While careful wildlife management at the state park has preserved now-thriving populations of bighorn sheep, elk, deer, bobcats, coyotes, birds and American bison, a change in the 19th annual Great Bison Roundup program also inspired hundreds of horsemen and women to abandon modern conveniences in exchange for an authentic experience on the range.
Park manager Ron Taylor said the wranglers have always participated in the herd-management roundup, but greater reliance on helicopters in recent years has diminished the role of the volunteer riders.
"There were a lot of places the choppers couldn't get them out of," said Randy Stone, a rider with the Cache County Sheriff's Posse and a 12-year veteran of the roundup. "But it was just a short ride - and if you saw a buffalo, you were lucky."
This year, though, Taylor and his park staff turned the roundup, which was always over in a few hours after two helicopters took flight, into a quality, three-day encounter for the volunteers.
"The helicopters push the bison pretty hard, and this is a lot less stressful for them," Taylor said of the "hazing" process that moves the herd at its own pace using horses and their riders.
As the weather progressed like a saddle sore - from sunshine on Thursday to showers on Friday and squalls on Saturday - more than 100 volunteers strapped on their chaps and saddled their steeds to round up nearly 700 bison scattered around the 15-mile-long and 5-mile-wide island located west of Syracuse in the Great Salt Lake.
The drive to corrals at the north end of the island was slow and steady, and sometimes the posses lost ground when one animal resisted. The rustlers quickly learned the dynamics of the groups after watching one stubborn female bison stop a herd in its tracks.
"Bison are led by a matriarchal society. She's the lead cow. If you don't get her moving, you ain't getting nothing going," explained Antelope Island Wildlife Range Manager Steve Bates.
By the second day, the rustlers also learned the difference between a bluff charge and a real one - and not to stick around to see which was which.
For Harriman cattle rancher Larry Farnsworth, the bison roundup was just another day in the saddle. An experienced wrangler, Farnsworth admitted that the bison are a lot meaner than the animals he usually works with. For this reason, park rangers exclude stray bulls from the roundup.
"They are grumpy and they're extremely hard on the equipment and hard on each other," Taylor said, noting the tendency of male bison to gore whatever gets in the way.
Wranglers, who nearly got eyeball to eyeball with the 2,000-pound-plus beasts, made it through the weekend unscathed, except for a couple of injuries in the parking area, dubbed the rodeo arena by Taylor.
One cowhand packed up and went back home shortly after he arrived Thursday morning and was bucked off his own horse - twice. A Pocatello woman suffered a broken ankle Friday morning when her horse turned over on her.
By Friday night, when the Antelope Island campsites were full and the band Saddle Strings was tuned up for an old-fashioned cowboy dance, the wranglers were tired but happy.
"They made a push and put 300 animals in the corrals before dark," Taylor said. "They were elated that they were successful. We just wanted them to have a great time, but that was a bonus that they were able to get them all they way in."
Two helicopters joined the roundup Saturday morning and the entire bison population was corralled before noon.
After a few days of rest, wildlife rangers will give each bison a health examination consisting of blood work, inoculations, pregnancy tests and weight checks. Excess animals will be sold at auction in order to keep the herd down to about 550 head, Taylor said, and the rest of the bison will be turned out again into the big, wide yonder of Antelope Island's 28,022 acres.
The public is invited to observe the inspections Friday, Saturday and Sunday at Buffalo Point in the state park. For more information, call 801-721-9569.
abrunson@sltrib.com
