I have been thinking a lot lately about two huge phenomena that have affected the buffalo from about the mid-nineteenth century to the present. The first concerns the views held by different people regarding the buffalo. The second concerns the views held by different people regarding the land itself, primarily the Great Plains.
In the days of the Westward Expansion after the Civil War and throughout the period of the Indian Wars, the American Bison was nearly exterminated. Three elements affected this near extermination: military policy, the construction of the Transcontinental Railway, and the buffalo hide hunters. Military policy saw the buffalo as the supply line of the enemy, which indeed it was; therefore it became a target.
The railway needed food for its workers and later provided a shooting sport for its clients. The hide hunters pursued the buffalo everywhere and shot them nearly into extinction.
That is the view of buffalo as enemy, which summarizes the first phenomenon.
Native Americans viewed themselves as an integral part of the land on which they lived; therefore they did not own the land they inhabited. They established rudimentary territorial boundaries that fluctuated in a manner similar to that of the nesting and hunting territories of the Red Tail Hawk, which fluctuates in accordance with the seasons and their migrations. Native Americans shifted territories with varying degrees of nomadism, to some extent determined by the movements of the buffalo. There must have been other reasons to move their camps: water, fuel, sanitation, shelter from seasonal weather, and protection from attack. But through it all, they viewed themselves as guests on the land, passes through, visitors, very much like the non-human species that inhabited the land with them.
When European settlement began to expand westward, they unsettled, unseated, and defeated any resistance to that expansion. And they imposed on the new land and all its inhabitants a view of this New World land they had brought with them from the Old World: ownership. Ownership of land sets new rules and conditions upon formerly fluctuating boundaries. It establishes fixed boundaries, thereby stopping, limiting, or altering the traditional, migratory, or nomadic movements of people and, to some degree, animals across the land. To accomplish this restriction and to stipulate dramatically the concept of ownership, the land became divided, not by natural boundaries of river or mountain range, but by platted squares via the surveyor’s transits and chains, and eventually by a system of barbed wire fences. And now the way the land is perceived and used has radically changed.
That is the view of the land, which summarizes the second phenomenon.
But that is only part of the story. A few small enclaves of buffalo survived the slaughter, and then a few individuals, both native and non-native, including the renowned conservationist, Theodore Roosevelt, stepped in to save the animal by protecting them on private ranches, Indian Reservations, and National Preserves, each of which is behind a fence.
The protected herds increased and essentially began to outgrow the lands upon which they were kept, creating a new dilemma: the ratio of land to animal. Something had to happen–now that the land was divided and fenced. There had to be more land available or the herds had to be reduced or both, which required two things: some of the animals would be slaughtered for meat and markets for that meat and the by-products had to be established.
The markets that eventually formed for the meat were largely health conscious ones, interested in red meat, low in fat and bad cholesterol and high in Omega 3 fatty acids. So now the problem is, not one of extinction, but one of the buffalo outgrowing the properties on which it lives. The lands are fenced; the natural predators of lion, bear and wolf have been reduced to ineffectiveness, which leaves the responsible rancher, the tribal and federal managers to be the herd caretakers. The view of the buffalo has now changed.
This is the buffalo as friend.
Comments 10
Gervase: Great essay and musings as always. Thank you. For those interested in Native American history, catch “We Shall Remain” series on PBS beginning Monday, Ap 13, 8pm.
I look foreward to recieving your and Dans writings. Very interesting as I live on Vancouver Island British Columbia and we get over a hundred inches of rain annually. Some winters we don’t get snow, just rain. Anyhow, your articles are interesting and welcome, Thank-you, Delton Henrich.
Thanks Linda. And thanks for the info.
Gervase,
Well-written historical summary…thank you. Bison are beauty full.
Barry
Gervase,
We are unacquainted as of yet, but I have the good fortune of being enrolled in a course with Dan, and, as he has gently encouraged us to join the discussion on his blog, I have decided to join yours, for it speaks very much to my own feelings and draws a lot of connections with the discussions we have been having these past two weeks.
