Ivory traders have killed 65% of world’s forest elephants in 12 years

By Jeremy Hance / Mongabay

Forest elephants have suffered unprecedented butchery for their ivory tusks over the past decade, according to new numbers released by conservationists today in London. Sixty-five percent of the world’s forest elephants have been slaughtered by poachers over the last dozen years, with poachers killing an astounding nine percent of the population annually. Lesser-known than their savannah cousins, a genetics study in 2010 found that forest elephants are in fact a distinct species, as far removed from savannah elephants as Asian elephants are from mammoths. These findings make the forest elephant crisis even more urgent.

“At least a couple of hundred thousand forest elephants were lost between 2002-2013 to the tune of at least sixty a day, or one every twenty minutes, day and night,” says Fiona Maisels, a researcher with the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) who headed the research. “By the time you eat breakfast, another elephant has been slaughtered to produce trinkets for the ivory market.”

The analysis adds new data from 2012 and 2013 to a landmark study last year, showing that despite some stepped-up conservation efforts poaching continues apace.

Forest elephants are found primarily in Central and West Africa, largely inhabiting—as its name suggests—the Congo Rainforest. However, this means that it’s not only more difficult to monitor populations hidden by great forests, but also that it’s easy for poachers to kill them and getaway with immunity. Many of the countries in which they are found are also beset by poverty, instability, and corruption, making forest elephant conservation incredibly challenging.

For example, forest elephants used to have their biggest stronghold in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), but relentless poaching means that the country has lost many of its forest elephants.

“The current number and distribution of elephants is mind-boggling when compared to what it should be,” said Samantha Strindberg, also with WCS and co-author of the paper. “About 95 percent of the forests of DRC are almost empty of elephants.”

Today, Gabon holds the most surviving forest elephants with about 60 percent of the global population.

Despite the 2010 study showing that forest elephants are a distinct species, this has yet to be recognized by the IUCN (the International Union for the Conservation of Nature). The group currently lumps forest and savannah elephants together and lists them as Vulnerable. However that listing hasn’t been updated for nearly six years.

Governments are beginning to respond. Just yesterday, the Obama Administration released an ambitious new strategy for tackling global wildlife crime, including toughening restrictions on ivory and shutting loopholes. Many countries, including most recently France, have begun to destroy their ivory stockpiles. Although much of this comes years too late for many of the crippled populations of forest elephants.

“These new numbers showing the continuing decline of the African forest elephant are the exact reason why there is a sense of urgency at the United for Wildlife trafficking symposium in London this week,” John Robinson, WCS Chief Conservation Officer and Executive Vice President of Conservation and Science with the WCS, says. “The solutions we are discussing in London this week and the commitments we are making cannot fail or the African forest elephant will blink out in our lifetime.”

From Mongabay: “Ivory trade’s shocking toll: 65% of world’s forest elephants killed in 12 years (warning: graphic image)

Ivory cartels have killed 62% of all forest elephants in Africa in 10 years

Ivory cartels have killed 62% of all forest elephants in Africa in 10 years

By Mongabay

More than 60 percent of Africa’s forest elephants have been killed in the past decade due to the ivory trade, reports a new study published in the online journal PLOS ONE.

The study warns that the diminutive elephant species — genetically distinct from the better-known savanna elephant — is rapidly heading toward extinction.

“The analysis confirms what conservationists have feared: the rapid trend towards extinction – potentially within the next decade – of the forest elephant,” said study co-author Samantha Strindberg of the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS).

“Saving the species requires a coordinated global effort in the countries where elephants occur – all along the ivory smuggling routes, and at the final destination in the Far East,” added co-author Fiona Maisels, also of WCS. “We don’t have much time before elephants are gone.”

The study is based on the largest-ever set of survey data across five forest elephant range countries: Cameroon, Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Gabon and the Republic of Congo. The study involved more than 60 scientists who spent 91,600 person-days surveying for elephants, walking over 13,000 kilometers (more than 8,000 miles).

The study shows that elephants are increasingly scarce in areas with “high human density, high infrastructure density such as roads, high hunting intensity, and poor governance”, according to a statement from WCS.“Historically, elephants ranged right across the forests of this vast region of over 2 million square kilometers (over 772,000 square miles), but now cower in just a quarter of that area,” said co-author John Hart of the Lukuru Foundation. “Although the forest cover remains, it is empty of elephants, demonstrating that this is not a habitat degradation issue. This is almost entirely due to poaching.”

