Brutal Harrasment of Wild Bison by DOL Helicopter
By Wild Buffalo, New West Unfiltered 5-08-09
Buffalo Field Campaign
Yellowstone Bison
Update from the Field
May 7, 2009
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In this issue:
* Update from the Field (New Video)
* BFC Needs You on the Front Lines!
* Freedom to Roam: Patagonia Features Wild Buffalo
* Apple Laptop Computer Needed for BFC's Media Crew
* Last Words
* Kill Tally
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* Update from the Field
Chaos is reigning along Yellowstone National Park's western boundary as the thumping of chopper blades and the shouts of government agents repeatedly harass wild buffalo families and all wildlife near the Madison River. Nearly 200 buffalo - including dozens of newborn calves, yearlings, and pregnant mothers - have been ruthlessly run off of their spring habitat within the Gallatin National Forest. Agents are out harassing buffalo as this Update is being written.
Newborn buffalo calves and many pregnant buffalo cows have been run for miles through pockets of deep snow, barbed wire fences, thick forests laden with dead-fall, fast moving river currents, mucky wetlands, and steep, sandy bluffs. For these babies, it is a terrible and sometimes deadly introduction to the world. The new and developing muscles of these little ones cannot sustain such abuse. Today, mounted Montana Department of Livestock and Yellowstone National Park horsemen have picked up the hazing operation at Yellowstone's border, after it left Gallatin National Forest land, and are currently pushing the exhausted buffalo deep into Yellowstone National Park's interior with the assistance of the Montana Department of Livestock's helicopter.
Two days ago, Buffalo Field Campaign patrols witnessed one baby buffalo unable escape the DOL agents, trying unsuccessfully to negotiate a barbed wire fence. Numerous times the baby buffalo ran into the sharp, unforgiving fence, as its worried mother waited. Frightened, the little one finally scrambled through, only to be continuously pursued by the harsh, aggressive actions of Department of Livestock agents.
Yesterday and today patrols documented buffalo being hazed across the Madison River by horses and the helicopter after being forced to run for miles. The buffalo were exhausted and yesterday three little calves narrowly escaped being carried away by the river. One baby buffalo collapsed after it used it's last bit of energy to climb the steep bank. It took every ounce of restraint for our patrols not to jump in and help it out. Thankfully, the baby was able to finally climb the bank. While these horrific events take a tremendous toll on the buffalo, it is amazing to see the strength and resolve that enables them to escape.
Watch BFC's video footage from this week
http://www.buffalofieldcampaign.org and please share these images with others so that more people can be made aware of what is happening. Then, please take a moment to contact President Barack Obama - even if you have already done so - and continue to urge him to take immediate action to stop the harassment and slaughter of these gentle giants.
http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/2426/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=26453
All of these heavy-handed management actions have been taking place south of the Madison River. Next week, the rest of the western boundary lands, including the always cattle-free Horse Butte Peninsula, will be terrorized. May 15 marks the dreaded day where livestock interests demand that all wild bison be forced out of Montana, even though there's not a cow in sight.
Your federal tax dollars are being wasted to harass buffalo and all the wildlife in this fragile ecosystem because the cattle industry doesn't want wild buffalo eating grass they claim is for their cows alone. They use the fraudulent brucellosis argument as means to scare the public into accepting that these horrific actions are necessary. Yet there's not a single cow in sight, and there's never been a documented case of wild bison transmitting the cattle-disease brucellosis back to livestock. And even if there were, neither invasive cattle nor the economic interests of Montana's cattle industry are worth this disastrous management scheme that harms America's last wild bison population, terrorizing the Yellowstone ecosystem and all of her inhabitants. As an example of wasteful government spending, all of the past week's activities have essentially been focused to cater to the interests of one small hobby rancher who won't even have cattle on his ranch until mid- to late-June.
The lives of wild buffalo must not be sacrificed for invasive cattle. Please take action now http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/2426/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=26453
and help spread the word to save the last wild herds!
http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/2426/tellafriend.jsp?tell_a_friend_KEY=3835
ROAM FREE!
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* BFC Needs You on the Front Lines!
Buffalo Field Campaign is looking for volunteers to join us on the front lines now. Buffalo migration is in full swing and our shaggy friends are everywhere, keeping us busy nearly 24 hours a day. Extreme and invasive hazing operations have begun, and will likely continue throughout the rest of the month, and possibly beyond. We need you to join us on the front lines! BFC provides room, board, training, and gear; the ecosystem provides the magic and mystery. If you are interested, please contact Chris, our volunteer coordinator at volunteer@buffalofieldcampaign.org or call 406-646-0070.
