| Show Writers Trace Story Story tory of I Bison in Utah Bison the ha baggy gy buffaloes or of pioneer pioneer days roamed the Great Plains by the millions but were never m ni In the mountains of Utah according to source mate materiaLs materiaLs riaLs on file lie with the Utah Writ Writers I ers era Project While the buffalo Gas as a an imp important food supply s for plains Indians Utah tribes were forced to seek tek out wilder and scarce r game Ell EU ac cout CaUl t t tills this hi import portal lI t In explaining the more primitive standard of liv 11 living mg ing fo i 1 i among amone mountain tribes tribe in fn pioneer pi days dav 1 Early trappers of the Rocky Mountain and Hudson s Bay corn com cornI I an ane t a wintering li it Utah after 1824 speak frequently of buffalo buffalomeat meat Ineat s a-s a part of their diet indi rating that buffalo were present In the i Utah region at that ti ne Jim Bridger Bridget and otter oti oll er trapp trappers ri I 1 1 tell ell of the se severity erit of the winter inter of 1830 31 and the lm im II n i se plies piles of f b blenched bleached h ha buffalo i i skeletons n found un In the Bear a River Vill y and the Uintah Basin in that deep snows snow about that inI I time t practically wiped out the bl bisot OI ii ti Utah I The ItH Utah pioneers of 1847 found I sir h It a buffalo In the whole hole 1 I mountain region An occasional animal was reported killed in Utah up to 1850 1150 but two mountain moun mountain lain tain buffalo became extinct se sev several eral ral decades before their relatives on 1 on the Great Plains Plain succumbed d to wholesale slaughter To as a late as 1890 0 Isolated herds survived on the plains plain Early I sources from the trapper i and explorer era speak of mute mate real rial differences between the plains t f and the mountain or woods bi bison wn son According to these reports the mountain variety was vas of slighter slight er en stature had shorter horter legs and shorter hair and was always several sev several several eral shades darker in color These leports reports Interest the Smithsonian Institution which in inthe inthe inthe the 1880 s 1180 s authorized a study of 01 othe the American bison The Institute succeeded In taking several specimens spec wens mens of the plains buffalo but were wert unable to locate locale a single example ex example example ample of the mountain buffalo which unfortunately had become extinct many years ears before The Smithsonian dependent upon the secondary evidence of th trappers and mountain mOl men firmly final finally finally ly resolved re Oh ed that they had dent clent evidence to 10 J 1 cla the mountain bison as a separate variety of bison and ands s that mountain and plain bL bison on were ere biologically identical |
