Don't Kill the Buffalo in Yellowstone
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More wild buffalo have been slaughtered in the U.S. in the past ten years than at any time in the last century. This may surprise most Americans, who think of the buffalo massacre that took place in the 19th century as a closed chapter in our history. But it is not.
Right now, Yellowstone National Park is carrying out plans to kill roughly 1,000 more wild bison for exactly the same reasons our forefathers exterminated them 150 years ago -- to protect the lucrative cattle industry. Bison that wander out of Yellowstone are considered a danger to livestock because they can transfer the disease brucellosis to cattle. For this reason, Yellowstone has slaughtered nearly 9,000 wild bison since 1985. This number is all the more striking because there are currently only about 3,000 buffalo living in Yellowstone, comprising America's only free-roaming and unfenced population.
Meanwhile, many area Native American tribes are struggling to restore bison populations on their lands. Doing so would revitalize reservation landscape and wildlife, while also re-establishing Native Americans’ cultural and historic connections to this great animal. More than 136 Yellowstone bison have already been resettled to tribal lands in Montana, and with great success -- the Assiniboine and Sioux Tribes have already seen grassland birds return and native grasses thrive on their land.
Please join me in calling on U.S. National Park Services and the Montana Department of Livestock to immediately halt any further slaughter of these Yellowstone bison and move them to tribal lands instead. It’s a win-win solution for all parties.