The decline in elephant populations has significant implications for the forest ecosystem. Elephants are considered “architects of the forest” for the role in opening clearings and maintain trails.

“A rain forest without elephants is a barren place,” explained Lee White. “They bring it to life, they create the trails and keep open the forest clearings other animals use; they disperse the seeds of many of the rainforest trees – elephants are forest gardeners at a vast scale. Their calls reverberate through the trees reminding us of the grandeur of primeval nature. If we do not turn the situation around quickly the future of elephants in Africa is doomed. These new results illustrate starkly just how dramatic the situation has become. Our actions over the coming decade will determine whether this iconic species survives.”

Alarm As Exploratory Drilling For Oil Begins In Northern Namibia

Alarm As Exploratory Drilling For Oil Begins In Northern Namibia

This article was written by on 28 December 2020


By Jim TanMongabay

  • Reconnaissance Energy Africa, an oil and gas company with headquarters in Canada, has recently begun exploratory drilling in northern Namibia.
  • Conservationists and local communities are concerned over the potential environmental impact that oil and gas extraction could have on such an important ecosystem.
  • Northern Namibia and Botswana have a number of interconnected watersheds including the Okavango Delta – the potential for pollutants to enter watercourses and spread throughout the region are a particular concern.

On December 21, Reconnaissance Energy Africa (Recon Africa) announced that it had begun exploratory drilling for oil and gas in the Namibian portion of the Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area (KAZA). The move has alarmed environmental campaigners and community groups who are concerned about the impact this could have on the region’s watercourses, people and wildlife.

Recon Africa is the holder of a licence to explore a 2.5 million hectare area (6.3-million-acres) of northeastern Namibia, granted to a predecessor company in January 2015. The majority of the area covered by Petroleum Exploration Licence (PEL) 73 sits in the KAZA, a conservation initiative covering 520,000 square kilometres (201,000 square miles) of Angola, Botswana, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe. The company also has a licence to prospect for oil in another section of KAZA, 1 million hectare area (2.5 million acres) of northwestern Botswana, where it hopes to begin drilling in 2021.

Concerns

The KAZA conservation area is home to the largest remaining population of African elephants and is one of the last remaining strongholds of the African wild dog (Lycaon pictus). Recon Africa’s exploration areas in both Botswana and Namibia fall largely within the Okavango River Basin which flows into the richly-biodiverse Okavango Delta — a UNESCO World Heritage site. Conservationists are particularly concerned by the potential impact drilling for oil and gas here could have on the interconnected watercourses of the river basin.

There is a serious lack of knowledge on groundwater resources in the target oil and gas extraction area,” said Surina Esterhuyse, a geohydrologist at the University of the Free State, South Africa. “In Botswana, the Okavango river basin is still relatively pristine, but the planned exploration and extraction could have serious impacts on the [Okavango] delta.”

Recon Africa is drilling into a 9,000-meter-deep sedimentary basin known to geologists as the Kavango Basin to establish whether there is actually oil beneath the KAZA, and if these resources can be economically exploited. Daniel Jarvie, a geochemist consulting for Recon Africa, estimates that the basin holds a similar potential quantity of extractable oil and gas as the Eagle Ford Basin in Texas, USA. Since production there began in 2008, over 20,000 oil and gas wells have been drilled at Eagle Ford.

Use and contamination of water.

“The possible impact that oil and gas extraction would have on the water resources in Namibia and Botswana is the biggest concern,” says Esterhuyse, whose research focuses on the impact of oil and gas extraction on groundwater resources. The two main areas of concern are the use of water, particularly in areas such as northern Namibia, where water is a scarce resource, and possible contamination of water sources through oil and gas extraction.

The risks posed by oil and gas extraction are greater if unconventional hydraulic fracturing techniques, commonly known as fracking, are used.  Regular references to “unconventional plays” in Recon Africa’s marketing material and the hiring of experienced fracking engineers have led to concerns that this may be the company’s intention.

Both Recon Africa spokesperson Claire Preece and the Namibian government have denied that there are any plans for fracking to take place.

Assessing impacts

So far the Namibian government has only approved the drilling to two test wells approximately 55km south of the town of Rundu. Any further activity would require additional environmental impact assessments and approval from the Namibian government, which has a 10% share in the oil exploration venture through the state oil company, NAMCOR. Whilst they await the outcome of the current operations, communities in the region are growing increasingly concerned.

