Adopt a Wildlife Acre Program near Yellowstone - National Wildlife Federation


Yellowstone

Intro to Yellowstone

What is the Wildlife Acre program?

Adopt a Wildlife Acre Program

Map showing location of Yellowstone ecosystem

For the big animals that live in Yellowstone National Park, it's not clear where the park's boundaries start and stop. The result: they tend to roam outside of the park into areas where they are less welcomed. This results in conflict between wildlife and people - and the wildlife usually lose.

The National Wildlife Federation has a goal of reducing these conflicts by retiring public land grazing allotments that experience chronic conflict with wildlife, particularly large carnivores. The goal is not removal of all grazing from public lands, but rather resolution of longstanding problems between livestock and wildlife in specific locations. Ranchers are often willing partners as the retirement can benefit both parties. Ranchers may use payment provided for allotment retirement to secure new grazing lands that do not have significant wildlife conflicts.

The average cost to retire allotments has been $3-$4 per acre. Generous National Wildlife Federation members have been very supportive of this program through our Adopt a Wildlife Acre program.

Since NWF initiated its Wildlife Conflict Resolution project in 2002, we have retired 23 allotments totalling 474,526 acres. These allotments include:

Blackrock/Spread Creek: This 88,000-acre grazing allotment in northwestern Wyoming lies immediately adjacent to Grand Teton National Park. During the last decade, it has experienced over 100 different conflicts between grizzly bears and cows, more than any other allotment in the Yellowstone area.
Horse Butte: This 2,000-acre allotment on the west side of Yellowstone National Park has been the site of bitter acrimony over management of bison populations. Livestock authorities fear bison will transmit brucellosis (a disease that induces abortion in livestock) to their cattle. Hundreds of bison have been killed and the government has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars trying to haze bison back into the park.
Moose Creek: This 22,000-acre allotment on the west side of the Teton Range in Wyoming (also bordering Grand Teton National Park) has important herds of bighorn sheep that are susceptible to diseases carried by domestic sheep. This is also important grizzly bear and wolf habitat.

For more information, visit National Wildlife Federation's Wildlife Conflict Resolution website.

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Wildlife Conflict Resolution Program - On specific landscapes in the West, the surest permanent solution to conflict is the elimination of livestock grazing. The retirement of grazing allotments, with fair consideration toward the affected livestock producers, is the optimal solution to problems of long standing.

Seeking Safe Passage - Scientists are increasingly discovering the benefits of protecting wildlife corridors, like those in the Yellowstone ecosystem, that connect isolated wildlife habitats.

A Top Dog Takes Over - Exterminated from Yellowstone National Park eight decades ago, gray wolves are back — and boosting the park's biodiversity.

Rebirth of Yellowstone's Wolves - The saga of the first wolf pups born in the region in seven decades.

Clash of the Carnivores - What happens when the hunters become the hunted at Yellowstone?

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