Posted by [EMAIL PROTECTED] : ----- Original Message ----- From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Monday, December 13, 1999 1:01 PM Subject: Yellowstone Bison Slaughter > Winter comes to Yellowstone > > Ushering in another bison kill > > By Wynona LaDuke - Special to Indian Country Today > > Wii-zoogipod. It is likely to snow. As the snow starts to fall in Yellowstone > National Park, there are some absolute certainties. There is a certainty that > the National Park Service will grind away at a process to determine the fate > of the survivors of the Great Buffalo Nation. There is a virtual certainty > that buffalo will die, perhaps a few, perhaps a hundred, perhaps mostly > mothers, like last winter, who left orphaned calves, dying later. And, there > is a certainty that people will oppose that slaughter. > > Three meetings, called "tribal consultations" by the National Park Service, > were called this past year to seek input from Native Nations on the > Environmental Impact Statement for the future management of Yellowstone > buffalo. At the least, tribal representatives are frustrated with the process. > James Garrett from Cheyenne River Lakota Nation commented that the Park > Service seems to be, "mixing consultation with insultation . being consulted > at the eleventh hour is tantamount to insult." > > The Native community is insulted and angry with a process that has > marginalized perhaps the only people who know anything about buffalo. The > wider community, evidenced by more than 60,000 letters and calls, was also > pretty disgusted with every single proposal the Park Service has come up with > to manage the Yellowstone herd. And, the Park Service, weighed under the > politics of cattlemen, the quandary of federal process and an impending 2000 > election, scrambles feebly and weakly to do something right. > > It is the cusp of the millennium and America remains in a strange dance with > death. It is a dance between mythology and reality, cowboys and Indians, > cattle and buffalo, expressing a deep-set fear that somehow if those buffalo > live, what is America will not. Through this dance, American policy makers > struggle to determine the future of a buffalo herd and an entire bioregion. > > Look at it this way : 45 million cattle have replaced 60 million buffalo in > the Northern Plains region. Many of these cattle have moved into government > held lands in the region and are scarfing up grazing rights to most of the > region. That is about 250 million acres of the American West. The politics and > economics of this situation, resulting from faulty land use and agricultural > policy, has led to the decimation of one third of the Yellowstone buffalo herd > over the past four years. The Yellowstone herd are descendants of the 23 last > wild buffalo who lived through the great massacre of the past century. The > herd asks for enough food to survive and to live in some dignity. > > It is a simple request but the tribes have learned all too well that there is > no such thing. "They're going to slap us down . they're going to slap those > buffalo down," says Louis LaRose from the Winnebago of Nebraska. As Native > peoples, it is that quandary we all live in, how to not get slapped down, and > how to live in dignity. > > The bullet fence and the myth of wild > > "The buffalo is central to our existence," explains Milo Yellow Hair of the > Oglala Lakota Nation. "Our ceremonies will have no meaning if there is no > buffalo. Our language will have no meaning if there is no buffalo." It is that > basic. > > Yet an impossible dilemma is again leading the buffalo to the edge of genetic > oblivion. Buffalo suffer from genetic bottleneck, a direct consequence of the > massacres of the past century. Genetically speaking, the more there are, the > better their chances at survival. And, genetically speaking, many experts > consider the Yellowstone herd to be the "strongest herd." Therefore, a herd > cap proposed at Yellowstone of 1,700 to 2,200 animals means that the > "strongest herd" can only grow so far before it is killed. That is a > biological concern for the longevity of the Buffalo Nation. > > It is a fact that the Yellowstone Park boundaries and attendant ecosystem can > only support so many buffalo. In total, the greater Yellowstone ecosystem, as > it is called, in all of its glory is about 1.75 million acres. Yellowstone > National Park was established for the beauty of the location, not for its > ability to sustain a buffalo herd in the middle of winter. > > So it happens year after year, driven by their survival instincts, Yellowstone > buffalo are shot and killed after leaving the park for winter forage. Over the > past four years, the state of Montana and federal officials have killed 1,900 > of these buffalo as they move in search of food. > > Then there is the myth of wildness. While the Park Service maintains a > non-interference policy with wildlife in the park borders, that > non-interference policy does not allow the buffalo to carry on a natural > migration to winter grazing lands during the harsh winters. In other words, > they are wild until they hit an invisible border. "They're free ranging, only > until they get to the Montana line," says LaRose. "That's not what would fit > my definition of free ranging . But elk can free range across there (the > boundary) because they represent an economic resource to the state of > Montana."(LaRose refers to the $11 million generated in elk hunting permits in > the state). John Mack a wildlife biologist for the National Park Service > acknowledges the irony, "Bison, wolves, don't recognize a political boundary, > they recognize the land." > > So it is that the buffalo of Yellowstone are wild enough to live inside the > park, wild enough to die of starvation in the park, if they cannot get to > grazing lands, but absolutely dead if they hit the border of the park, if they > hit the bullet fence. That, in its own right illustrates the hypocrisy, many > would say, of public policy over the natural world. > > Another myth drives the killings - the myth of brucellosis, a dreaded cattle > disease that most of the Yellowstone herd carries. Brucellosis can only be > transmitted through fetal materials. A buffalo would have to pretty much give > birth in the face of a cow for that cow to contract the disease. That's why > there has never been one case of a buffalo transmitting the disease to cattle > in the wild. But the supposed risk of brucellosis transmission forms the > entire premise of current and proposed buffalo management policy. > > Most of Yellowstone's 100,000 elk have tested positive for