The AP article reveals two interesting aspects. First, it mentions that DOL contacted the Governor as to what they should do regarding the captured bison. In 11-1/2 years of living in West Yellowstone I've never heard of DOL doing that.

Secondly, it shows that the Governor has exercised his discretionary power over DOL actions. The IBMP plan states that DOL MAY take certain actions when events in the field warrant such; DOL has continually acted as though the plan says MUST take these actions. This has been particularly frustrating for us here in West Yellowstone when we see DOL hazing, capturing and sending bison to slaughter in the winter months when no cattle are around. And while DOL claims that brucellosis is transmitted through contact with after birth materials, they continue to apply these same actions to bull buffalo. How many of you out there have ever seen or heard of a bull discharging after birth? That's how absurd the policy gets.

While Hal Harper says "we cannot foresee anything that's going to happen in future months" with respect to the Governor's actions, what we can foresee is the upcoming escalation of hazing, capture and slaughter here on the west side of YNP once the hunt ends on February 15th.

At this point, I think it's important for us to contact Governor Schweitzer in support of this politically courageous action and let him know we stand behind him acting this way in the future ... you can be sure he's hearing from the stockgrower's association.

be WILD & FREE
barb abramo
West Yellowstone

The governor's decision is a good start--a small step that however will be of no value unless it is followed by a policy that reflects the public trust rather than the special interests of the livestock industry.

The next thing Governor Schweitzer should do is take a hard look at the absurd quarantine facilities for bison. They serve no rational purpose and should be closed. He might also want to consider suing the state of Wyoming over its elk feedgrounds. They represent a serious CWD threat to the State of Montana. When CWD hits the feedgrounds, we can expect a serious epidemic, with the disease moving into and out of the Jackson Elk Herd to the Yellowstone Northern Herd.

Because the State of Wyoming has made the negligent decision to leave feedgrounds open for now, as well as not close them once CWD breaks out on them, there really is no option other than lawsuits to try to force their closure before CWD becomes established on them.

Myself, Glenn Hockett, and Jim Wisman of the Gallatin Wildlife Association had a meeting with Hal Harper and Pat Flowers (Region 3 FWP head) yesterday morning. Our group has provided sound suggestions for bison management that are a true win/win, for stockmen, wildlife enthusiasts (not mutually exclusive terms, I'd hope), the public at large, and far from least; the wildlife of Montana.
Unfortunately, we emerged from that meeting gravely disappointed at having our suggestions dismissed yet again. FWP and Hal, at least, appear committed to the quarantine boondoggle as the sole means of bison management in MT. Yes, they talk about "expanded habitat", but appear loathe indeed to push for the necessary adaptions to the Interagency Bison Management Plan. Within the existing constraints of the Plan, I fail to see how we can have anything other than miniscule expansions of bison habitat.
Worse, we have grave concerns with the direction the quarantine could take. APHIS is committed to brucellosis eradication. Sure, that sounds great, disregarding the depopulation of much of the Greater Yellowstone Area wildlife, but that's what you can expect from an ag veterinarian perspective. It's telling that we received NO assurance yesterday that elk will not wind up in these capture/test/slaughter facilities, like is happening in Wyoming.
Barb is absolutely right. Please contact the Governor to urge him to stand tall for common-sense bison solutions, instead of fostering endless bureaucratic gridlock that perpetuates the existing intolerance of wild bison in MT. It is the height of lunacy not to treat wild bison as the enormous asset they could be to our state.

Bill, Glenn, and Jim

If I may make a suggestion, perhaps a slight change of thinking might be of benefit here. I see that the base of your suggestions to Hal Harper is to seek a win-win solution to bison and brucellosis, that is, something that the ranchers would buy into. I think it is clear, at least it is to me down here working the elk feedground issue, that ranchers and the livestock industry has absolutely no interest in any kind of negotiated agreement. They are in charge of bison, conservationists aren't, and that's that, as far as they're concerned. It seems to me that it's time to take off the gloves and declare war, as it were, on the cowboys, and adopt a policy of working to eliminate cattle grazing in the GYE. The best way to begin this process is to go after cattle allotments on public land. This does not mean abandoning the policy of some groups to buy off and retire allotments. But it does mean it's time to stop talking and start fighting. It's time to end the collaboration and follow the old activists' adage, endless pressure endlessly applied. Access to the governor isn't pressure, it's appeasement.

Otherwise, politicians like Brian Schweitzer will continue talking a good line but doing nothing to make things better.

Robert

Robert,

If I lived in WY I'd feel the same way, no doubt. And as you know, Glenn has been an actively involved in public land grazing issues for a long time, and in fact was profiled in the Montana Farmer-Stockman as "the enemy" some time back. But then he studied Dale Carnegie... ;-)
Perhaps I'm naively optimistic that we can appease the Stockgrowers, although after they sabotaged our bison mgmt bill in the last Legislature, I had an op-ed in the Billings Gazette that gave credit where due. I think a lot of mainstream stockmen cringe at that sort of publicity. DOL is doing them no favors.
But, our suggestions ARE a good thing for stockmen, as they considerably strengthen protection against losing our B-free status. Unless, of course, APHIS yanks it in retaliation, as they've blatantly threatened to do. We plan to pre-empt that message in ag publications, though, pointing out that it's political vindictiveness instead of science driving that decision.
Those bison going through the ice on Hebgen dramatically shifted the equation. NO ONE can come out and endorse the policies that led us to that. You talk about thin ice...

