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Grazing Reform >
Ecological Impact >
Yellowstone Ecosystem
Yellowstone Ecosystem
The Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem
is truly an extraordinary place – one of the few places
in our country where all the species of plants and animals
that were here prior to the arrival of Europeans to North
America still survive. Wildlife abounds here like nowhere
else in the contiguous U.S. primarily because 75 percent
of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, or 15 million acres,
consists of publicly owned lands (National Parks, Forests,
Wildlife Refuges, and land managed by the Bureau of Land
Management).
But a battle is taking place over
who controls our publicly owned land – livestock ranchers
or the public. Every blade of grass eaten by wildlife is
viewed by ranchers as stolen from the mouths of their livestock.
In all of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, only Yellowstone
National Park and the National Elk Refuge prohibit livestock
grazing. Excluding these two areas, most of the remaining
publicly owned land and nearly all of the privately owned
land is available for livestock production. As a result
of the livestock industry’s domination of the Greater Yellowstone
landscape:
• Bison are imprisoned inside Yellowstone
and Grand Teton National Parks. Those that migrate beyond
the Park boundary are hazed back into the Park or are slaughtered
by state and federal agencies.
• Grizzly bears and wolves are safe
only within the confines of Yellowstone and Grand Teton
National Parks. Outside of these areas they are captured,
tranquilized, relocated or killed if they prey on livestock.
• Bighorn sheep are confined to small,
isolated mountain ranges. Bighorns that leave their home
range to expand into nearby suitable habitat are killed
to ensure they do not mingle with domestic sheep grazing
on publicly owned land.
• Pronghorn are forced to negotiate
105 fences twice a year in their 120-mile migration between
Grand Teton National Park and their winter range.
• Prairie dogs are shot, trapped,
and poisoned. Although this extermination campaign is directed
at prairie dogs, it has also wiped out the black-footed
ferret, swift fox, ferruginous hawk, mountain plover, burrowing
owl, prairie falcon, prairie rattlesnake, great plains toad,
and many other native species that rely on the habitat created
by prairie dogs.
While livestock production on publicly
owned land provides a prestigious lifestyle and private
profit center for a privileged few, it provides no public
benefits. To the contrary, in addition to the negative impacts
to wildlife mentioned above, livestock production causes
dewatering of streams and destruction of fisheries and riparian
habitat; loss of native plant communities and infestations
of noxious weeds; an increased potential for disease transmission
from livestock to wildlife; and a decrease in small mammal
and bird populations.
Livestock grazing comes down to a
simple concept: more cows and sheep eating publicly owned
forage means less food is available for wildlife, therefore,
suppressing wildlife populations below optimum levels. Just
as ranchers have the right to graze their private land,
U.S. citizens have the right to determine whether they want
their land to be grazed by livestock at the expense of wildlife.
It is time to demand that our government free the Greater
Yellowstone Ecosystem from the nuisance of livestock production
on publicly owned lands by ending this program and managing
our land for the public benefit.
For specific questions about our efforts to reduce grazing on public
lands,
contact Melissa Hailey,
Grazing Reform program director.
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