Vol 2, # 122

   Wednesday, December 2, 1998

YELLOWSTONE
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WEST YELLOWSTONE, Mont. (YNET) -- The Montana Department of Livestock has received approval to operate it's bison capture facility through January 1999.  Located near West Yellowstone, the facility is designed to capture and test wandering bison for the disease brucellosis.  The disease is feared by the livestock industry, which claims that it is a threat to cattle.  Brucellosis can cause cows to abort their calves, but there is no evidence that brucellosis has ever been transmitted between wild bison and domesticated cattle.

During the winter of 1996-97, some 1100 of Yellowstone's bison were slaughtered when they left the Park to forage during the severe winter months.  A mild winter last year resulted in only a handful of bison being slaughtered.

The Department of Livestock has declared that there goal is to capture and return as many bison as possible to the Park.  Animals which test positive to brucellosis, however, will face death at the hands of the Department of Livestock.

Bison advocates are campaigning for more protection for the bison, declaring that the killing of bison is unnecessary.  Yellowstone, state and federal officials are still struggling with a long term solution to the ongoing problem.

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CONTRIBUTING WRITERS AND COLUMNISTS

Ralph Maughan
Kim Steinbacher
Kevin Sanders
Steve Brashear
Clint Wilkes
Tim Gourley
Hon. Bob Gammage
Ruth Colter-Frick
Lee Whittlesey
Tom Mazzarisi
Russ Finley
David Monteith
Denise Elmer
Dr. Robert Bara

BILLINGS, Mont. (YNET) -- I recently got this email from my friend in Chicago, Bob Bara. It concerns another incredibly stupid TV commercial. I enjoy commercials with animals in them if they do not make fun of the animal or in this case are just really dumb.

I join his email in progress........"during supper, had the TV on, and saw a strange commercial.  I am very sensitive to the wildlife issues, especially after the Planter's Peanuts column you did a few weeks ago.

Well, the commercial is for "Beefsteak Rye".  Scenario is adults at a "campsite", obviously in bear country, with all their food in a blue and white plastic cooler chest (not bearproof).  The huge bear comes along, and all laugh, thinking nothing of it, as the bear has a free-for-all with the unprotected food.   Let the bear enjoy, they say.  Then, someone asks about the "Beefsteak sandwiches"...all of a sudden it is not OK, and all charge at the bear to chase it away.  This is certainly a wrong message to present to the consumer.  How stupid to be in bear country, not have the food in a bear-proof container, condone that the bear is eating people food, until the poor bear gets to the beefsteak, and then, to risk injury by being aggressive to an eating bear by actually running up to it.

Certainly children will get the wrong message, let alone the adults. I don't know where, all of a sudden, all these companies are getting the idea of exploiting wildlife in an unsafe and obviously careless manner. I guess it comes down to the idea that anything is OK, as long as it
satisfies the current, momentary(Clint added "monetary" also) need.   "I want it now, and that's what I want, because I want it, and that's that...it is a free country!  Oh, do we have a lot to learn."

A NOTE FROM CLINT: Almost all bears that learn to eat food left by humans will have to be KILLED. Thank You Beefsteak Rye.

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YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK (YNET) --
One of the most famous Yellowstone painters, and, in fact, the painter who was most responsible for making Yellowstone known to the American public in the 1800s, was Thomas Moran.

The National Park Service offers the following description of Thomas Moran, Painter of Yellowstone:

"Thomas Moran, with William Henry Jackson, played an important role in depicting Yellowstone. By the time Moran died in 1926, he had painted a dozen other areas that would become national parks or monuments in the National Park System. But Yellowstone, Moran himself claimed, was "his love." It is a land whose story will forever be intertwined with that of the man who first painted it, just over 125 years ago.

Moran's interest in the area that would become Yellowstone National Park was first piqued when he illustrated an article for Scribner's Monthly magazine, "The Wonders of the Yellowstone." Moran accepted the assignment without having seen the place firsthand, instead
reworking amateur sketches of Yellowstone for publication. After drawing renditions of geothermal features and other natural wonders using someone else's crude sketches, notes, and verbal descriptions, Moran found a way to travel to the area himself."

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A NOTE TO OUR READERS:  The Yellowstone Net Newspaper archives past editions on the internet, going back to the publications beginning in October of 1997.  The archive listing contains the date and select story titles from each edition.

To access the archives, now updated through November 1998, click here.

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