Bison bouncing back but lack room to roam, forcing herd cuts

The dwindling of open space where bison can roam is hurting federal efforts to restore herds, forcing refuge managers to kill hundreds of bison and search for land links between protected areas. But the bison on fenced preserves continue to multiply — 11 calves were born here this spring after recent forced herd reductions. Interior Secretary Sally Jewell says she is working on ensuring large landscapes nationwide, increasingly by collaborating with private property owners. "One of our biggest challenges across the entire country is habitat fragmentation. It certainly has impacted the bison," Jewell said in a recent interview with The Denver Post. "There's almost no animal it has not impacted. You get a treasure like the Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge — 15,000 acres in an urban area. It is really an oasis. But without connectivity to other parts of the landscape, it's going to be difficult to make it anything like what it used to be."  Limited open space has forced culling of bison each year from nearly all the Department of Interior's 17 restoration herds — 10,000 bison on 4.6 million acres in 12 states. These include the most genetically robust bison, a third of bison managed for conservation purposes. Of those 17 herds, 11 are fenced-in...more