Ranchers go to court over bison

BOZEMAN – Cattle ranchers upset over a herd of bison still lingering outside Yellowstone National Park went to court Wednesday, seeking to compel the Montana Department of Livestock to move the animals and accusing the agency of jeopardizing the state’s brucellosis-free status.

The Department of Livestock said it already planned within days to haze the bison into the park and off of private land whose owners want the state to leave the animals alone. To do so would be a violation of a federal-state agreement that calls for killing or removing bison that migrate outside Yellowstone to prevent the spread of brucellosis – a disease that can cause cows to abort their calves.

Since February, 1,728 Yellowstone bison have been killed or removed under the program.

There has never been a documented bison-to-cattle transmission of brucellosis, but ranchers say the state was running that risk by allowing bison to linger outside the park’s western boundary as cattle are set to return to the area within the next several days.

“They have to be hazed back in, captured or shot,” said Errol Rice with the Montana Stockgrowers Association. “Now’s the time to be extremely cautious, not more tolerant of bison in Montana.”

For the last three years, state officials have allowed bison to linger outside the park past a May 15 deadline outlined in the 2000 federal-state agreement.

On Wednesday, the stockgrowers group and two ranchers went to court in Helena to compel the Department of Livestock to comply with the agreement – just hours before the state said between 85 and 100 of the animals would be pushed back into the park from 700 acres owned by the Galanis family.

Despite the state’s later pledge to act, Rice said his group would continue to press its case in court to make sure Montana abides by the agreement in future years.

A brucellosis outbreak last year near Bridger, Mont. – an occurrence linked to elk, not bison – put the state on the verge of losing its federal disease-free status. If another outbreak occurs before July 2009, ranchers statewide would face a costly vaccination and testing program.

Department of Livestock spokesman Steve Merritt said his agency had delayed action on the bison herd until it could talk with the Galanis family on Wednesday. In the interim, Merritt said the state had concentrated on removing bison from other areas outside the park.

“They will be removed, and they will be removed shortly,” Merritt said. “We have authority to go on private land to do it, but we wanted to work things through.”

An attorney who participated in Wednesday’s meeting said the Galanis family continued to oppose the hazing or removal of bison from their property. But the attorney, Tim Preso with the group Earthjustice, said he was not aware of any plans by the family to try to stop the hazing.