brucellosis, but > state and federal officials have found no need to address this fact. This may > be attributed to the elk's economic importance. > > It turns out that when the first 19 buffalo slain at Yellowstone last year > underwent further testing, 17 of them did not even have brucellosis. And many > of the 90 plus killed were bulls, yearlings and non-pregnant females, which > even the U.S. Animal and Plant Health Inspection team said did not need to > die. The brucellosis bogeyman is basically being used to motivate a policy and > process which many believe is rooted in simple economics : access to grazing > land. > > Millions of dollars are being spent to protect the 2,000 cattle that graze > adjacent to Yellowstone National Park from buffalo who pose no threat. > Considering the effort, one would think that the 45 million plus cattle in the > ecosystem of the Great Plains are in danger of oblivion. > > Process leaves out Native People > > There is immense irony here. Sitting at the policy-making table for the > Yellowstone buffalo impact statement is the state of Montana and federal > agencies. > > Absent are the people who actually know the buffalo: the Nez Perce, Blackfeet > and Crow, and others whose treaties actually encompass part of Yellowstone > National Park, or the Winnebago, Ho Chunk, Lakota, Anishinabe, Kiowa, Gros > Ventre, Cheyenne, Shoshone Bannock and others, whose spiritual practices, > cultural practices, languages and lives are entirely intertwined with buffalo. > To us, the buffalo is the Western Doorkeeper, the Elder Brother, the Great > One. This is not, at its foundation, a "wildlife management issue" it is a > deeper spiritual issue that connects these nations to the very fabric of who > they are. > > Native representatives are absolutely clear that the Park Service is only > making a minimal attempt to include tribes. "It's like they give a call to > tell the tribe and, if no one answers, they say, 'Well, we tried,'" says Jim > Garrett. > > Rosalie Little Thunder, chairwoman of the Seventh Generation Fund, reiterates > that the Native response needs to be taken extremely seriously. "Tribal > councils are not to be treated as the general public comments. We are not the > public. We are sovereign nations with government-to-government requirements." > > Status of the EIS at Yellowstone > > After nearly a decade of research and planning, the Park Service released the > Environmental Impact Statement for the future management of Yellowstone > buffalo in June of 1998. The document outlines seven alternative management > scenarios. All seven share a chilling common denominator: "lethal control." > > The preferred alternative being pushed by the Park Service, known as > Alternative Seven, mixes "lethal control" with a potpourri of multi-use, > multi-interest management tactics. As the statement notes, "the preferred > alternative includes the use of capture, test and slaughter, the creation of > special management areas (SMAs).hazing and shooting bison outside the SMAs, > and on private land within the SMAs, quarantine of some seronegative bison, > hunting for recreational purposes, and to help control bison distribution , > vaccination of bison, the potential acquisition of additional winter range, > and the proposed creation on a SMA on that range as management tools." > > This proposal, tribes argue, does little to preserve the integrity of the > herd, preserve the long-term viability or Yellowstone as an ecosystem for > large buffalo and represents instead a non-innovative, those who have guns > should make public policy approach to the Yellowstone buffalo herds future. > > Butch Denny, chairman of the Santee Dakota, explained the position of most > tribes in his testimony to the Park Service. "I'd like to go on record to show > that we are opposed to all seven alternatives . The Santee Tribe of Nebraska . > has a resolution asking for the stop of the killing of the bison in > Yellowstone and a removal to the tribes." > > As well, Poncho Bigby of Fort Belknap, echoed the need for a new set of > alternatives with some semblance of representing sentiments of the tribes and > the public. "These tribes that are represented here have indicated that there > are other alternatives outside of the seven that are presented so I ask, on > behalf of the Ft. Belknap Indian community that you look at this other step, > this supplemental EIS, for additional alternatives in what is being presented > now. . Because you have heard everyone here and I haven't heard one person say > that they support any of the (existing) alternatives." > > Head of the impact statement team for the Park Service, Sarah Branscom has a > difficult job. That's an understatement. At the close of this process her team > is supposed to come up with a final management plan. That final impact > statement is expected this coming spring or summer. She has reviewed more than > 65,000 comments and suggestions. Branscom notes that 90 percent of the > respondents oppose "preferred alternative seven." In fact, 90 percent do not > like any of the alternatives. > > Branscom also reports that the Yellowstone impact statement generated more > comments from the Native community and tribal governments than any other in > the federal government's history. > > Gary Silk, whose determination and vision was key to the 500-mile ride and > walk from Rapid City to Yellowstone last winter, asked a simple question that > echoes all the questions asked by Native people for the last century. "If it > takes nine years to try and resolve the buffalo issue, there's something > completely wrong. When I come to meetings like this and hear things, I think > the people who we deal with must be aliens, the way they think, to allow all > of this to be happening. I think man has to connect himself again with the > spiritual world. A lot of these people don't even know who the Creator is. If > they did, they wouldn't allow this to happen. Does every buffalo have to die > before they realize it? Do they have to kill everything on this earth before > they know who they really are as a human being. > ------------------------- > Winona LaDuke is program director for Honor the Earth, a national Native > foundation and advocacy program working to increase funding and public support > for Native environmental issues. For more information: 1-800-EARTH-07 > > http://indiancountry.com/headlines.html#articlethree > Reprinted under the Fair Use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html doctrine of international copyright law. <><<<<<>>>>><><<<<> Tsonkwadiyonrat (We are ONE Spirit) http://www.tdi.net/ishgooda/ <><<<<<>>>>><><<<<>
