Former FWP Biologists Promote Bison Restoration on CMR

Former FWP Biologists Promote Bison Restoration

Recently, nine former employees of Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks, averaging over 25 years of service each, cosigned a letter toGovernor Steve Bullock to support restoring a public, wild bison herdon the Charles M. Russell National Wildlife Refuge.

Biologists thanked Governor Bullock for vetoing, in 2017 and 2019, anti-bison legislation that would have ended any future for wild bison in Montana; but noted: “These efforts could come to naught with a new governor in 2021.” They said, “We have failed to preserve public, wild bison as anything more than seasonal, abused visitors to our state.”

“The Charles M. Russell National Wildlife Refuge is the largest federal refuge within the historic range of plains bison. Elsewhere in the Great Plains, bison herds on federal and state lands do not provide herd sizes, range sizes, or habitat quality and diversity necessary for long-term preservation of truly wild bison and their wild-adapted genomes.”

Biologists noted several political and biological issues of bison restoration that indicate the CMR Refuge is the best possible location for restoring public wild bison, leaving a “long-lasting legacy of the Bullock administration for future generations of Montanans and the nation.”