“The local community are in darkness, they don’t have clues on what is going on,” said Max Muyemburuko, chairperson of the Muduva Nyangana Conservancy that lies in PEL 73. “They want their voices to be heard.”

Muyemburuko says they have not been contacted by Recon Africa or the Namibian government about potential plans for oil and gas production in the region. Residents of the Muduva Nyangana Conservancy rely on tourism income and natural resources from the land. Muyemburuko fears these could be jeopardised by pollution from oil and gas production.

“Kavango is the only land that we have,” he said. “We will keep it for the generation to come.”

The ministry of mines has said that proposed oil exploration activities will not harm the Okavango ecosystem in any way and highlight the potential economic benefits of a major oil discovery. The ministry also says that no oil and gas exploration will be allowed in national parks, but this does not include the KAZA conservation area which does not enjoy the same level of environmental protection as parks.

Recon Africa’s carefully crafted responses to challenges over environmental questions strike a sharp contrast to the company’s bold claims of an “unprecedented opportunity” in its marketing materials. If the Kavango Basin proves to have the lucrative potential that Recon Africa’s shareholders are hoping for, the Namibian government will face difficult questions over how to balance the allure of oil dollars against environmental protection for one of the world’s most important ecosystems.


This article was originally published in Mongabay, please find the original article here. Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Featured image: Derek Keats via Flickr (CC BY 2.0)

What Zoos Really Teach Our Children

What Zoos Really Teach Our Children

From Zoos to Concentration Camps, A Culture of Cages

From chattel slavery to modern immigrant concentration camps to zoos and aquariums to private prisons, we live in a culture of cages. Understanding this system, and the ideology behind it, is essential to fighting it.

This statement on zoos and aquariums comes from the Deep Green Bush School. The Deep Green Bush School is a participatory, technology-free, evolutionary and revolutionary school in Aotearoa (New Zealand) designed to raise intelligent, healthy, mature, responsible young adults who can think for themselves, meet their needs, live a meaningful life and challenge the current system in order to bring about a healthy world.

Statement on Zoos and Aquariums

The Deep Green Bush-School curriculum is opposed to zoos and aquariums* and therefore the school will not take students to zoos or aquariums as a field trip. The DGBS recommends that parents also not to take children to the zoo. This document highlights how zoos and aquariums contradict and undermine efforts towards a healthy culture and a healthy world.

First of all, we can ask ourselves, would WE want to be kidnapped from our family, taken far away and locked up for our entire lives, to be stared at, photographed, harrassed and teased daily by thousands of people? Of course not. Yet that is what we subject animals to in a zoo or aquarium.

The fact is, a zoo is a miserable place for animals. They are not in their natural habitat, they are stressed by humans visitors and stressed by crowding. They never have enough of their own species to interact with – and more important, they do not have their families or herds or packs that they would normally be living with. All animals are social, even animals we normally don’t think of as social (Bradshaw 2017) – even trees and plants are social. (Fleming 2014, Simard 2016, Wohlleben 2015) Yet in zoos they are all locked up, often alone.

One of the most painful, abusive and torturous aspects of zoos is that the animals are ripped apart from their families and friends, or prevented from forming healthy social relations as they naturally would do. In Auckland, there are two completely unrelated Asian elephants, whereas elephants normally live in matriarchal herds based on family relations. Orcas and dolphins live in pods. Wolves live in packs. And so on. Denied these natural social arrangements, the animals are stressed, painfully alone and depressed. Many zoo animals are given anti-depressant medication. (Smith 2014) It’s like living in prison, or worse, in solitary confinement, or a concentration camp. It’s no wonder why captive animals regularly try to escape or fight back or kill their oppressors. (Hribal 2011)

On top of that, no zoo can possibly provide the natural amount of space an animal would have in thewild. Tigers and lions have around 18,000 times less space in zoos than they would in the wild. Polar bears have one million times less space. (CAPS 2006) Orcas and dolphins travel the ocean. Being in a zoo is torture for them.

The result of the torturous environment of a zoo is mental illness and trauma. Most animals in zoos suffer from anxiety and mental illness and show associated behavioural problems, such as pacing, rocking, circling, shuffling, self-mutilation, obsessive grooming, and hyper-aggression (Just like kids stuck in a classroom.)

