"US, tribe deal to aid comeback of buffalo; Oglala Sioux work to create national forest" by Juliet Eilperin | Washington Post, June 30, 2013
BADLANDS NATIONAL PARK, S.D. — Tens of millions of bison used to range freely in North America before they were almost wiped out in the late 1800s.
Wow, a GRAND Holocaust™!
The American Bison Society disbanded in 1935 with the understanding it had saved the species by placing 20,000 animals in conservation herds; there are now an additional 400,000 or so being raised in the United States and Canada for meat production.
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It could be horse, it could be rat, it could be pink slime, it could be just about anything, folks.
But those numbers are not enough for the buffalo to reclaim their traditional role in the ecosystem in what the Northern Great Plains used to look like, a chance to reclaim an area that served as a crucible for the nation’s economic and political expansion in the 1800s....
Not meaning to offend, but.... George Carlin on The Environment
Free-roaming bison provide habitat for grassland birds and other animals by grazing intermittently, leaving the grass at different heights. Cattle ranching, by contrast, leaves the grass at a more uniform level.
The Wildlife Conservation Society relaunched the American Bison Society in 2005, and a coalition of tribes, environmentalists, and ranchers have been working to bring them back to areas where there is enough available land....
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The Badlands — where sediment deposits have been eroded by wind and water during millions of years — is an ideal setting for buffalo to make a comeback. The region is less suitable for agricultural development than other parts of the Great Plains.
Related: Badlands
But even though it makes sense from an ecological and economic perspective, reintroducing buffalo poses a political challenge....
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