But wildlife advocates are now doing battle with a surprising adversary: Native Americans. Northern Cheyenne and other regional tribes use bison for food, clothing and ritual-much as they did a century ago when millions of bison blanketed the Great Plains. “We believe the buffalo was put here for our purposes,” says Fort Peck tribal chairman Cabel Shields. The Fund for Animals, a group trying to save the buffalo, says it intends no slight to Native Americans. But Donald John Schubert, the fund’s director of investigations, says carcasses can be had when the animals die naturally. Right now, says Schubert, tribes are jumping on “the killing bandwagon.”
