If there’s good news, it’s that this canned hunt was organized by wildlife managers who didn’t implement knowledge of bison migration habits. Some gunners will definitely come away empty-handed. Maybe that’s what it will take for hunters to finally understand that until there is significant year-round habitat, until wild buffalo establish a viable, resident population throughout the state, until the Department of Livestock is stripped of authority, and until Montana honors the buffalo and respects them as a native wildlife species, the “hunt” is not only unfair, unethical, and unjust, it’s plain WRONG by any definition.
The Yellowstone buffalo are America’s last continuously wild herd and number fewer than 4,000 animals. Their once vast numbers have been reduced to less than .01 percent of their historic population. They are genetically and behaviorally unique, yet with such a small population, threatened with wanton government destruction year after year, the last wild buffalo are in real danger of an eventual collapse. Wild buffalo are essential to the health of grassland ecosystems, they are the icon of the American West, and they represent a profound sacredness to First Nations People. Wild buffalo deserve protection and respect, not cruelty and indifference. They deserve to be honored, not persecuted. The land hungers for their return. When the land teemed with millions of buffalo, they gave of themselves freely. We now live in a time when we must give back to them.
Please continue to call, write, fax and email Montana Governor Brian Schweitzer. Insist that he take real and positive action for the last wild buffalo and encourage Montana to co-exist with these gentle, shaggy giants who have walked this land for over ten thousand years.
Montana Governor Brian Schweitzer, State Capitol, Helena, MT 59620-0801
Phone: 1-406-444-3111 / Fax: 1-406-444 5529 / Email: BrianSchweitzer@mt.gov
Thanks to each and every one of you who continue to be a strong voice for the last wild buffalo!
Roam Free,
~Stephany
View the hunt breakdown –
http://www.buffalofieldcampaign.org/media/press0506/pressreleases0506/080306.html.
Ralph Maughan
Dr. Ralph Maughan is professor emeritus of political science at Idaho State University. He was a Western Watersheds Project Board Member off and on for many years, and was also its President for several years. For a long time he produced Ralph Maughan's Wolf Report. He was a founder of the Greater Yellowstone Coalition. He and Jackie Johnson Maughan wrote three editions of "Hiking Idaho." He also wrote "Beyond the Tetons" and "Backpacking Wyoming's Teton and Washakie Wilderness." He created and is the administrator of The Wildlife News.
Do the members of the Buffalo Field Campaign apply for some of these permits thus sparing a buffalo?
Yes, many did.
Did any draw tags?
Watch the Montana media this hunting season to find out…