American Gam

“…more than anything else I felt motion in the landscape; in the fresh, easy-blowing morning wind, and in the earth itself, as if the shaggy grass were a sort of loose hide, and underneath it were herds of wild buffalo galloping, galloping….” ~ Willa Cather

I drove through Wind Cave National Park today. I didn’t go to the visitor’s center. I didn’t buy any souvenirs. I didn’t even go into any caves. I simply drove through, north to south and then south to north, on my way to visit the Mammoth Site down in Hot Springs.

What I did do was take pictures along the way of the beautiful rolling landscape of nearly twenty thousand acres. The clouds were also rolling along carrying with them an occasional spattering of rain. It was a pleasant rain and I liked the shadows within the clouds that stretched to the horizon.

The landscape here on the prairie is composed mostly of eastern tall grasses and western short grasses. Normally, this verdant grassland is a natural refuge for the wide diversity of wildlife that live on this prairie but, at the present time, we are in a severe drought in this part of the country and so I worry for the well-being of nature’s critters.

I visited with some of those critters here in the park. They were the usual suspects that live here on the South Dakota prairie, namely Mrs. Prairie Dog and Mr. Tatanka.

Mrs. Prairie Dog and her one million family members were everywhere, and whether they know it or not, these Black-Tailed Prairie Dogs are wildlife managers. These ground squirrels are intricately connected to the numerous plant and animal species and play a key role in the health and stability of this prairie. Their eating habits alter vegetation, which attracts bison, elk, pronghorn and deer to their prairie dog towns to graze on tender new shoots, while their burrows provide shelter for insects, amphibians, reptiles, and other small mammals.

Mr. Tatanka was traveling solo today, moseying on down the road without a care in the world. He was looking very handsome and majestic today.

Between three hundred and five hundred bison now roam this national park, which is a mere token of the thirty to sixty million that once inhabited these Great Plains of North America.

The American bison, commonly called buffalo, or tatanka to the Lakota Indians, nearly became extinct as eastern settlers moved across the continent in the last two centuries. The bison were hunted relentlessly for their tongues and hides and to eliminate a source of food and supplies for the Plains Indians. Their numbers dwindled to just a few hundred until conservationists finally intervened.

Wind Cave National Park was established in 1903 by President Theodore Roosevelt and was the first cave in the world designated as a national park. The Lakota view the cave as a sacred place and an ancestral site. I see the park as resplendent slice of nature.

I hope the mighty bison continue to thrive and make a comeback from their close foray at the brink of extinction.

The gam continues…