Members Of 'Buffalo Nation' In Yellowstone Deserve Better Treatment
Jaedin Medicine Elk (Northern Cheyenne) says the scene that played out just beyond Yellowstone's border with bison this year needs fixing, not a portrayal of it being a rousing success
Wildlife don't recognize artificial invisible human boundaries imposed upon natural landscapes—and it comes at their peril. Here, Yellowstone bison straddle Yellowstone's northern boundary with Montana on the edge of Gardiner. Beyond the structures in this photo, many hundreds of bison were killed this winter by native subsistence hunters and others, creating what some called a gruesome scene, unbefitting of animals regarded as sacred and descended from ancestors that survived near extermination. Photo by Jacob W. Frank/NPS
EDITOR’S NOTE: Last winter a large number of Yellowstone bison were taken by indigenous hunters for reasons of subsistence and to utilize hunting rights secured by treaties after the animals crossed the park border into Montana. The killing was controversial even amongst participating tribes, not only for the manner it was conducted but that it resulted in hundreds of carcasses and bloody gut piles just beyond the park’s front doorstep. In the essay, below, Jaedin Medicine Elk (Northern Cheyenne) writes about his frustration with parties to the decades’ old Interagency Bison Management Plan. He submitted his thoughts with the hope that, as tribes gather in Yellowstone in early August and mark their presence with colorfully-lit teepees and desires to pursue co-management of the park, that leaders ponder a better way to carry out the hunt of animals that figure so prominently and reverently in plains tribal cultures. —TW for MoJo
By Jaedin Medicine Elk
I expected the recent meeting of those involved with the Interagency Bison Management Plan to be highly emotional given the national and international outrage over the indiscriminate killing of so many Yellowstone buffalo this year.
Instead, it was business as usual with no remorse from anyone for killing over 25 percent of the herd as state and tribal hunt managers talked about how well it went and claimed there were no problems.
If you considered the 1,250 dead bulls, pregnant females, and calves from the buffalo’s perspective, however, the conversation would have gone much differently. But none of the “managers” or tribal representatives did that.
The dominate, colonized culture has made its way onto our tribal nations. But we can't live as tribal people when all we think about is ourselves and our rights and not Mother Earth or the wildlife our ancestors loved and depended on.
Killing hungry, pregnant female buffalo at Yellowstone’s border isn't what we should be doing. We need to allow these matriarchal family groups – mainly pregnant females and grandmothers – to teach the young ones the migration corridors so more buffalo can establish themselves on the lands that are their birth right.
The buffalo know what to do, they just need our help to allow them to do it -- it’s the humans who need to be managed. As buffalo culture tribal people, when we see things like Blood Creek at Beattie Gulch in the new documentary by Yellowstone Voices: A Path Forward for the American Bison, we must speak up, not participate in the massive kill.
We have to stop treating these buffalo like they are just meat animals that don’t have a right to roam free on Turtle Island. We’re treating the Buffalo Nation as the Veho (whites) want us to, controlling and destroying these buffalo to appease Montana and the livestock interests – with our help! They want us to forget our ancient relationship and obligations to the Buffalo Nation.
When first joining this issue, I expected powerful native voices who see what is going on to say something. But I came to find out the reality is, people are afraid to say anything as tribal members. We don’t want to fight our own people, but at the same time when it’s our people helping facilitate the destruction of a wild buffalo population, what are we supposed to do? Sit by and let buffalo keep dying because Tribal people have been brain-washed to believe humans are everything and we matter the most? This "hunt" isn’t the right way to reconnect with the Buffalo Nation. They’ve had our back since we made that spiritual connection. Now it’s time we had theirs.
"We don’t want to fight our own people, but at the same time when it’s our people helping facilitate the destruction of a wild buffalo population, what are we supposed to do? Sit by and let buffalo keep dying because we Tribal people have been brain-washed to believe humans are everything and we matter the most? This 'hunt' isn’t the right way to reconnect with the Buffalo Nation." —Jaedin Medicine Elk
The older I get, the more I understand why our elders tell us to learn our language and culture. When I started being with wild buffalo, things became more clear as to how our ancestors lived their ways of life, copying the Buffalo Nation that kept them going for thousands of years.
Today the Buffalo Nation is like our own tribal nations...forgotten. Our relationship and connection to them is likewise forgotten—because tribal members are killing pregnant female buffalo and preventing the next generation of buffalo from seeing the sun, moon, grass, blue skies, rain, and everything this beautiful Turtle Island has to offer. The Buffalo Nation is looking to tribal nations to help them, not just kill as many as we can because we have treaty rights to do so.
The laws made by men can be unmade by men and now is the time to “un-make” the “management plan” that is decimating wild Buffalo Nation and allow them to once again roam free.
When first joining this issue, I expected powerful native voices who see what is going on to say something. But I came to find out the reality is, people are afraid to say anything as tribal members.
We don’t want to fight our own people, but at the same time when it’s our people helping facilitate the destruction of a wild buffalo population, what are we supposed to do? Sit by and let buffalo keep dying because we Tribal people have been brain-washed to believe humans are everything and we matter the most? This "hunt" isn’t the right way to reconnect with the Buffalo Nation. They’ve had our back since we made that spiritual connection. Now it’s time we had theirs.
The older I get, the more I understand why our elders tell us to learn our language and culture. When I started being with wild buffalo, things became more clear as to how our ancestors lived their ways of life, copying the Buffalo Nation that kept them going for thousands of years.
Today the Buffalo Nation is like our own tribal nations...forgotten. Our relationship and connection to them is likewise forgotten -- because tribal members are killing pregnant female buffalo and preventing the next generation 0f buffalo from seeing the sun, moon, grass, blue skies, rain, and everything this beautiful Turtle Island has to offer. The Buffalo Nation is looking to tribal nations to help them, not just kill as many as we can because we have treaty rights to do so.
The laws made by men can be unmade by men and now is the time to “un-make” the “management plan” that is decimating wild Buffalo Nation and allow them to once again roam free.
NOTE: What do you think about of Jaedin Medicine Elk's op-ed? Let us know. Drop us a note and we may publish your thoughts below. Be civil and stay on point.
About Jaedin Medicine Elk
Jaedin Christopher Medicine Elk, co-founder of the bison advocacy group, Roam Free Nation, is Northern Cheyenne (Tsis tsis'tas), a Sundancer and Sacred Pipe Carrier from a traditional Buffalo Culture family. He was born and raised in southeast Montana and other than spending a few years in Colorado and North Dakota, has lived in Montana his whole life. Jaedin was mostly raised by his grandmother, Rosalie Bird Woman, who is one of the few who speak and teach the Northern Cheyenne language to the youth today. Jaedin has spent many years standing in defense of his relatives, the last wild, migratory buffalo of Yellowstone country.
