wildlife

Wild Buffalo Cows and Calves Captured by Livestock Agents
For Immediate Release, April 12, 2005
Contact Stephany Seay, 406-646-0070

WEST YELLOWSTONE, MONTANA. After running them off of their calving grounds at Horse Butte over ten miles to the Duck Creek Capture Facility, the Montana Department of Livestock (DOL) agents captured eighteen of America's last wild, genetically pure buffalo on Monday. Today, the DOL captured at least 14 more buffalo, running them three miles up highway 191 to the Duck Creek Capture Facility.

These recent operations will likely send more wild buffalo to slaughter, more calves to a quarantine facility, and agents will likely conduct a post-capture hazing operation, returning them to Horse Butte, public land where wild buffalo are currently not tolerated. At least one of the buffalo captured yesterday was previously hazed, captured, tested, and released earlier this year. Bull bison, that pose no risk of transmitting brucellosis, have also been captured and may be sent to slaughter.

Since October 2004, the Department of Livestock has captured at least 78 Yellowstone buffalo, slaughtered 21, sent six to quarantine, and released 19 on Horse Butte.

"The DOL's hazing and capture operations of wild buffalo engaged in their spring migration are

endangering motorists who come to the region to see wildlife found nowhere else in the country," said Mike Mease of the Buffalo Field Campaign.

Governor Brian Schweitzer has said that buffalo will enjoy more tolerance in Montana. In his statements, Schweitzer said that management of buffalo and the protection of Montana's brucellosis-free status should be determined by "science, not hyperbole," and that the DOL is "ill-equipped" to manage wild buffalo for the State of Montana.

"Governor Schweitzer needs to turn his words into action," said Mease. "Wild buffalo are being managed to death, and he has the power to end the state's zero-tolerance policy and provide habitat for wild buffalo in Montana."

" The scientific value of the Yellowstone herd cannot be overstated and their protection should not be compromised," said Dr. Andrew Dobson, professor at Princeton University in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology.

Inaccurate Brucellosis Testing
Buffalo develop immunities to the European livestock disease brucellosis and retain long-term anti-bodies. The test the government uses to determine which buffalo are slaughtered and which are released is not inaccurate because it merely determines exposure to the livestock disease. The percentage of Yellowstone buffalo that actually carry any brucellosis bacteria is only from 2 to 20 percent.

Dr. Paul Nicoletti, DVM and emeritus professor at the University of Florida, and a leading expert on brucellosis stated, "At present, the agencies either slaughter all captured bison or blood test captured bison sending all seropositive and pregnant bison to slaughter. This methodology, since the blood tests only determine exposure, results in a large number of non-infected bison being killed."