One of the results of the torturous zoo environment is that animals don’t live as long in zoos. Just as human diseases increased once humans started living crowded together in cities, animals forced to live crowded with other animals in zoos are exposed to a wider range of diseases than in the wild. According to a report by the Captive Animal Protection Society (now called Freedom for Animals), African elephants in the wild live more than three times as long as those kept in zoos. 40% of lion cubs in zoos die before one month of age. (CAPS 2006)

Other highlights of the CAPS report include:

  • Zoos regularly kill “surplus” animals. Between 7,500 and 200,000 animals in European zoos are considered ‘surplus’ at any one time. The European Association of Zoos and Aquaria (EAZA) said in 2007 that zoos were encouraged to kill the animals they don’t want, including tigers.
  • Most zoo animals – 70-80% of them – are still taken from the wild. Often the mothers are killed first and then the young are taken.

The fact is, what you see in a zoo is not actually the animal. An animal can only be understood in the wild. An elephant in the zoo is not an elephant, unless it is surrounded by its matriarchal herd, and it is not an elephant unless it is living in the place it evolved to live, the place it is rooted to, with all the trees, other animals and climate that shape how they live and who they are. An orca is only an orca with its pod in the ocean, swimming with all the other creatures of the oceans. A wolf is only a wolf in the wild where it has always been, with all the other animals it would interact with,such as caribou and deer.

Furthermore, all the different aspects of an animal’s intellligence, including social and emotional intelligence, as well as their entire culture, only develops in the wild, surrounded by the other members of its familial group from which young animals learn how to live, to all the other animals, plants, trees, rocks, weather, and countless other stimuli, to which the animal is constantly responding to. Thus, defense of zoos reflects a total ignorance of and disregard for ecology – that everything is connected, and an animal in a zoo is not the animal.

Zoos objectify animals. Zoos make animals a thing to be used for our entertainment or for scientific research, not as equals, not recognising they have their own desires for how to live their lives. The only way to treat animals in such a way is to think of them as objects – unthinking, unfeeling, undeserving of respect.

Zoos reflect humanism and human superiority, which is a belief inherent in civilisations, when humans live disconnected from the wild. It is a source of all destruction of the wild. Humanism/human superiority refers to the common belief that humans are superior to all other life forms, and thus we are able to do whatever we wish, with any other creature. (Jensen 2016) In fact, zoos only arose with civilisation, the first zoos being created 5000 years ago. (Jensen 2007) It is this kind of thinking which is why most wildlife is now gone, and 96% of all mammals, by weight, are humans and their livestock. (Carrington 2018) Half of all wildlife has been wiped out in just the last 40 years. (WWF 2018) Zoos are a reflection of human idiocy and cruelty.

Zoos claim to aid the cause of conservation. This is part of their PR and greenwashing. Most zoos do not engage in conservation, many animals will not breed in captivity, genetic diversity is unnaturally low, and most animals that are bred in zoos are kept in zoos or other forms of captivity. (CAPS 2006, Jamieson 1985) Furthermore, the whole notion of “conservation” comes from the humanist/human superiority ideology, in which humans determine that some areas will be for humans only – i.e., cities, which are effectively death zones, from which all of nature has been eradicated – and some areas will be for wildlife and “wilderness”. Conservation is the belief that little pockets of wildlife can thrive while surrounded by ever-growing death zones of human cities, spewing toxic waste, radioactive waste and endless rubbish. The belief in conservation is well-meaning but ultimately a reflection of total ecological ignorance. (Livingston 1991)

Many zoos portray themselves as helping to “educate” youth and the public. It’s true, they do. Zoos do an excellent job teaching:

  • Zoos teach that humans are superior to the rest of nature.
  • Zoos teach that only humans do not like to be locked up (and even then, some humans still lock up millions of other humans – in prisons and classrooms, for example).
  • Zoos teach that animals have no thoughts or feelings.
  • Zoos teach that humans can do whatever they want to nature.
  • Zoos teach that nature exists for our entertainment.
  • Zoos teach that our current way of life is acceptable.
  • Zoos teach our children to be cruel.

Let us remember that for more than two million years, humans did not create zoos and did not view themselves as superior to other creatures. Humans evolved living among wild animals, treating them with respect and viewing them as kin. Humans regarded all of the natural world as sacred. As Luther Standing Bear of the Lakota explained,

Kinship with all the creatures of the earth, sky and water was a real and active principle. For the animal and bird world there existed a brotherly feeling that kept the Lakota safe among them and so close did some of the Lakotas come to their feathered and furred friends that in true brotherhood they spoke a common tongue.

