Heading West Again
I left Bismarck after a quiet and pleasant sleep with the rain falling on the roof of the van, and a bunch of weird dreams about my future life. The landscape began to change again about 40 miles west of Bismarck. There were still a lot of large soybean and corn farms, but there was also a lot of range land, with some Holsteins, but a lot of Angus. We’re in piece o’meat country now! As we continued, the rain dried up, but the sky was low and grey almost all day. The contours of the land began to shift, from flat flat farms to rolling hills and interesting shapes, cones jutting out of a valley, hills that looked like drip castles. About 45 miles from the Montana border, we moved into the real badlands. The Theodore Roosevelt National Park is not as well known as the South Dakota badlands, but since I declined to travel through South Dakota in my own little private boycott against abortion legislation recently signed into law by the Governor, I thought I’d enjoy this little brother badland. It’s quite incredible. The park is two distinct parcels of land, the southern one, which includes the headwaters of the Little Missouri River, and the northern one, which is bisected by the Little Missouri, but about 50 miles to the north. I spent some time exploring the southern portion.
The landscapes remind me of the Grand Canyon in miniature, but no less dramatic, perhaps just in a scale that I could comprehend. A unique feature of the landscape is provided by the coal seams running through the land. Fires have ignited the coal seams and baked the surrounding clay and sand. As erosion has removed the softer material, the hills have remained capped with this hard-baked material, with colorful striations through its mass.
In what looks like a barren landscape, there’s plenty of life. Way too cold for the snakes, but mountain bluebirds crossed my path, as did wild turkeys, I saw some wild horses from a distance, and we saw quite a number of bison. They calved about two weeks ago.
The little ones watched us curiously, the adults were way too jaded to pay attention. As we drove past some bison, Bubba’s behavior was interesting. He looked out the window, and you could almost see the thought in a balloon over his head,”I am NOT making eye contact with this dude, he’s MUCH too big!” He turned his back on the open window and lay down out of the line of sight of the bison. His behavior was quite different as we passed a prairie dog town. “Mom, for me? PLEASE can I have one? or a bunch?” The only acceptable answer was no. I’m betting I could find a bunch of local ranchers who would hire him though. 
I had a chance to talk with one of the rangers who’s been working on wildlife management issues. They worked with Montana State University to define a carrying capacity of the land for the herds of bison, horses and elk. There are not enough predators to keep the herds a manageable size for the land, although wildcats do take some down, and coyotes are believed to take some of the sick animals. They work with some of the local Indian tribes, and have transferred some of the bison to them for their own herds, for ceremonial purposes and for meat. They cannot allow any hunting without a change of their authorizing legislation, although some type of hunting will probably be necessary, in combination with other management techniques, to control the size of the population. The consequence of not controlling the population is habitat damage and a weaker sicker population. But they must be concerned about the public image of the Park Service allowing hunting in the parks, and the politics probably will make it impossible. I was reminded of our discussions at an Association of Nature Center Administrators Conference some years ago, when a number of us were talking about white tailed deer management issues in the northeast. We were all experiencing habitat damage from deer browsing at our centers. We recognized that several years of education of the public would be necessary before any action would be taken, or we would be pilloried for allowing Bambi to be killed. The climate is more hunter-oriented in the west, but the legislative changes would have to take place in Washington, and, regardless of the science, there would be loud opposition. There would be equally loud opposition from ranchers to the reintroduction of predators (wolves) who could play an active role in controlling the population.
I went from the park to the National Cowboy Hall of Fame in Medora, ND. I wasn’t there but a few minutes when a local cowboy stopped in to tell me it looked like there was a problem with my brakes, based on the powdery black buildup on my wheels, and that I seemed to have a radiator leak. The van is a great place to sleep, but doesn’t seem to be such a great place to drive lately. I decided to get myself to a community where I could find a service station before dark, so drove on with only a short view of the famous cowboys.
As I crossed the border into Montana, the sun came out for the first time since Iowa. I’d been feeling apprehensive as I drove across North Dakota: “What have I done? Is this a crazy trip?” I figure that the sun shining through those big Montana skies is prophetic. I’ll check in with a garage in Miles City in the morning and see if I can get Maybelline squared away for the last leg of the trip.
