In the early 1990s, Montana cattle ranchers were in an uproar over the natural migration of buffalo in Montana beyond Yellowstone National Park's borders.

Using the fear of brucellosis and loss of the state’s brucellosis-free status, cattle ranchers successfully manipulated the Montana legislature into passing Montana Code Annotated (MCA) § 81-2-120.  The new law placed the Montana Dept. of Livestock and the State Veterinarian in control of the migratory wildlife species and the only wild buffalo population in the state.

Shortly after MCA 81-2-120 became law in 1995, Governor Marc Racicot used the state statute to sue Yellowstone National Park and stop the migration of wild buffalo beyond park boundaries into Montana. The suit resulted in a voluntarily agreed to settlement calling for the creation of an Interagency Bison Management Plan to placate Montana’s cattle industry.

Under the Interagency Bison Management Plan – the Montana “governor-approved plan” MCA 81-2-120 calls for – millions of federal taxpayer dollars are spent destroying thousands of wild buffalo inside Yellowstone National Park, and in Montana, on National Forest, state, and private lands. In effect, the National Park Service and National Forest have ceded their authority for wild buffalo to the Montana Dept. of Livestock and federal taxpayers are picking up the tab.

Under MCA 81-2-120, wild buffalo are restricted to less than 0.3% of Montana's habitat and can no longer fulfill their keystone ecological role as caretaker of the land.

Montana and Yellowstone National Park are deadlocked on developing a new management plan which mirrors the same costly, harmful, and destructive livestock practices as the old one. A new approach is needed, one that respects wild buffalo as wildlife.

TAKE ACTION NOW!  Contact Montana Governor Greg Gianforte and urge him to do everything in his power to work with legislators to repeal MCA 81-2-120, and chart a new course managing wild buffalo like wild elk in Montana.