Bill

Well, one thing that makes it hard to deal with the problem is that different groups are following different policies, for one reason or another. I can't tell you how disappointed I am with the NWF policy on bison, which is purely self-serving (as is its policy on grizzly bears). I have simply come to the conclusion that trying to be moderate with the livestock industry is getting us nowhere, and will get us nowhere. That puts me in a minority, I know, but having studied the issues deeply and for a long time, I can come to no other conclusion.

I do think we need to rethink the brucellosis-free issue. Now that Wyoming--given the negiligence of the Wyoming Game & Fish Department and the livestock industry and individual ranchers in western Wyoming in creating that situation--has lost its brucellosis free status, it's fair to ask, has it been the great economic tragedy that the cowboys have told us it is? I have yet to see any firm numbers on what the loss of status has done to the finances of Wyoming's ranchers, and in any case I also know that the Wyoming legislature was generous with subsidies to offset additional costs of testing, etc. I suspect quite frankly that the alleged tragedy of loss of status is a sham, as has been the whole brucellosis issue a sham. The interstate shipment of Wyoming cattle under loss of "free" status has not been been restricted to any noticeable degree, and I follow the market reports just to keep track.

Until conservationists are willing to admit openly that brucellosis as a problem has nothing to do with livestock disease and everything to do with the political power of the livestock industry to protect its status as an oligarchy in Wyoming and Montana, we will continue to try and talk these things out, looking for the elusive and non-existant win-win solutions, with the same hard responses that you, Glenn, and Jim got from Hal Harper recently. I will continue to stay with this message until things change.

Good luck to the GWA and others working this issue.

Best,
Robert

Oops, I forgot to mention Craig Sharpe with the Montana Wildlife Federation was also there. Sorry, Craig.
There's getting to be more concensus, and we're told there's been more movement in the last couple months than the previous decade, so we're grateful for that. Unfortunately they won't tell us what that progress consists of, which kind of takes the fun out of it, but so it goes.
Keep the faith down there in WY, Robert. Those policies are obviously not sustainable, but mercy, what a cluster in the meanwhile...

Bill

Yes, I know Craig. I applaud the MWF for keeping its independence from the NWF on the bison issue. Wish I could say the same about the WWF, which has even bought into elk test and slaughter.

Re: consensus among conservation groups, if it's going in the wrong direction, I don't see much sense in it. I'd rather be out here on the frontier where I can speak the truth.

Down here in Wyoming, we will at least have a dramatic demonstration of the unsustainability of elk management when Chronic Wasting Disease hits the feedgrounds. By this summer, CWD will be moving through the whitetailed deer as they browse and graze along the Wind River near my cabin here on the Reservation toward the elk feedgrounds in the Gros Ventre River Valley west of Dubois and Union Pass. At the same time, CWD is moving inexorably toward the feedgrounds in the Upper Green River Basin (Pinedale, Daniel) from the south and the east. I give it five years for an epidemic to begin, and I suspect that time frame is conservative. Then things will be truly FUBAR.

Robert

hi bill,

I wouldn't totally blame the stockgrowers for the failure of GWA's very fine proposal in last year's legislature, which was initially fully supported by myself, HOBNOB, BFC, etc. We always expected opposition from the stockgrowers ... that's always the given. The worst offenders, to me, were the conservation groups in Bozeman and Gardiner, who kept whittling away at the proposal in order to protect their "conservation easement" rancher constituents, who give them big bucks. Add into that mix a brand new governor and a first term legislator as sponsor of the bill, who seemed more concerned and frightened of not being re-elected -- well, it seemed doomed to me. Let's not make that mistake again!

I would also support Robert's idea regarding a lawsuit against Wyoming for not closing their feedlots. As of January 19th when we had our FWP meeting here in West about the hunting regs, there were no statistics available yet on brucellosis exposure rate in elk in the Madison Range. Shockingly, they only received 28 blood samples! I don't think we can be so lackadaisical about brucellosis in elk.

barb
West Yellowstone

The BISON is LIFE (Nine)to the Native Americans..Do you forget thatin the 1880's in Miles City there is where the food source for the Native Tribes were slaughtered by the tens of thousands... Yet the Creator kept the Bison here...Did anyone think to Call President Joe Garcia the Native American National Tribal Leader for his input? Maybe the Gov did?
Anybody thought that maybe the Bison (Buffalo) could be taken to the Reservations where Alcholism is a problem and let the Native Americans deal with these creator driven unwanted animals?
Listen to your inner drum, what is it telling you..It tells me the Bison are LIFE to the Native Americans!!! They will always be!!