Black Angus cattle and small grain crops. Ever since attending a buffalo auction at
Custer State Park as a child, I have been interested in raising buffalo, or American
Bison, but my father, fearing we could not handle them, would not allow them on the
place. In the past decade Bison prices sky rocketed, and I really wished I had
followed my heart then. Unlike many cattle ranchers who wanted in on part of the
action and sold cattle to buy bison breeding stock, I decided to wait for the prices to
stabilize again. During the winter of 1996-1997 when I watched as cattle froze to death
in shelter, including my own, I became more convinced than ever to switch from
raising cattle to raising bison, once the prices stabilized.
As I feared, the high market prices for bison were breeder driven. Early this decade
as the demand for bison meat could not keep up with supply, and as the drought
worsened, the bottom fell out of the Bison market. Ranchers with large herds began
offering buffalo hunts in attempts to market their animals and pay off debts. Now
market prices seem to be stabilizing again. The only thing keeping me from beginning
to raise buffalo is my lack of grass land. I began to develop a plan to find partners like
myself who wished to own a buffalo ranch corporation that would supply
shareholders with bison meat for the freezer on a continual basis as well as a resort
for family vacations. This corporation would offer absentee ownership of land and
bison, then safe guard the property and livestock in exchange for a share of the calf
crop. For now I call it Tatanka Winds.
Initially this will consist of an average or above size ranch divided into smaller
shares. Various sized shares will be available to best suit each family's needs. With a
6 Animal Unit(AU) share, the shareholder could expect to get 450 lbs of buffalo every
year for the freezer, worth about $2,000. The ranch could expect to get as its share a
two year old female buffalo worth approximately $700 which could be sold to cover
ranch expenses. The ranch will be self-sufficient, and the share holder will get a
return on his original investment. As the ranch is promoted and word of mouth
spreads, demand will grow and the ranch will expand.
Tatanka Winds is a venture in Agri-tourism. Tatanka Winds is unique in design from
anything now in existence or in the planning stage. Currently in existence are buffalo
ranches where bison are raised in a traditional cattle ranch style format. Also in
existence are public parks, preserves, and sanctuaries where government entities
operate bison herds on public lands. "Buffalo Commons" is a plan by some to create
even more public funded lands and sanctuaries for the bison, but with that attempt to
create a bison sanctuary there is no plan in place for controlling over-population of
the herd.
Tatanka Winds is middle ground, somewhere between a single owner buffalo ranch
and a public park with a buffalo herd. Like Yellowstone National Park or Custer State
Park in South Dakota, Tatanka Winds will be available for family vacations, camping,
hiking, horse backing, snowmobiling, and viewing of the herds, but like a ranch, it will
be privately owned and operated by those families.
Tatanka Winds will be a game preserve, but this must not be confused with an animal
sanctuary. Tatanka Winds will not be an animal sanctuary. Tatanka Winds will have as
its mission to preserve the largest game animal of North America, the bison, known to
the Lakota as Tatanka. There are two varieties of bison native to North America; the
Woodlands Bison and the Plains Bison . Tatanka Winds will be located on the plains of
west river South Dakota and will protect both the virgin grasslands and the plains
bison who have been at home there for thousands and thousands of years.
Tatanka Winds game preserve will be the larger consolidation of native grassland and
plains bison owned corporately by smaller absentee partners, who have invested
with the expectation to one day resell that share or shares for a profit, but in the
mean time will also benefit from the harvest of excess game, mainly two-year-old bulls
not needed for breeding/reproductive purposes.
The most obvious factor in preserving a species and protecting it from extinction is
to promote propagation of that species. But in addition to promoting propagation,
difficult tho it may be for us to accept, a necessary part of the process of preserving a
species is protecting it from over population. Over-population of a species will only
lead to disease and starvation of the herd, overgrazing and erosion of the earth.
Therefore to keep a healthy balance with nature the excess animals not needed for
propagation must be harvested. Roughly 10% of each calf crop will be needed for
propagation of the herd. The remaining 90% will be available for shareholders and
Tatanka Winds ranch to split.
Tatanka Winds, as a self-sustaining ranch, will retain for its share one-half of the
offspring from the bison herd, and will rely on the income generated from the sales of
that share, one-half of bison offspring, mainly the heifers, to finance the ranch
operation. As this is very similar to the share ratio a land owner would receive for
keeping any bovine herd for absentee owners, and given the fact that land payments
are not a part of Tatanka Winds expenses, there is no reason Tatanka Winds should
not survive quite well financially on its half of the bison calf crop.