The old Lakota was wise. He knew that man’s heart away from nature becomes hard; he knew that lack of respect for growing, living things soon led to lack of respect for humans too. So he kept his youth close to its softening influence. (McLuhan1971)

This reflects a fundamental element of the Deep Green Bush-School curriculum. In the end, the best way to help animals is to leave them alone and to make every effort to stop this civilisation from destroying all of life on the planet.

What to do instead of going to the zoo:

  • Allow your child freedom in any natural setting, to explore the trees, plants, bugs, birds and other animals
  • Take your child camping and hiking
  • Role model respect for the natural world. For example:
    • only taking dead wood
    • thanking trees, plants, and animals when you use or eat them
    • talking to the trees and animals
  • Give kids books about nature and that contain photos of animals
  • Read to them from books about wildlife and nature
  • Explain to them why you’re not going to the zoo

* The focus here is on zoos and aquariums. But the points made also apply to other forms of abusive animal captivity such as circuses, rodeos, factory farms and any form of animal experimentation and vivisection.

References

Bradshaw, G.A. (2017). Carnivore Minds: Who These Fearsome Animals Really Are. Yale University Press.

CAPS (Captive Animals’ Protection Society). (2006). “Sad Eyes and Empty Lives: The Reality of Zoos”. Retrieved from https://mafiadoc.com/sad-eyes-amp-empty-lives_59ae88d41723ddbec5e2c4a2.html

Carrington, Damian. (2018, May 21). “Humans just 0.01% of all life but have destroyed 83% of wild mammals – study”. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/21/human-race-just-001-of-all-life-but-has-destroyed-over-80-of-wild-mammals-study

Dasgupta, Shreya. (2015, September 9). “Many Animals Can Become Mentally Ill.” BBC Earth. Retrieved from http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20150909-many-animals-can-become-mentally-ill

Fleming, Nic. (2014, November 11). “Plants Talk to Each Other Using an Internet of Fungus”. BBC Earth. Retrieved from http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20141111-plants-have-a-hidden-internet

Hribal, Jason. (2011). Fear of the Animal Planet: The Hidden History of Animal Resistance. AK Press.

Jamieson, Dale. (1985). “Against Zoos”. Retrieved from http://www.animal-rights-library.com/texts-m/jamieson01.htm

Jensen, Derrick. (2016). The Myth of Human Supremacy. Seven Stories Press.

Jensen, Derrick. (2007). Thought to Exist in the Wild: Awakening from the Nightmare of Zoos. Novoice Unheard.

Livingston, John. (1991). The Fallacy of Wildlife Conservation. McClelland and Stewart.

McLuhan, T.C., editor. (1971). Touch the Earth: A Self Portrait of Indian Existence. Simon and Schuster.

Sample, Ian. (2008, Dec 12). “Stress and Lack of Exercise are Killing Elephants, Zoos Warned”. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/science/2008/dec/12/elephants-animal-welfare

Simard, Suzanne. (2016, June). “How Trees Talk to Each Other”. Ted Talks. Retrieved from https://www.ted.com/talks/suzanne_simard_how_trees_talk_to_each_other

Smith, Laura. (2014, June 20). “Zoos Drive Animals Crazy”. Slate. Retrieved from https://slate.com/technology/2014/06/animal-madness-zoochosis-stereotypic-behavior-and-problems-with-zoos.html

Wohlleben, Peter. (2015). The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate. Greystone Books.

WWF. (2018). Living Planet Report – 2018: Aiming Higher. Grooten, M. and Almond, R.E.A.(Eds). Retrieved at http://wwf.panda.org/knowledge_hub/all_publications/living_planet_report_2018/

“Zoos Neither Educate Nor Empower Children”. Freedom for Animals. Retrieved from https://www.freedomforanimals.org.uk/news/zoos-neither-educate-nor-empower-children

Tragic Evidence of Bison Mismanagement in Yellowstone

Tragic Evidence of Bison Mismanagement in Yellowstone

Editor’s Note: The following is a press release by Roam Free Nation. It describes how the population of wild bison is being targeted and reduced in favor for the livestock industry. Once again, the needs of the natural world is being held secondary to the profit motive of businesses.


GARDINER, MT: On Friday, Yellowstone National Park submitted a report to IBMP.info (the website of the Interagency Bison Management Plan) revealing shocking numbers of Yellowstone’s bison – the country’s last wild migratory buffalo — who have been killed during the so-called hunt, slaughter, and removal for quarantine (domestication). At the time the report was issued, the number of buffalo eliminated from Yellowstone’s population stood at 1,024. That number increases daily, and it’s only early February. This is already the most deadly year for wild buffalo since 2017, and if the killing and capturing continues at this rate, these mis-management actions could remove a third to half of the population.

