SIOUX FALLS, S.D.—Thousands of people will watch as hundreds of huge, snorting brown animals are rounded up and herded into dusty corrals during the annual Custer State Park buffalo roundup on Monday, but it’s what happens in the sale pen eight weeks later that will draw the attention of bison producers around the country.
The 44th roundup and the Nov. 21 auction will be used to keep the herd at a manageable number over the winter in the 71,000-acre southern Black Hills park.
During the roundup, the herd is driven into corrals where park employees can sort the animals for the sale as well as vaccinate and brand this year’s crop of calves.
Many bison herds around the country can trace their seed stock to the first Custer auction in 1965, said Dave Carter, executive director of the National Bison Association of Westminster, Colo.
“It has an incredible history to it, but it’s also one of the benchmark events of the year that determines the overall trends and prices for bison,” he said.
Other auctions and private sales have helped the bison industry expand since then, said Carter.
“But if somebody was going to talk about the most important sales event for commercial bison production, I’m sure Custer comes out at the top,” he said.
The Custer herd numbers about 1,230 this year, down from the optimum summer capacity of around 1,500. The park has been running a smaller herd during a drought that began in 2002.
“We’ve had a couple of pretty good years, last year and this year, with pretty good moisture and pretty good grass and we’re starting to grow it (herd) a little,” said Richard Miller, the park director.
Fewer cows will be sold this year in order to add to the calf crop in spring.
Normal herd size over the winter is around 970 head. This year’s sale of about 235 head will put the park herd at around 900 for winter.
Last year’s average price of $777 was the highest per-head average this decade. The low point came in 2002 after a rush to develop bison herds drove up the price of live animals in the 1990s and the industry “fell off a cliff,” Carter said.
Custer Park took in a record $910,000 in 1998 with the sale of 343 animals at an average price of $2,653. In 2002, the average price on 360 head was $228.
“These are animals that are out on grass all year long and they haven’t had a lot of human handling,” said Carter. “If you really want to go buy some buffalo that have good buffalo characteristics, Custer is a good place to go.”
The 2008 auction at the Custer State Park corrals drew 147 registered buyers from six states.
Until two years ago, park officials would gather the buffalo into one large herd on the Sunday before the official roundup and get them into position to drive them into the corrals on Monday.
But that was too much strain for the animals, especially during a drought, said Miller, the park director.
“You push them hard two days in a row and then start working them the same day with driving them into the chutes, branding calves, vaccinating, testing and all that and we found we were stressing them.”
Now, work begins a week or more before the roundup to slowly move the bison into the southern part of the park to an area that’s been off limits to grazing. They’ll stay there until roundup day when about 60 horseback riders and others in pickup trucks drive the bison into a valley leading to the corrals as 10,000 to 11,000 spectators watch from hillsides.
Proceeds from the auction go into the general fund of the parks and recreation division within the state Department of Game, Fish and Parks.
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