More Than 400 Yellowstone Bison Slaughtered So Far This Year in Montana
More than 400 bison have been slaughtered outside the northern boundary of Yellowstone National Park in Montana as they left the protected area in their customary winter search for food at lower altitudes.
According to the Buffalo Field Campaign, an advocacy group formed to stop the culling of the herd in the name of livestock owners’ interests, 410 bison have been trapped and removed for slaughter over the past several weeks.
The effort has been under way since mid-January, according to Boulder Weekly; it’s part of the Interagency Bison Management Plan, which will remove between 800 and 900 animals this year. Hunting will eliminate about 350 of them, the newspaper said, and from 500 to 600 will be captured and then slaughtered. Those will be given to tribes, which will use the meat for sustenance and ceremonies.
The Buffalo Field Campaign has documented the measures being taken to both drive the bison back inside the park, and to reduce the herd.
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Attention was drawn to the 2014 hunt with the arrest of 21-year-old activist Comfrey Jacobs handcuffed himself to the a cement-filled drum and blocked the roadway leading to a trapping facility with mesh webbing. He pleaded guilty in June 2014 to a misdemeanor charge of interfering with an agency function.
RELATED: Video: Young Activist Pleads Guilty to Blocking Bison Slaughter in Yellowstone
The hunt was called off soon after, when Yellowstone said it had reached its goal for the year. Last year the hunt culled 600 bison in a hunt-slaughter combo that lasted through early March.
RELATED: Yellowstone Bison Slaughter Over, Controversy Remains
