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MONDAY
July 16, 2001
Vol 5, # 63

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YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK (YNET) -- Even during the summer months, the fate of Yellowstone's bison continues to make news.  Last week a number of bison who had wandered out of Yellowstone were captured well outside the Park in the Targhee National Forest area and trucked back to the Park.  Although noticeably stressed, the bison arrived safely back in the Park.

Area ranchers who run cattle on land adjacent to Yellowstone complain that the bison should be forced to stay within Park boundaries.   Against this backdrop, a lawsuit was filed last week against those ranchers who are grazing their cattle on public land adjacent to Yellowstone.  A press release from the Greater Yellowstone Coalition states:

In an effort to prevent future conflict between buffalo and livestock and to stop the slaughter of Yellowstone National Park’s buffalo, a coalition of conservationists, Native American tribes, hunters and wildlife advocates (see header) have filed suit over a Forest Service decision to permit continued cattle grazing in critical buffalo winter range just outside the Park’s west boundary.

"Over the years conservationists have worked to achieve solutions to this problem, including urging the Forest Service to provide an alternative grazing allotment, exploring acquisition of the permittee’s lands, and offering to pay for private grazing areas for the permittee’s cattle away from any potential conflict with buffalo," said Michael Scott, executive director of the Greater Yellowstone Coalition. "Only after meeting steady resistance to these common-sense approaches are we asking a judge to intervene."

The lawsuit challenges the U.S. Forest Service’s renewal of a 10-year permit that allows Idaho cattle to be trucked into the Yellowstone area every summer for grazing on Horse Butte, which is located in the Gallatin National Forest approximately five miles west of the Park boundary near West Yellowstone, Montana.

The presence of the trucked-in cattle contributes to an annual program of buffalo hazing and slaughter that the government has claimed is unavoidable. Horse Butte provides essential winter range for Yellowstone buffalo that migrate out of the Park to escape severe cold and heavy snows. Hundreds of buffalo entering these national forest lands have been killed by government agents over the past decade as part of a program aimed to protect cattle from a theoretical threat that buffalo might infect them with a livestock disease known as brucellosis. The transmission of brucellosis between buffalo and domestic cattle in the field has never been documented.

"Cattle should not have priority over buffalo on public lands adjacent to our nation’s first national park," said Tim Preso of the Earthjustice Legal Defense Fund, an attorney representing the groups filing the lawsuit. "Cattle grazing on Horse Butte has provided a major justification for the government’s buffalo killing program. The Horse Butte lease renewal perpetuates the slaughter by giving cattle priority over buffalo in this crucial winter range."

The Yellowstone buffalo slaughter is particularly troubling for many Native Americans, for whom the buffalo always has held great meaning. The Yellowstone herd is the last remnant of the estimated 60 million buffalo that once roamed the Great Plains and the American West. Millions were slaughtered in the late-nineteenth century, and only the Yellowstone buffalo survived as a wild herd.

"The buffalo were slaughtered in the 1800s to destroy the food supply of the Native American people and to make room for European cattle. It is a tragedy that slaughtering buffalo is still government policy today," said Fred DuBray, a member of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe and president of the InterTribal Bison Cooperative.

"For the last five years, the Forest Service has promised to evaluate the impacts of cattle grazing on bison before renewing the permit on the Horse Butte grazing allotment," said attorney Tom France of the National Wildlife Federation. "By reissuing the grazing permit, the Forest Service has broken this promise. More importantly, the Forest Service has refused to take steps that could result in a win for both livestock grazing and bison. There are good options to the status quo."

The lawsuit challenges the Forest Service’s failure to study the environmental impacts of continued cattle grazing on the Horse Butte livestock allotment before renewing the grazing permit, as required by the National Environmental Policy Act. The Forest Service renewed the permit in December 2000 without any consideration of the impacts that cattle grazing in the area would have on buffalo, other environmental concerns, or even the federal Treasury.

"Livestock grazing on Horse Butte is bad for buffalo, but it is also bad for the American taxpayer," said Mike Leahy of Defenders of Wildlife. "The grazing fee for the Horse Butte allotment returns less than $1,200 annually to the government, but the government’s system of hazing and slaughtering Yellowstone buffalo for the sake of cattle grazing is estimated to cost the taxpayer more than $1.7 million each year."

