CONSERVATION

and consumption have more than quadrupled.
According to Bob Dineen of Rocky Mountain
Natural Meats, 50,000 bison have been annually
slaughtered in recent years under USDA inspection;
as many as 30,000 more are processed under state
inspection. That does not put much of a dent in
bison population recovery, since more than 450,000
bison now roam the ranges or eat in feedlots in the
U.S. and Canada.
Dineen stressed that the return of buffalo herds
has been driven more by private ranchers and
restaurateurs—like Ted Turner, who owns 70 percent
of all herds in the U.S. and several steakhouses—
than by the conservation efforts of federal agencies
on public lands. “Most buffalo are being raised
explicitly for the meat industry,” said Dineen. Since
he began buffalo ranching in the earlier 1980s,
he estimates the number of animals has roughly
doubled, responding to consumer demand. Today,
close to 5,000 farms and ranches in the U.S. raise
bison for meat, in addition to those produced on
tribally managed rangelands on reservations.
Although the price of ground bison meat now
ranges from nine to ten dollars a pound, buffalo
burgers have become a mainstay on menus from
Denver, Colorado to Boston, Massachusetts; buffalo
tenderloins and rib eyes are often offered as specials
at high-end restaurants from coast to coast. In
Denver, Colorado, the Buckhorn Exchange has been
serving buffalo tenderloin as a regular menu item
since 1978.
“We pioneered offering it as a menu item,”
said Bill Dutton, the Buckhorn Exchange’s general
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