The almost inexplicable mismanagement of America's last wild bison herd living in Yellowstone National Park continues with the announcement of the Park's plan to slaughter 600 to 800 bison to keep the population down between 3,000 and 3,500 animals. Buffalo advocates say this limit is nowhere near the natural carrying capacity of the ecosystem and is politically derived, not based on science. Perhaps to make the slaughter more publicly acceptable, it will be conducted by native tribes under an agreement with the Park Service. The justification for this inhuman treatment is the usual scare word, brucellosis. Need
US Person repeat the fact that there has never been one documented case of wild bison transmitting the disease to cattle? Other wildlife, such as elk, carry brucellosis, yet are not slaughtered and are left to migrate and commingle with cattle. This culturally ingrained mistreatment continues year upon year with millions spent on a
useless Interagency Bison "Management" plan that forcibly prevents natural migration, subjects the animals to hazing from the air, and captures large numbers for quarantine and slaughter. Nearly 7200 wild bison have been eliminated from the last wild bison population since 1985. It is the only population to remain genetically free of cattle genes. Currently there are about 4400 buffalo living in Yellowstone. Before their near extermination, an estimated 30 to 60 million buffalo ranged from Canada to Mexico on the Great Plains; by 1890 that number was reduced to only 1,000. The slaughter of the buffalo is one of this country's greatest crimes against nature*, and incredibly a crime that continues to this day.
*a non-exhaustive list, not in order of gravity, includes: the chemical defoliation of Vietnamese forests; the over-appropriation of the Colorado River; the industrial pollution of the Gulf of Mexico; genocide of the American Indian; the extirpation of the passenger pigeon; atmospheric nuclear weapons testing; the Dust Bowl; the many Superfund sites that remain untreated; the persecution of the grey wolf etc.
