Hi everyone. I'm in Wyoming right now but wanted to share some of the photos from North Dakota before I head to central Wyoming tomorrow and will be offline for a few days. Future posts will show a little of the energy extraction economy in this part of the west, as well as some scenes from central Wyoming sage brush habitat, pronghorns (and pronghorn hunting), sage grouse (another conservation success that is dependent on lots of cooperation among a whole range of partners), and more about black-footed ferrets.
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| This is the Little Missouri River in the North Unit of Theodore Roosevelt National Park. Quite an extensive bit of erosion, forming quite a canyon. |
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| A group of bison at a distance from the road on the left, then a solitary bison on the right. The one on the right had been up a canyon several hours earlier when I drove in to hike at the spot above. Driving out about 5 or 6 hours later, I looked up the canyon and he was gone, turned my head to see him right next to the road. Bison were introduced into the park and now constitute a free-ranging herd of several hundred. However, the park is fenced to keep them in and off the adjacent private lands. Twenty bison were introduced into the North Unit (10M:10F) in 1962, from the population that was introduced into the South Unit in 1956 (from a herd on a National Wildlife Refuge in Nebraska). Today they try to manage the North Unit for no more than 300 animals. |
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| Here is a view of that perimeter fence. The South Unit, about 60 miles away, also is fenced to keep their bison and horse populations within the boundary. Elk, pronghorn, mule deer, whitetails all should be able to pass over or through the fence. |
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| Black-tailed prairie dog on the left, and a neat shot of 2 bison in this creek bottom as the sunset colored the hills beyond. There are a couple of prairie dog colonies in the north Unit of the park that visitors can walk through on trails. |
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| Some of the landscape of western North Dakota has these unique "pyramid" like features, caused by erosion. Quite a striking landscape. |
I can't imagine putting up that much fence!
ReplyDeleteIn the National Wildlife Refuge how do they control the northern unit bison population to approximatly 300? Do they issue so many hunting permits? Relocate some animals? Introduce a natural predator population?
ReplyDeleteAndrew, good question. This is a national park, not a wildlife refuge, so the process to do wildlife management is a little different. Some park units do allow hunting but this one does not. Here they do a roundup of the bison using helicopters and relocate a portion of them to off-park locations, rather than have a controlled hunt, to keep the numbers within the target range.
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