Tag Archives: bison

environmental news

They’re labeled ‘wildlife’ for a good reason

baby-bison-with-mother

This is one of those stories that simply sends me into orbit.

Some visitors were driving through Yellowstone National Park. They see a newborn bison calf. They pick it up and put it into their SUV, believing it was “freezing.” They take the creature to a park office, where I presume the National Park Service rangers were none too happy to receive this arrival.

The rangers sought to return the animal to the wild, return it to the herd from which the visitors “rescued” it.

Mama bison wouldn’t care for her baby, which at that point was doomed.

Faced with the prospect of allowing the young bison to starve to death, the rangers decided to euthanize the tiny critter.

You know, of course, why this story is so outrageous.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/travel/news/yellowstone-tourists-put-bison-calf-in-car-spurring-warning/ar-BBt7pJ9?li=BBnbfcL

The National Park Service spends a lot of time and energy — not to mention public money — educating the public about the hazards of messing with these creatures. Tourists must not feed them, pet them, love on them … pick them up and put them in their vehicles.

As for the bison in particular, they are powerful and often cantankerous beasts that can inflict serious bodily harm.

The visitors were fined $110 for touching the baby bison. A part of me wishes the penalty was a lot stiffer. I also hope the rangers gave these visitors a serious tongue-lashing for what they did.

OK, you are welcome to accuse me of restating the obvious — but these animals are labeled “wildlife” for a very good reason.

 

environmental news

Bison get new, exalted status

bison

Let us take a break from partisan politics for a moment and talk briefly about something that ought to warm our hearts.

The bison has been named the national mammal of the United States of America, to which I offer a hearty “bravo!”

President Obama has signed the National Bison Legacy Act into law. This new designation does not remove the bald eagle from its standing as the national symbol. It does give the bison some added standing as the national mammal, which is a good thing, considering what human beings did to the grand creature during much of the 19th century.

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/05/north-american-bison-national-mammal-us-222975

We’ve all studied American history enough to know how humans slaughtered the great herds on which Native Americans depended for food, clothing and shelter. Bison would roam the prairies in vast numbers. Millions of them galloped across the High Plains, for example.

Humans killed so many of them that their numbers were decimated to fewer than 1,000 or so head of wild beasts by the turn of the 20th century.

They’ve come back. Thankfully.

Several hundred thousand of them now are being raised on ranches and farms. Thousands more roam on public lands. Why, we’ve even received some of them at Caprock Canyons State Park in the Texas Panhandle, where the herd is doing quite well, according to Texas Parks & Wildlife officials.

I’m glad that Congress and the president saw fit to honor the glorious beast with this national mammal designation.

Fans of the bald eagle need not worry about the national symbol, though. It, too, was nearly killed off until the government banned the use of the pesticide DDT, from which the great birds were dying because they were eating fish that had been poisoned by the chemical.

So, what’s next? Designation of the national reptile? I have a suggestion: the alligator, which has made a dramatic comeback of its own along the Gulf Coast.

Meantime, let the buffalo — ‘er bison — roam.