Yellowstone bison hunt takes most since '89

MATTHEW BROWN Associated Press Published:

BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) -- Hunters killed more wild bison migrating from Yellowstone National Park this season than they have in decades, with the numbers driven by strong participation from American Indians who harvest the animals under longstanding treaty rights.


Combined with a mild winter, the means there's unlikely to be a repeat this year of the massive slaughters that have killed thousands of bison in the last two decades in the name of disease control.





As a result, bison have access to tens of thousands of acres of historic grazing areas -- and hunters have more chance to shoot them.

"This season has been really, really busy," said Keith Lawrence, wildlife division director for Idaho's Nez Perce Tribe.


For Lawrence, that's much preferred to shipping bison to slaughter, which the tribe argues violates its rights by removing animals that hunters otherwise could harvest.

"We would like to see the population at a level where there's an annual migration," he said, adding that the tribe "is not interested in seeing a gross movement of animals" to slaughter.



Several other tribes with treaty rights also participated in this year's hunt, including the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation





Despite recent changes in federal policy that eased trade sanctions against states with brucellosis-infected cattle, Montana's livestock industry and its supporters are pushing to restore restrictions that would keep bison in the park.

That includes so-called "zero tolerance" bison legislation pending before the Montana Legislature and a state lawsuit that would reverse the state's decision to allow the animals to roam largely free in the 75,000-acre Gardiner Basin.




The hunts since then have been more closely regulated.

"Our goal was to as much as possible manage the population level through hunting as opposed to other means," said Pat Flowers, the Yellowstone region supervisor for Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks. "If we can have a more consistent removal out of the park, we can get the population back down near the target of 3,000 to 3,500 bison."