"The government has laid down a rule that the buffalo can’t roam freely where cattle are grazed," said Glenn Hockett of the Gallatin Wildlife Association. "If that is the rule, then we have no choice but to object when the Forest Service allows 10 more years of cattle grazing in the middle of prime buffalo range on our national forest lands."

The lawsuit, which is being filed in the federal district court in Washington, DC, seeks to halt further livestock grazing on Horse Butte until the Forest Service complies with the law.

(Yellowstone Net provides you opportunity to voice your opinion regarding the various Yellowstone issues to your congresspersons and to editorial sections of magazines and newspapers by clicking here.)

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CONTRIBUTING WRITERS AND COLUMNISTS

Russ Finley
Ralph Maughan
Kim Steinbacher
Steve Brashear
Clint Wilkes
Hon. Bob Gammage
Lee Whittlesey
David Monteith
Denise Elmer
Dr. Bob Bara
Matthew McLean

STRANDED BOY SCOUTS BACK HOME
News Brief

CHEYENNE, Wyo. -- A group of Boy Scouts from North Texas who had been stranded on a steep Wyoming mountainside headed home to Texas on Saturday.  The Scouts, from Coppell, were rescued Thursday after spending a night camped on Eagle Nest Mountain, a 10,000-foot elevation east of Yellowstone National Park.   The group included eight boys ages 14 to 16 and eight adults, and was led by a local trail guide who became lost because he failed to follow established trails.

The planned 50-mile hike began Monday, but by Wednesday the Scouts were at a point in Cloudburst Canyon south of Pahaska Teepee where they could not climb farther down without proper equipment nor could they safely retreat because of loose rock.  They camped on the mountainside that night.

One of the adults experienced altitude sickness Tuesday and was led 12 miles out by the guide. The guide returned but he also became sick after searching in vain for a safe way out of the canyon Wednesday.

The decision was made Thursday morning for four adults to strike out for help.  They made it back to their base camp late that morning and notified authorities.  Shortly thereafter, a plane dropped a note to the Scouts telling them that help was on the way.  Rescuers were airlifted in and led the Scouts on foot for a distance, then transferred them to horseback for the rest of their journey to safety.

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GLACIER NATIONAL PARK, Mont. (NPS) -- Representatives from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service spotted two wolf pups from the North Camas pack near the Canadian border in the North Fork area of the park during a recent survey flight. There are also indications that this is one of three wolf packs that possibly denned within the park this year.

At present, there are three gray wolf (Canus lupus) packs located within the park - the North Camas pack, the South Camas pack, and the McDonald pack. Numbers of individuals per pack are relatively low, with only four to five members in each (not counting this year's possible pups). These population numbers are derived from track surveys conducted in the winter of 2000-2001 by the FWS and the park. Information received from the movements of the six current radio-collared wolves leads biologists to believe that both the South Camas and McDonald packs denned in the park this season, but pups have not been confirmed. Indications are that these packs have established rendezvous sites where pups remain while the adults are hunting. All three packs are located on the west side of the park

Wolf packs normally produce one litter a year with an average of six to eight pups. Normally, only the alpha male and alpha female wolves in each pack breed, but all the members help with the rearing of the pups. Adult wolves will typically move litters to a series of rendezvous areas throughout the summer as the pups grow and mature. By late August or September, pups begin travelling and hunting with the adults throughout their home range.

Wolves historically roamed throughout Glacier National Park and most of the western United States. They had been missing (with the exception of isolated sightings) from the park and there had been no records of denning for over 50 years following the eradication efforts of the 1920s. They started recolonizing the North Fork of the Flathead River area of the park when they migrated south from British Columbia, Canada, in the early 1980s. In 1986, the first confirmed den of wolves in the western United States occurred in the park. Wolves have continued to den in the park nearly every year since 1986. The gray wolf has been listed as an endangered species in the western United States since 1967.

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GRAND CANYON NATIONAL PARK, Ariz. (NPS)  -- Due to extreme fire conditions in the park, fire crews have set out supplemental water "pumpkins" (portable water tanks) in order to respond to wildfires. On the morning of June 29th, park resource staff received reports of California condors utilizing these pumpkins as dipping ponds. Unfortunately, they preferred the pumpkin located near the North Rim helibase. Upon arrival, park staff found 14 condors at the pumpkins - some perched precariously on the edges, some completely submerging themselves, others simply there for the social gathering. Fire crews immediately responded by covering all pumpkins in the park in order to prevent attractants to park wildlife.

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