Hey I know We’re gonna save this little bison even though if the rest of its herd sees us and decides to act our car is going to be run over by the biological equivalent of a battalion tank charge. WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG?!
Read the book, saw the movie!
Attached is an image of an adult bison. He laid down in this shady spot the night before I took this image. It took him three days to die, and I tried to stay with him as much as I could. I was stroking his head when he finally passed, and he was in quite a bit of pain. The reason that there was not a vet there for that animal is because after dozens had died in the same manner, the vet told the rancher that once the lay down, they are past the point where any intervention would help. This herd of more than 200 started losing about three animals a week
I could show an image of what we see when the disease in a pregnant bison cow causes spontaneous abortions. That particular horror is why the pathogen that causes the disease is called “Brucella abortus”
So I have personal reasons to believe that Brucellosis and the other diseases are something more than a distraction.
i have several hundred elk, who show every sign of being healthy. Nobody gets to hunt them, paying or not.
-Correction- Saying that I have a bunch of elk implies ownership. There are a couple of large elk herds that generally stay on our land. They are wild animals, and can go pretty much wherever they want to.
6 Likes
The jerks just got a ticket?
Appropriate punishment:
Issue the pair signs reading “WE GOT A BISON CALF KILLED” and “ASSHOLES WHO DON’T FOLLOW RULES.”
Have them stand in a pen by an entrance to the park, along with people carrying “LITTERBUG” and “FED THE BEARS” signs.
4 Likes
That reminds me of a local park that eventually contracted bow hunters to take out a good chunk of the deer population. Its population had out grown the land, too many were hitting car near by, and pretty much the whole herd suffered from an STD epidemic…
Nature is a harsh bitch. Earth has hit “reset” with mass extinction events several times. With out man’s meddling there have been many massive die offs in the past.
Lastly, I don’t think he meant to completely trivialize Brucellosis, only that disease was being used to push the anti-bison agenda in the area, not that there aren’t legit concerns about the disease. Could be wrong, but that’s how I read it.
2 Likes
I’m really disappointed that the calf didn’t piss and crap all over the rental car so that these idiots would have to both live with the smell for the rest of their trip and then have to pay to have it cleaned on return.
2 Likes
1 Like
[quote=“Mister44, post:50, topic:78169”]
Lastly, I don’t think he meant to completely trivialize Brucellosis, only that disease was being used to push the anti-bison agenda in the area, not that there aren’t legit concerns about the disease. Could be wrong, but that’s how I read it.
[/quote]I don’t know what’s going on in that photo, or that specific (commercial?) herd. But brucellosis doesn’t really kill bison, doesn’t kill elk, it causes spontaneous abortions in cattle, and various quarantine related measures kick in when it’s detected in cattle.
Like you said, it’s being used by anti-bison agricultural interests to block the widespread reintroduction of bison. But the same people oppose building bison herds from animals that have tested and are free of brucellosis. So it’s just an excuse. At the end of the day, they just don’t want grazing competition. They should be honest about that.
3 Likes
IANAL, but doesn’t the word murder only apply to humans being killed?
1 Like
Don’t take this the wrong way, but why didn’t you kill him?
2 Likes
You’ve had that avatar so long now I just kinda assume it’s a picture of you now.
4 Likes
It was not my ranch. The owner, a Hollywood type, introduced the bison for what seem like me to be reasons of vanity or perhaps other motives. The manager of the property is attempting a job beyond his abilities. Neither of them have much more than contempt for the locals. So there is not much I can do.
1 Like
Speculation: probably fear of contagion; after all, sick animals just don’t smell right.
1 Like
They euthanized the wrong mammal. Stupid tourists first.
3 Likes
Mothers sometimes reject offspring that have interacted with humans
In the tourists’ defence, why are we not talking about the fact that bison are massive racists? "Oh you played with some human kids one time? That’s nice, now get out of my house forever "
1 Like
Because the world needs to know about when park rangers do their job?
But this one cute baby animal is special because it is on a photo I saw on the internet ?
If you want to cry about animals go to a meat factory or something. This is not journalism, this is clickbait. Look at all the cute baby animals. Just look at them.
Horrible, horrible humans. Just horrible. UGH!!!
Ugh that’s terrible. Is that exterior fencing we can see? In this neck of the woods it’s mostly sheep and goats, and a small bit of cattle. But there are a couple of small bison producers because if you can do it’s a good market, they never lack for customers & can often sell at a nice markup to fancy restaurants in Toronto & Ottawa.
Anyway I’ve never seen barbed wire over 6 feet, everyone uses hi tensile or such and the serious people use energized fencing on the exterior no matter if the height is for sheep, goats cattle or bison. But you can tell a bison producer by the 6+foot fencing & often much more robust than a cattle ranch, cause the adult male bison can make a 6 foot standing jump pretty unifomally. Significant difference in a bit of domestic beef wandering about and some adult bison who are more likely to go together without needing a broken fence to do so.
@Voice_of_Reason it isn’t anywhere near that easy, I think most ranchers would immediately weigh the labour and say no, aside from concerns over bringing a previously wild creature onto your controlled environment.
@anon85905360 Good clickbait IMHO, the underlying message of don’t fuck with the fauna because you don’t know shit is a good one for reasons beyond one calf.
2 Likes
A LOT of animals decide who’s in and who’s out based on scent. It’s a more ubiquitous natural language than most other things, and when you’re all “red in tooth and claw” like wild nature is, you don’t have a lot of tolerance for goof-ups - something that “smells funny” might be sick or it might be a dog or it might be a hunter or it might be an alien from Glorfilax-9. Whatever it is, it’s not one of you, which means you don’t have to take care of it or nurse it or protect it, and, in fact, you should get rid of it as fast as possible.
Bison aren’t particularly bright - they’re also not particularly compassionate or nice. They have two jobs most of the time: to eat and to stay safe (and sometimes they mate and then things get complicated). Some weird gangling creature enters the herd smelling like someone’s van air freshener, you don’t take the risk - it doesn’t help you eat or stay safe. Bison aren’t unique in this regard, either.
Wild creatures are amoral as fuuuuuuck.
5 Likes
That is a poor excuse for a fence that you see. It probably is not enough for cattle, but they went ahead and put bison in, without first building proper fences. This has been an issue.
I’m sure there are plenty of ranchers in the area that wouldn’t mind an extra mouth to feed?
What makes you so sure about that? I guess a rancher that already has animals infected with brucellosis they might not mind getting another one, but I’m guessing there aren’t plenty of ranchers in that situation.
You aren’t really living up to your username. Did you pick it ironically?
