Bison Roundup

On Friday, we got up early and rode the bus over to Custer State Park to wait for the bison to come over the hill and go into the corrals for culling. When there are more than about 800 bison, the park folks roundup the herds and find ones to sell or give to the Indian Reservations because the park grasslands will only support about 800. They will die of starvation otherwise. They thought there would be 1400 bison but only about 700 showed up for brucellosis vaccination, tagging, and inspection.

It was overcast and about 47 degrees; we were lucky we did not get the forecasted rain.  About 15,000 people came to watch the bison being rounded up by folks on horseback or truck.  It took about an hour of bumper to bumper traffic to get into the parking area at the southern tip of the park.  We took chairs and set them up by the road and waited about 2 hours before we saw the first bison come rolling over the hill.  We also saw a herd of elk who came to watch the roundup. It took about 30 minutes for the bison to come down near us, then they were running by very quickly so I didn't get really nice photos (see below - bottom one is a video). The parklands are beautiful and I would like to return there and stay in the cabins or lodges sometime.

We spent the afternoon at the Crazy Horse Memorial and watched the great grandchild of Sitting Bull dance for us with his son.  They are carving the mountain into a humongous statue of Crazy Horse ring his horse.  Not sure they will ever finish.

 

Crazy Horse mountain sculpture