Bison problem won't go away until bison go away

Dear Editor:

I am hopeful the U.S. Bureau of Land Management will have a wide awakening with the forthcoming Secretary of the Interior Rep. Ryan Zinke. BLM will require new personnel who understand how to manage the public land resources but do they have any today at all? BLM effectively destroyed A.L. Hormay's restoration grazing allotments south of Malta that proved how range should be managed. Over the last 8 years BLM has drifted into an left environmental agenda supporting organizations like the American Prairie Foundation . BLM licensed these bison actually hybrid domestic livestock with a 12 month license to graze on our public lands a bison consumes 2 1/2 more forage than a cow with calf and bull bison free to BLM. The 12 month grazing is a gimmick so they can falsely be called free-roaming and wild to collect money BLM is a party to this false advertising. BLM would never license cattle for 12 months.

Grazing the range vegetation for 12 months is destructive to the vegetation and soil resource. Having recently viewed the range adjacent to YNP near Gardiner I have never seen that range in such deplorable condition. Most all is bare ground and the bison are showing ribs and on the verge of starvation and malnutrition a die off is expected. No cattle rancher would ever abuse the range in this manner. In Malta the range has always supported healthy cattle as well as elk, mule deer, pronghorn antelope, whitetail deer, upland bird populations and waterfowl. Stock ponds for livestock have provided measurable habitat for waterfowl in the Central Flyway.

False advertising continues by APF to collect money which is of course illegal APF taking claim to wildlife as it belongs to them. I have corresponded with BLM in Malta over the last 15 years on the APF problem there even the BLM state directors in Billings. The conclusion is BLM is clueless so how will they solve the problem? High wildlife unfriendly fence to hold bison is a violation of the federal unlawful enclosures act of 1885 and yet bison will go though about any fence constructed. It's happened with Turners 52 inch high fence in SW Montana. What happens in Malta remains to be seen but the bison problem will not go away until the bison go away there as well. Bison are also dangerous animals more bison human encounters in YNP than with bears. These bison do not belong on our public lands along the Hi line period!

Sincerely,

Jack D. Jones

Wildlife biologist 36 years

12 years in Malta