Guest Column
Getting Out of the Way: Respecting Ranchers, Habitat and Bison
By Bill O'Connell, Guest Writer, 9-25-07
Map of the southwest quadrant of the Gallatin National Forest. Click on map for larger image. courtesy of Gallatin National Forest
Recently the Gallatin Wildlife Association was allowed to present our bison management suggestions to the Montana Board of Livestock, an opportunity for which we are immensely grateful. Likewise to NewWest.Net for soliciting this editorial, and I must say the recent interview series with Bob Jackson is some of the most fascinating stuff I’ve read in quite a while. His success at integrating naturally occurring social structures with production agriculture is visionary and confirms yet again you’re better off working with nature.
That’s a fundamental tenet of our suggestions, and we’ve long felt we have a unique opportunity for a true win-win when it comes to wild bison in Montana. Our suggestions completely support private property rights, protect our brucellosis-free status, embrace the situation as an asset, harvest a whole lot more buffalo, and require very little to no change in current livestock practices in areas adjacent to Yellowstone.
The adjacent map of the Montana portion of the Greater Yellowstone area demonstrates yet again how lucky we are to live in Montana! We have a landscape that lends itself perfectly to a common-sense solution. Although, after reading Jackson’s viewpoints, I’m going to have a harder time using the word “management,” and may try to avoid it. All we really have to do is get out of the way.
The perception has long been fostered that if wild bison set foot in Montana, our B-free status is toast. Neither science nor the actual on-the-ground situation support this contention, however. Research clearly indicates the risk window is the birthing—or rather abortion season—February through May. Animals sharing feedlines during this time frame are the significant high-risk situation, as the feedground situation in Wyoming abundantly confirms. However, I’m told the Wyoming governor is facing a political reality that a significant portion of their voter base support this debacle, and it’s not going away anytime soon. This brings us to another reality, that the Wyoming feedgrounds are the recurrent source of brucellosis in the GYA, and until something is done to address that situation, the calls for eradication ring a bit hollow, to say the least. Not to mention, effective wildlife vaccines remain a distant possibility at best, and proponents of massive capture/test/slaughter operations in Yellowstone clearly have not spent much time pursuing elk! What lunacy…
Fortunately, in Montana we only have a handful of places adjacent to the park that present risk points. There are obvious reasons people don’t winter their cattle in say, the West Yellowstone basin, or the upper Gallatin, or even the upper Madison. Looking at the map again, this same landscape hands us the solution on a platter. It contains several State Wildlife Management Areas that are the historic winter ranges, where untold generations of elk have gone and bison attempt to go. Dome Mountain WMA near Gardiner, the Gallatin and Porcupine WMAs in the upper Gallatin, Wall Creek in the Madison, and their surrounding landscapes are all free of livestock conflict during this risk window and are nearly so year-round. We contend the handful of existing allotments and private grazing situations already utilize sound practices, primarily delayed turnout dates (7/1 or later). Brucella from aborted birthing materials can persist in the soil for a time, but breaks down rapidly with heat and sunlight. Coupled with livestock vaccines approaching 90 percent plus efficacy, this is as low-risk an endeavor as running cows with a bunch of wolves and grizzly bears can be!
The Church Universal and Triumphant contains the only significant number of year-round cattle in the areas mentioned, until you get north of Dome Mountain. Yes, there are a handful of other private lands with cattle in the Gardiner area, and we completely support their private property rights to do as they see fit. Their cattle can be protected (buffalo fence) for a pittance in comparison to what we’re spending on the existing haze, capture, and slaughter operations. We’re talking just a handful of isolated instances, ten head in one case I know of, all but right on the Park boundary. Plus, of course the risk can be reduced to zero by running steers or spayed heifers, not to mention horses or mules. The reality is that these areas are in no sense bastions of the cattle industry in Montana, and using them as “gates” to preclude wild bison from the surrounding vast and conflict-free public lands is an idea whose time has gone.
A commonly raised objection is that these bison will be allowed to spread unfettered across Montana, or at least the “lines” will continually expand. No, that’s not what we’re suggesting, and fortunately this same landscape offers geographic constraints in key spots that once again hand us a solution. Private landowners can truly lead and limit beyond these areas, and we’re encouraged that many of the significant adjoining operations are not only wildlife-tolerant, but clearly see the potential for wild bison in their outfitting and eco-tourism operations.
Recognizing these facts opens the door to turn the situation into an incredible asset, including a greatly expanded public hunt. We simply need to allow bison to access the winter ranges. Trying to preclude this natural process is an exercise in futility. Habitat is the solution, and again, all we have to do is get out of the way.
Like this story? Get more! Sign up for our free newsletters.
Comments
Add your comment below
Buffalo have been exposed, just like cattle when being vaccinated, and will show "positive" on a card test, same as cattle that have been vaccinated. However, a more definitive tissue test shows negative on every buffalo that has ever been tested.
As simple, and easy as it is to prove that buffalo don't have, or carry brucellosis, the main question is why hasn't this been done yet? Look beyond the disease myth, there is something else behind the unnecessary slaughter of the buffalo.
Yes, we have wondered about feral hogs, Bob. Also yersinia and bluetongue, BVD, cheatgrass, and a host of other ailments.
It does not change the fact that millions of tax dollars are spent needlessly to haze, capture, and slaughter these amazing animals. It does not change that fact that millions of tax payers object to this mismanagement of the Yellowstone Bison, including furious locals who love the bison. The bison need to get to the lower elevations and should have year-round habitat in the state of Montana. Bison need to be classified as wildlife rather than pests!
I myself have witnessed the daily harassment of these magnificent animals and have seen calves collapse from being chased by federal agents in helicopters and hundreds of wild bison chased into cattle capture facilities. These bison need protection under the Endangered Species Act, which is currently available for citizens to submit comments. The Buffalo Field Campaign has more information available on-line... the website is online and can give interested citizens up-to-date and accurate science on the current bison slaughter and ESA listing. Check it out!
Now come on people, this isn't something being transmitted from one species to another, this is a laboratory experiment.
We all need to be a little "better" informed.