After leaving Gardiner I traveled down to West Yellowstone – on the west side of the park – the other main migration corridor for wild buffalo. The buffalo that migrate out the west side are all from the at-risk Central herd. For years Yellowstone has recommended there be zero hunting on the west side, but those calls have gone unheeded.
Indeed, West Yellowstone saw the only buffalo “hunting” to happen so far this year, with eighteen killed earlier in the winter. The survivors of those killings ran back to the safety of the park, and no more have migrated out there this winter.
So like Gardiner, to visit with any buffalo near West Yellowstone, one has seek them out inside the park, but unlike Gardiner, the park roads are closed, so I took to a borrowed pair of cross country skis for a beautiful, and exhausting, day.
The first group of buffalo I came across grazed and lazed in the sun. I sat a ways away, listening to the sound of their hooves in the soft ground, the rhythm of their chewing. Similar to in Gardiner, we had a chat about which way is safe, and which way leads towards the invisible line of the park border and certain death. I think they know. I hope they know.
Many of the tribes will end their hunt season at the end of March. Unfortunately, the Northern Arapaho allow hunting through the end of April, the Blackfeet permit hunting bulls through the end of May, and the Shoshone-Bannock hunt year round. What this means is that the traditional spring migration to Horse Butte and other areas west of the park may be met with bullets.
In the afternoon I briefly spotted another group, heading along the river, thankfully further into the park. One after another, down the hill to disappear into the willows. A small yearling struggled slightly with the loose gravelly slope. The herd was there, to show the little one a different route, to show the little one the way.
If only we humans would stop interfering, these matriarchs, these leaders, would show us all the way to true restoration.