We are also looking for summer volunteers to help us with outreach in Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks. Talking to park visitors who are in the company of the buffalo we are trying to protect is a great way to raise awareness and make more friends for the buffalo. If you would like to spend some or all of your summer with BFC, please contact Chris at volunteer@buffalofieldcampaing.org or call 406-646-0070.
See you in West Yellowstone in the land of the last wild buffalo!
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* Last Words
"The hubris [of those] who believe that nature will fall apart if humans aren't there "managing" the land is unbelievable. All livestock production in the arid West has unavoidable ecological impacts-changes in nutrient cycles, changes in fire regimes, soil compaction, spread of weeds, competition with native herbivores, damage to riparian zones, dewatering rivers (for irrigation), and so forth. And the list of species endangered or jeopardized primarily or largely as a result of livestock production includes many animals ... Indeed, livestock grazing is the single greatest cause of species endangerment in the West. "
~ George Wuerthner Wildlands champion and editor of "Welfare Ranching: The Subsidized Destruction of the American West"
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* Kill Tally
AMERICAN BISON ELIMINATED from the last wild population in the U.S.
2008-2009 Total: 17
2008-2009 Slaughter: 0
2008-2009 Hunt: 1
2008-2009 Quarantine: 0
2008-2009 Shot by Agents: 1
2008-2009 Highway Mortality: 15
2007-2008 Total: 1,631
Total Since 2000: 3,698*
*includes lethal government action, quarantine, hunts, highway mortalities
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Media & Outreach
Buffalo Field Campaign
P.O. Box 957
West Yellowstone, MT 59758
406-646-0070
bfc-media@wildrockies.org
http://www.buffalofieldcampaign.org
BFC is the only group working in the field every day
in defense of the last wild buffalo population in the U.S.
Comments
Knowing nothing of BFC I come away from this article thinking they are simply another raving pack of enviro-loonies who will never get any support from me regardless of the righteous nature of their beliefs.
Tone down the rhetoric and reap the benefits. Being savvy can be very green . . . on many different levels.
Very likely the Frenchman who was gored by the bison got too close. Bison are extremely tolerant of humans. But, they are wild and they are very clear about letting one know when you've encroached upon their space.
Also, I don't know how the "gentle giants" and the discussion of "the Frenchman" got into it; but, I am familiar with the story. There have, for as long as any of us can remember, been senior bulls who lay up on a couple of the hillsides above the "Buffalo Crossing" area in the summer afternoons. These are larger bulls who lay in the shade up on the east-facing hillsides to catch the breeze avoid the heat. When my daughter was a toddler, I would put her on my shoulders and take her up to see them. Having experience working bison, I knew how very reluctant any of them would be to move anything other than their tails and their jaws in that heat and how close we could safely get as a result. My daughter loved to visit what was a huge, clearly dominant, herd bull who looked to be well over a ton even in lean condition. We went up and looked at him that afternoon and heard that "the Frenchman" had been killed shortly after we left. I turned back to get information on what had happened. The story was that this fellow was a photographer and wanted the bull, the same bull, to stand up for a photo session. When the bull could not be hazed to his feet through armwaving and shouts, "the Frenchman" apparently went to kicking the bull in the rump area, which went on for some time with the bull simply taking it. Eventually, however, one of the fellow's kicks went awry and the fellow's boot went between the bull's rear legs and hit something other than the bull's leg. It was only at that point that the bull finally got up and dispatched his foolish abuser. I would have certainly done the same under the circumstances, only sooner, and I generally like people from France.
The Montana DOL is able to get away with undeniable cruelty--and yes torture, that is the precise term, torture--to wild bison because it has the power to do so. Power breeds arrogance, and you see arrogance in everything the DOL does regarding bison. Can anyone reasonably deny that these so-called "agents" of the DOL loathe wild things?
The BFC stands as a witness to the truth. If members of the public can't handle the truth, so be it. You can't spin the truth, although many try.
RH
If they would put half that effort in to actually helping the rancher maybe they could get somewhere. But we have the Stock Growers suing their own kind because of a fear of a non-existent problem. Cattle can NOT and never will get Brucellosis from Bison or anything else on the Horse Butte, so why are they wasting our tax dollars out there? That money could be better spent. They may as well haze Koalas in Australia, it makes as much sense, because they are protecting nothing by their actions.