07/15/08 The Brucellosis Problem

The Brucellosis Problem. I'm Greg Martin with today's Line On Agriculture. There has been some finger pointing in the Yellowstone National Park area due to an outbreak of brucellosis in cattle. The Montana cattle industry is on the verge of losing their brucellosis free classification and attention has been thrown at the herds of bison that roam Yellowstone. Dave Carter, Executive Director of the National Bison Association says that is wrong. CARTER: When we take a look at the brucellosis that's starting to crop up in areas of Wyoming and Montana in the cattle herds those are happening in areas that are far distant from any of the areas where the bison are roaming. The herds of bison in Yellowstone are what is called a "keystone herd." They are direct ancestors of the original herds that roamed across North America. Carter thinks the problem lies in another direction. CARTER: I have a tendency to feel that it's probably more of a problem coming from the elk herds that are migrating around and mixing with the cattle. But regardless it creates a real headache for us in the bison business because anytime you talk about that people think, well gosh bison today have brucellosis and the answer is no. All the domestic herds are all brucellosis free. There has been a concerted effort over the years to make sure that that herd and any issues they might have do not stray outside the park's boundaries included the killing of more than 6000 bison in the last 20 years. Carter talks about brucellosis. CARTER: The problem with brucellosis is that it doesn't endanger the meat or make the meat unsafe, what the big problem it has is it causes the animal's to abort their offspring and so that's the main thing that ranchers are concerned about. You know it's a problem within these wild herds. Carter says that all domestic herds are brucellosis free and are in no way intermingled with the herds in Yellowstone. He also says that now is really a great time to think about getting into or expanding bison production. CARTER: Where we see the trend lines going we're going to need some more ranchers out there raising bison and that's very encouraging. Even during this time of the high fuel prices and everything else, high feed prices; a lot of people are starting to say well gosh here's an animal that kind of evolved in this eco-system over tens of thousands of years, it eats the grass that is here, we don' have to put a lot of feed into them, we can process and market them locally and so it's a great fit for folks who want to take care of their diet and have great taste even as we wrestle with some of these other issues in the economy. That's today's Line On Agriculture. I'm Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.