All calves, both female heifers and male bulls, will be grass fed on the Tatanka Winds
ranch until the autumn of their second year, at which point they will be sorted and
shared. The top quality 10% of young bulls will be retained for breeding and will
replace the mature breeding bulls that are too old for further breeding. Since only
about 10% of the young male bison will be required for propagation of the herd, this
leaves 90% of the young males available for harvest -- a necessary job each fall,
making more room and forage available for the breeding herd. These young males,
and the older trophy bulls will be awarded to the shareholders each year for harvest.
A shareholder will have the option of harvesting the animal personally in field, or for
a fee having the game animal field-dressed, processed, and shipped.
By the fall of their second year, the majority of these heifers will already be bred,
carrying their first calf to be born in the spring of their third year. The top quality 10%
of these two-year-old heifers will be kept for replacement breeding purposes, to
replace the cows that are not bred, called open cows, or cows that may be bred but
are at that age when they no longer survive the winters well. This replacement
program will assure that each shareholder has a continual supply of young breeding
stock. These remaining two-year-old heifers, open cows, and mature cull cows will be
available for the ranch share, which Tatanka Winds will sell at auction or private treaty
for ranch income, with that income going for ranch expenses.
As Tatanka Winds proves itself and demand grows, there will be room for expansion.
The corporation will be able to expand, and the ranch will market some of its better
quality bred heifers through the sale of additional shares. This ensures that the herd
remains relatively closed to new disease, and is also beneficial because these
heifers are already part of the pecking order, and are familiar with the location and
pasture rotations.
Following is a ten year plan detailing what an 80 Acre +/- 3 AU shareholder could
expect and what Tatanka Winds ranch could expect from the shared calf crops. After
ten years the plan would repeat itself again.
and Harvest Schedule
For 80 Acre+/- 3 AU-Biennial Buffalo Hunt Share
Multiply by Two for 160 Acre+/- 6 AU-Annual Buffalo Hunt Share
Divide by Two for 40 Acre+/- 1.5 AU-Quadrennial Buffalo Hunt Share
Year One Year Two
80 acres+/- 80 Acres+/-
1/10th Mature Breeding Bull 1/10th Mature Breeding Bull
1 Three-Year-Old Bred Cow 1 Four-Year-Old Bred Cow
1 Bull Calf 1 Heifer Calf
1 Yearling Heifer 1 Yearling Bull
1 Two-Year-Old Bull (To Shareholder) 1 Two -Year-Old Heifer(To Ranch)
Year Three Year Four
80 acres+/- 80 Acres+/-
1/10th Mature Breeding Bull 1/10th Mature Breeding Bull
1 Five-Year-Old Bred Cow 1 Six-Year-Old Bred Cow
1 Bull Calf 1 Heifer Calf
1 Yearling Heifer 1 Yearling Bull
1 Two-Year-Old Bull (To Shareholder) 1 Two-Year-Old Heifer(To Ranch)
Year Five Year Six
80 acres+/- 80 Acres+/-
1/10th Mature Breeding Bull 1/10th Mature Breeding Bull
1 Seven-Year-Old Bred Cow 1 Eight-Year-Old Bred Cow
1 Bull Calf 1 Heifer Calf
1 Yearling Heifer 1 Yearling Bull
1 Two-Year-Old Bull(To Shareholder) 1 Two-Year-Old Heifer(To Ranch)
Year Seven Year Eight
80 acres+/- 80 Acres+/-
1/10th Mature Breeding Bull 1/10th Mature Breeding Bull
1 Nine-Year-Old Bred Cow 1 Ten-Year-Old Bred Cow
1 Bull Calf 1 Heifer Calf
1 Yearling Heifer 1 Yearling Bull
1 Two-Year-Old Bull(To Shareholder) 1 Two-Year-Old Heifer(To Ranch)
Year Nine Year Ten
80 acres+/- 80 Acres+/-
1/10th Mature Breeding Bull 1/10th Mature Breeding Bull
1 Eleven-Year-Old Bred Cow 1 Two-Year-Old Bred Heifer
1 Bull Calf 1 Heifer Calf
1 Yearling Heifer 1 Yearling Bull
1 Mature Bull(To Shareholder) 1 Thirteen-Year-Old Cow(To Ranch)
ranch and fence upkeep, liability insurance, and property taxes. Because this is an
agricultural venture, Tatanka Winds will try to save and maintain a significant reserve cash
supply through the good years in anticipation of the lean years.