It seems that so much of the disproportionate trauma humans have inflicted upon the natural world has resulted from discrepancies in how individuals and societies view and value it. While realistically, I see that the likelihood of converting PEOPLE on a grand scale to adopting a harmonious sense of value (regarding just about anything), I am encouraged by and do find hope in believing that we can work together towards having a shared effect on the natural world, even while maintaining disparate senses of value. Our fates are necessarily connected to the fate of our environment, but it is hard to sell this fact to people on a daily basis; rather, if we were to emphasize more immediate areas of common interest, we could work towards this ultimate greater good. The shifting view of the buffalo you describe points to this possibility–at least, as I have read it. People have taken an interest in raising buffalo based on a range of notions of value, but the ultimate result is that buffalo are being restored to their native land. People these days take an interest, for example, in sustainability based on different notions of value. Some believe in pushing for sustainability because they cherish this earth, some because of how they were raised–the morals and values with which they were instilled–while others “go green” as part of a trend, or because of the economic benefits of sustainability. In the end, though, it all contributes to what will ultimately be (hopefully) the paradigm shift (as Dan would say) this world needs.
On a separate note, I love how you illustrate the constructedness of human perception in how the myths we create around buffalo are fragile and to be viewed critically. This skepticism of past and present myths, idealizations, histories, is something I sense intensely in Dan’s writing, as well.
And on a very separate note, your essay reminded me of an English comps paper that was written last year. It charts a shift in the portrayal of dragons strangely similar to that of the buffalo you narrate. Here is a link to a commentary on her paper that you might find amusing:
http://apps.carleton.edu/campus/shout/?story_id=420036
Thank you for adding to the discussion in my head, which would surely lead me to delusion without the voices of others. And yes, bison are mighty and full of beauty.
Kaede
Kaede,
Wow! I’m not sure about seling anything like this to the public in general. It seems to me that the individual, if it happens at all, comes to a realization on his or her own that is life altering. This idea is not new. Percy B. Shelley knew it in the early part of the 19th century. That realization can come to the individual in many forms: equal rights, civil rights, sustainable farming, etc., use of credit, lots of things. But to believe that the individual is capable of great change (M. ghandi, M.L. King, jr., Nelson Mandella, our own framers of the
Constitution, for example) kind of keeps us going. Of course we get beat up a lot, but that is no reason to quit.
At this time in my life, I work a lot with fences. I never see them simply as structures to be built for a purpose or repaired as needed for that purpose. I see them as something brought into necessity by an unmitigable force that has had its will and has created a mass of fundamentally unconsdered changes, which, now, it is almosty imossible to change or thwart.
Thus the problem becomes how to make it into something that is somehow workable, somehow liveable.
Thanks for your comments. I write my atricles each month for the website. Maybe somethng in the future will interest you.
Gervase
I love the buffalo — and have made spaghetti and meat sauce with the buffalo pattis I bought from Wild Idea.
And, the buffalo I love the most is Curly Bill!
Cecelia,
I use quite a bit of buffalo myself. I use the pattis or ground as an addition to rice and beans, but I also make quite a few soups and stews–for which I use stew meat.
Curly has become legendary over the years. No question about that.
Gotta love him.
Greetings Gervase, good to see you are still writing your beautiful thoughts. . . somehow lost my connection to the newsletter. . .
many changes since we last spoke. I’m now living in Portland Oregon and working as a policy analyst in educatio. Its beautiful here but rains a lot!!!
Your thoughts from MOnterrey were inspiring. Hope to take a holiday there this summer or early fall. . .
Hope you are well, still enjoying your hearty life and the good times still ahead. I’ll be ordering some buffalo steaks soon. . .though I’m primary vegetarian now, buffalo is still o the list of healthy foods!!
Your friend,
gervaise
Hi Gervaise,
It has been a long time, but I’m glad you found us again. career changes can be really good, I think. I’m doing much the same as I was when last we spoke, but there have been some big and good changes here too—in our operation. And our buffalo are healthier than ever.