Bison in a Bubble: Do cattle deserve stronger health protections than people?

How’d you get to work today?

Did you drive? Take a bus? Ride your bike?

If so, you took a risk. Probably slight, but there was a chance something bad could have happened to you. We all take risks every day, its part of life…

…unless you are a rancher in Montana and the issue is brucellosis.

Then you can call for 0% risk solutions. They don’t seem to exist in real-life, but you can call for them all the same to force an acceptance of the status quo.

I should explain. A few weeks back, I was in Montana to observe the sad annual roust of Yellowstone’s bison herds from areas west of the Park. The animals leave the confines of the national park in search of food and places for calving. One of those spots, the Horse Butte peninsula, seems ideal because the issues that complicate buffalo leaving the confines of Yellowstone are not an issue on the spit of land just west of the Park (no cattle and landowners that generally welcome bison). Nonetheless, the animals are shooed of the peninsuladue to concerns, primarily from ranchers, about brucellosis---a disease carried by the buffalo that, in concept, could be transmitted to cattle (though it has never been documented to have happened outside of a controlled setting). We have discussed this issue a lot online and on Switchboard if you want to read up.

While we were in the area we met with a number of experts to help the small group of journalists who joined us to understand the complicated issues surrounding this ongoing debate. I was very pleased when we were joined by representatives from the Montana Stockgrowers Association, one of the state’s main livestock advocacy groups. The conversation was cordial, but frankly a bit surprising. I had expected to hear concerns and frustration about the heavy-handed regulatory approach to brucellosis. It’s no joke. A rancher must destroy his entire herd should one animal contact the disease---which has happened in Wyoming, Montana and Idaho in recent years due to interactions with elk, which also carry brucellosis. Frankly, I think that it is long past time for this country to look at a different sort of regulatory approach as it relates to this disease and the Department of Agriculture has started a review. I was prepared to actually find common ground.

I was wrong.

The Stockgrowers are unwilling to accept any more tolerance of bison outside the park, period. The explanation given revolved around international trade and vaccines, but it boiled down to the fact that no level of risk of disease transmission was acceptable to the Stockgrowers. When asked directly what percent chance of transmission was acceptable to the Stockgrowers the answer was clear, concise, and resolute. “None.”

Think about that. 0%. Absolute protection.

Never mind the fact that almost no effort has been made to address the threat of disease from elk, a far more numerous species that has already transferred brucellosis. Just think about that what 0% chance of transmission is a metric that we do not achieve in human health. That is something none of us can expect in our daily lives. Unless we want to live in plastic bubbles.

And I suppose, that’s what the Stockgrowers have in mind. Yellowstone’s herds are enclosed by the invisible boundaries of the Park. When they move beyond those imperceptible lines they are chased back in by wildlife agents on horseback, ATVs and low-flying helicopters. Only two years ago, they were simply slaughtered. So, for their needs the status quo looks pretty good.

While I was extremely pleased to give the Stockgrowers a chance to tell their side of the story to the journalists on-hand and to begin the necessary dialog between livestock interests and the conservation community, I have to say I was pretty disappointed. The temptation to employ the successful delaying tactics used by Big Tobacco and Big Oil must be strong, but a growing segment of folks in the region see the bison roust as the unnecessary boondoggle it is---denial will not hold off debate over a real solution for long.

Yellowstone bison nursing on Horse Butte image by jmogs via Flickr