Ranch Foreman
To assure that the investment of each absentee shareholder is safeguarded from theft,
disease, fire, and straying, a ranch foreman will be hired to reside on premises and attend to
needs of the ranch. His job it will be to maintain fences, monitor herd health and organize
animal husbandry practices, monitor grazing and range management, coordinate
agri-tourism events for shareholders, and oversee the harvest of excess game each
autumn. The ranch foreman will ideally be a shareholder himself, but might also be a
neighboring rancher. He will be chosen by the shareholders from applicants who have
submitted sealed bids for the job. His salary will be derived from ranch income, and will not
be an additional cost to shareholders. His housing will also be furnished on the ranch
premises. Utilities may or may not be included initially.
Veterinary Expenses
The ranch foreman of Tatanka Winds will be responsible for monitoring herd health and
insuring animals are treated for parasites and inoculated against disease. The herd will
need to be rounded up, corraled, and treated for parasite control each autumn. Ivomec
inoculation or pour-on works well, costing about $2.00- $2.50 per head, depending on weight
of the animal. Calves will be vaccinated for 7-way in Autumn about weigning time, at a cost of
$.45. The corporation and ranch foreman may also decide to pregnancy test each bison cow
every autumn, so as to cull the unbred, or open cows, making room for bred replacement
heifers. Preg testing will cost from $2 - $3 per head.
Ranch and Fence Upkeep
Being non-domesticated, bison require a strong enclosure. A typical fence for cattle is not
designed to hold bison. Generally additional posts are required to increase the height of the
perimeter fence, and an additional strand of barbed wire must be placed atop the fence.
Generally this is sufficient to hold a herd of bison, provided the range is managed correctly
and there is enough forage to maintain their appetite. Initially Tatanka Winds must
strengthen the existing perimeter fences, and there after maintain and repair said fences.
The ranch will no doubt include a set of improvements, or farm buildings, corrals, and house.
These will require annual maintenance. In addition to these improvements, a campground
area may be developed for shareholders to utilize on their visits.
Liability Insurance
I estimate the insurance will cost a minimum of $600 -$1000 annually. This includes a $30
annual fee, $180 dollars for liability up to $10,000 medical if any visitor was to get hurt on the
premises, $76 dollars for full time employee insurance, hurt in the course of employment,
$300 to insure house up to $50,000 and contents up to $25,000. Each partner could be
insured for up to $5,000 medical if hurt on premises for $23. Initially this $23 cost might be
the responsibility of each partner who wishes to be covered.
Property Taxes
Property taxes will vary slightly from county to county, and township to township, but for all
means and purposes should average about $1.25 per acre.
All totalled the approximate expenses Tatanka Winds will incur for each two-year-old heifer it
receives will be as follows:
Property Taxes: $200
Liability Insurance: $20
Animal husbandry: $21
Ranch Upkeep: $50
Foreman Wages: $125
---------------------------------
Total: $416
The most significant barriers I will face in implementing Tatanka Winds will be the initial
purchase of ranch land and the initial purchase of the bison. While I have found
considerable interest from sportsmen and non-sportsmen alike in this concept, I do not
believe that potential shareholders will commit themselves until there is concrete land and
animals they can inspect and approve of. I feel that to initiate the project I will be required to
borrow significant capitol to purchase ranch land and bison. I will be required to set up the
corporation, and then I will be required to promote the sale of shares. Until the shares are
sold and Tatanka Winds is operating as described above, I will be required to operate the
land and bison as a traditional cattle/buffalo ranch, selling calves each fall and/or buffalo
hunts to earn income to pay off the interest and debt.
Another barrier I face will be convincing others that this project will work. I have been told
that this endeavour to create Tatanka Winds is "admirable, but unrealistic". I am convinced it
will work and that it will be a boost to local small town and rural economies in western South
Dakota that are slowly depopulating. I believe it will create local jobs and tourism. I believe
that with blood sweat and tears it will work, it will expand, and it will out live me.
