Bison - Brucellosis
Montana will kill bison despite disease report
Tests show that 82 percent of slaughtered buffalo not infected by brucellosis.
By Rachel Odell, Jackson Hole News 12-23-99
The Montana Department of Livestock will continue to kill bison that test positive for brucellosis antibodies despite evidence that the agency is killing scores of uninfected animals.
Montana state veterinarian Arnold Gertonson said Monday that the Department of Livestock will continue to send bison that test positive to slaughter in an effort to eliminate the risk of brucellosis transmission to domestic livestock.
Last week the National Veterinary Services Laboratory revealed results of tissue sampling of bison that had tested positive in the field and been sent to slaughter. The analysis showed that of 144 bison, 117 were not infected with brucellosis.
That suggests that about 82 percent of the 1,189 bison killed in the past three years were not infected.
Still the state will not alter its policy which calls for trapping bison that leave Yellowstone National Park, testing them for exposure to brucellosis and sending positive-testing ones to slaughter, Gertonson said. Montana operates under an interim bison management plan that will be in place until the National Park Service endorses a permanent plan. The Park Service is expected to release a final environmental impact statement on bison management this spring.
Environmentalists and federal officials said the findings suggest the brucellosis field tests used on the bison are unreliable and encouraged the DOL to find alternatives to slaughter. Those tests search for brucellosis antibodies and cannot distinguish between a bison that is infected and one that has developed immunity, said Patrick Collins of the federal Animal Plant and Health Inspection Agency. To avoid killing uninfected bison, the DOL should focus more on flexible management that would keep the wild ungulates away from domestic ones, he said.
"This raises some real concerns," Collins said. "It seems to suggest that the field test is maybe not the tool we should rely on completely. Not to say there is no risk, but it suggests we could be more flexible."
Environmentalists were more adamant. The state agency has egregiously erred, at the expense of America's last free-roaming, wild buffalo herd, said Mike Clark, executive director of the Greater Yellowstone Coalition. "This is sad news and it confirms ... that Montana's Department of Livestock is killing buffalo unnecessarily," he said. "If you consider that 1,189 Yellowstone buffalo have been killed in the past three winters, this science, coming from the best lab in the country, indicates that as many as 966 of those buffalo died without ever posing a risk to cattle."
Gertonson defended Montana, saying that although 117 buffalo tissue samples tested negative, the animals could have still been infected. Collins from APHIS said the DOL was skirting the issue. "They are being a little disingenuous," he said. "It is clear that bison need to be managed and we are not suggesting we don't manage. But we can manage effectively without lethal control."
APHIS has proposed to Montana governor Marc Racicot to aid the state in getting away from killing bison and has offered to pay expenses and to intercede if other states threaten to boycott Montana livestock, Collins said.
"Unfortunately we cannot get Montana to cooperate in good faith," Collins said.
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