Large Unmet Demand for Bison Hunting

Recently noted statistics indicate that Montana has a large unmet demand for public bison hunting and harvesting.

In 2019, Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks received over 18,000 applications, each with a $10 non-refundable fee, for only 93 available licenses to harvest a bison near Yellowstone National Park. Over 17,000 of these applications were from Montana residents.

Also in 2019, American Prairie Reserve conducted a higher-quality bison hunt adjacent to the area pertinent to the Coalition’s goal of restoring public-trust bison on the Charles M. Russell National Wildlife Refuge. Although legally classified as livestock, APR’s bison roam across a very large containment area, much like wild bison. In a less publicized process (compared to FWP’s license process), APR offered 16 permits, at $300 each, to harvest bison. They received 2,500 applications.

This huge unmet demand for bison hunting/harvesting indicates one large potential in restoring a public, wild bison herd on the CMR National Wildlife Refuge:

to provide opportunities for recreational hunting, including cooperative family hunts that share and benefit from the large effort needed to put hundreds of pounds of meat for many Montana dinner tables;

to enhance local economies with monies spent by resident and non-resident hunters for transportation, food and lodging;

to provide opportunities for guiding, outfitting and carcass retrieval/processing businesses in rural areas.

Furthermore, the data indicate that proceeds from state license sales could provide much or all the income needed by Montana FWP to fund the management needed, under state law, for any newly established public, wild bison herd.

(Montana has not restored a public, wild bison herd. Hunted bison from Yellowstone Park are seasonal visitors from Wyoming. Human predation has long been a predominant selective force that created the modern bison species (see “Bison Hunting & Wildness”). Thus, carefully managed hunting is a management tool that would complement other natural selective forces, maintaining the wild bison genome.)

Jim Bailey,  Coordinator