Babbitt Tries To Buffalo State, Governor Says Feds Agreed To Bison Management Plan

Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt ignored his own agency’s responsibility when he asked Montana’s congressional delegation to stop the killing of Yellowstone National Park bison, Montana Gov. Marc Racicot said Friday.

Babbitt met with the Montana delegation Thursday and told reporters afterward that he “pleaded” with the three to help find some way to curtail the killing of bison for the rest of this winter.

“It’s not needed to kill any more of these animals. … There’s no reason for this to go on,” Babbitt said, adding that he had “not yet had an affirmative response from state officials.”

Racicot, in a letter to Babbitt on Friday, replied: “It’s a mystery to me how you reconcile this sentiment with your obligation under the Interim Bison Management plan, which was agreed to by the federal agencies and the state of Montana after exhaustive and thorough analysis.”

The interim plan calls for park bison to be rounded up and tested for exposure to brucellosis and those testing positive are shipped to slaughter. Bison that migrate beyond Yellowstone’s borders into Montana are shot by the Department of Livestock for fear they could be carriers of the disease and endanger Montana livestock.

The goal is to keep brucellosis-infected bison from transmitting the disease to domestic cattle. It causes cattle to abort and can cause undulant fever in humans.

As of Friday, Racicot said, 1,870 bison were in and around the park, 961 have been shot or sent to slaughter since last fall and 41 have been killed by vehicles, mostly near the Yellowstone gateway communities of Gardiner and West Yellowstone.

Racicot cited a recent report by Mary Meagher, a National Park Service biologist who has been studying the Yellowstone bison herd for 38 years. In her Feb. 21 report, Meagher said the bison herd is not facing extermination and that, in fact, the reduction of the bison herd below 2,000 is “a critical ecological need.”