Have you herd?
ATHOL, Idaho – Silverwood Theme Park’s latest attraction has nothing to do with speed or adrenaline-laced thrills.
Unlike the Panic Plunge, a 50-mph ride that opened last weekend, the park’s new herd of bison moves at an ambling gait. Three are expectant mothers with bulging midsections, due to deliver any day. Another gave birth on Sunday, and her leisurely stroll accommodates a nursing calf.
The American bison, often called buffalo, assemble when groundskeeper Jerry Wilson leans on the gate, yelling “bread, bread.”
“It’s their treat,” said Wilson, tossing day-old slices in the enclosure and pointing out each animal in the herd. They range from an aggressive young bull – still a lightweight at 800 pounds – to the calf, whose blocky young body is covered with fawn-colored fuzz.
The nine-member herd is on loan to Silverwood from a ranch in Cocolalla, Idaho. The bison are part of a new exhibit that park guests will view during a three-mile train ride.
After passing the herd, the train will continue to an Indian camp. Coeur d’Alene tribal elder Cliff SiJohn is preparing a taped oral history of the tribe, including how members traveled to Montana and Wyoming to hunt buffalo with their allies, the Flathead.
“I think people have a deep interest in the tribes and their history,” said Nancy DiGiammarco, Silverwood’s marketing director. “They’ll be able to learn a lot.”
The park spent about a year planning for the exhibit. Interest in a buffalo herd led to the idea for the encampment. Park managers consulted with SiJohn for accuracy, whose stories led to designs sketched by local artist David Clemons.
Gary Norton, Silverwood’s owner, was emphatic that “if we’re going to build a camp, it needs to be authentic,” DiGiammarco said.
The camp will include 12 teepees, along with racks for drying salmon, smoking meat and stretching hides. Ovens for cooking bitterroots will also be part of the display. Silverwood hopes to add a wooden longhouse next year. Longhouses were the camps’ gathering spots.
SiJohn put Silverwood in touch with a Nez Perce woman, who is stitching the canvas teepees. The top fourth of the teepees will be darkened, as if smoke from cooking fires had risen through their openings.
About six of the teepees should be up before Memorial Day, DiGiammarco said. SiJohn will visit in June when the camp is complete, for a ceremony to bless it.
SiJohn’s oral history will cover camp etiquette and discuss how each part of the bison was used for shelter, clothing, tools or food.
The herd has eight acres to roam within an electric fence at Silverwood. Wilson’s expecting three more animals to arrive in the next several weeks. Three days ago, he arrived to find their backs covered with silvery frost. He’s also caught them gamboling like goats, playing with the circular bales of hay.
He expects Silverwood’s guests to find them as absorbing.
“I could spend hours out here with them,” Wilson said.