call elk, they come,” said Audrey Hulsey, a six-time women’s World Elk Bugling champ from Luna, N.M. “It’s like saying, ‘Hey, come over here’ in English.” Hulsey, a 26-year-old hunting guide who grew up around elk, plans to take on the pros -- the first time a woman has infiltrated the all-male category -- at Saturday’s 16th world championship. Callers try to perfect what elks do naturally, though these human impersonators rely on such devices as mouthpieces or grunt tubes. Often decked out in hunting attire, they perform a cow/calf call and a bugle, the resonating sound of a bull elk. Each call lasts a minute. “Out of these small people come this huge sound like a bull elk would make,” said Beth Shipley, who organizes the event. And some are smaller than others, like 4-year-old Michaella Ficco of Broomfield, Colo., who will again compete in the peewee category for kids 10 and younger. Or Thomas Diesing, 14, of Loveland, Colo., who for two years straight has won a division in which callers compete using only their vocal cords. Winners bag $500 to $2,500. The call of the wild can get pretty extreme: “The calling contest is a whole different story than being in the woods with wild animals,” said Wayne Carlton, an elk-calling expert. “They’re trying to sound like the most ferocious bull bugle.” Preliminary events and a celebrity contest are scheduled Friday at the Elk Camp & Exposition sponsored by the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation at the Reno-Sparks Convention Center. Entry fees range from $10 to $100. Go to www.rmef.org.