“This is a global travesty,” said Stephany Seay, co-founder of Roam Free Nation, a Montana-based wildlife and wild lands advocacy group. “This is the last wild, migratory population of American bison left in this country, beloved the world over, who once numbered nearly 70 million strong, and at the beginning of this winter there were barely 6,000. There are nearly 50,000 African elephants left in the world, and they are considered endangered and fiercely protected. Why is our country’s National Mammal not given the same concerns and protections?”

Yellowstone’s report to the Interagency Bison Management Plan (IBMP) can be reviewed here.

At the November Interagency Bison Management Plan meeting, Yellowstone National Park Superintendent Cam Sholly and lead bison biologist Chris Geremia spoke strongly for the small but growing bison population, stating that the park alone could sustain upwards of 10,000. They stood up to the Montana Department of Livestock that wants to drive the population down to 3,000 for the sake of convenience.

“So much for Yellowstone’s good words,” said Cindy Rosin, Board Secretary for Roam Free Nation. “They have shown that it’s just business as usual in Yellowstone, which means doing the dirty work for Montana’s livestock industry.”

“It is so disheartening to see a failed policy continue to be pursued, a policy that was abandoned decades ago for one species, but revived for other species today,” said Lee Fulton, Treasurer for Roam Free Nation. “Bison, elk, and wolves have all been subjected to a firing line mentality once they dare to cross Yellowstone Park’s boundary as they pursue their natural migration.”

Excessive hunting, which is essentially an extension of government slaughter, has claimed the lives of more than 500 wild buffalo in less than two months, with more dying every day. The infamous killing fields of Beattie Gulch in Montana’s Gardiner Basin have seen the worst of the killing spree, when large family groups migrate across Yellowstone’s northern boundary and are gunned down by state and tribal hunters. In the frenzy, many buffalo have been severely wounded and run for the shelter of the park, only to be euthanized by park rangers.

“I don’t know how anyone partnered with the IBMP could say they want more buffalo,” said Jaedin Medicine Elk, a Northern Cheyenne tribal member and co-founder of Roam Free Nation. “That sounds great at the IBMP meetings but looks way different in the field where actions are speaking louder than words. Beattie Gulch hunting field? More like Beattie Guts slaughter field. It’s different when you actually see buffalo you have a relationship with getting killed off. Family groups getting wiped out, pregnant moms young and old getting killed with their babies in gut piles.”

“The hunters are blind to the fact that they are being used as tools by the Montana Department of Livestock to do the bidding of the cattle industry, that opposes wild bison restoring themselves in their native Montana lands,” Seay said. “Anyone who has witnessed even a single day at Beattie Gulch understands this to be a slaughter, a massacre, and not a hunt at all. Just because you have a right, does not make it right.”

As the so-called hunt blasts on, Yellowstone National Park began capturing wild buffalo at their Stephens Creek capture facility, barely a mile from Beattie Gulch. To date, Yellowstone has captured and consigned to slaughter 88 buffalo, with another nearly 400 captured for possible quarantine (domestication).

“People are fooled by the government into thinking that quarantine will eliminate slaughter, which it doesn’t,” said Seay. “Quarantine is a domestication program based on a livestock paradigm, removing wild bison from their wild homelands, tearing apart their families, and ensuring they will never roam free again. It’s another false-positive the government is selling to the public and to tribes.”

At least 340 of the wild buffalo eliminated are adult females, most of them pregnant. Every conservationist knows that if you want to drive a population down, you kill the females. Much like elephants, buffalo are a matriarchal society, so the adult females are the teachers, the wisdom-keepers, the ones who teach even the bulls how to be a successful buffalo. Every hunter or government worker who takes an adult female puts the herds in deeper jeopardy.

The Yellowstone buffalo (bison) populations are the last continuously wild, migratory buffalo who have existed on the landscape since prehistoric times.

Resistance Radio Interview of Stephany Seay

Roam Free Nation is a Montana-based, Native led wild buffalo, wildlife, and wild lands advocacy group who speaks from and represents the perspective of wild nature. Their representatives have over 50 years of combined experience in the field monitoring wild bison migration, documenting actions against them, and advocating on their behalf.
Contact:
Stephany Seay, Co-founder, Roam Free Nation

roamfreenation@gmail.com


Featured Image by Stephany Seay