Matt:
It looks like the elk were just putting down some ballast when things went south...
Mike
The elk can be a pain, but it's something we have to deal with having an outdoor forest layout. Why everything, including all turnouts, are brought indoors during the winter. Just the tracks are left outdoors. Thankfully the track can be repaired usually fairly quickly.
Here's that same area after being repaired (the elk damage was right about where the gondola is):
Matt from Anaheim, CA and Bayfield, COClick Here for my model train photo website
My problem was a chipmunk. My layout is in the garage, and I often leave the door open during the day. Sometimes I close the door with the remote from inside the house. Well, a chipmunk got caught inside for the night. They panick, and run across the layout from window to window, trying to get out. It knocked over a bunch of cars, and an apple orchard, and several signals. Oh, did I mention a couple small puddles of chipmunk pee.
I was almost killed by a squirrel, some years ago. A squirrel had built a nest in my chimney over the summer. When the furnace came on in the fall for the first time, I was watching it, and the flame was drafting backwards out the front of the furnace. Checking the chimney, it was packed solid with leaves and twigs and other crap. Probably saved my life! I put a wire chimney cap on it the same day.
Fortunately the wiring wasn't chewed. It was a boxcar with metal trucks that had been derailed. Dodged a bullet!