Where the private buffalo roam and the private antelope play: nongovernmental conservation is saving the planet.

• Author: Bailey, Ronald
• Position: Columns - American Prairie Reserve - Column

"I ASSCENDED TO the top of the cutt bluff this morning, from whence I had a most delightfull view of the country," wrote famed explorer Meriwether Lewis on April 22, 1805, as the Corps of Discovery journeyed west-ward through the newly acquired Louisiana Purchase. "The whole of which except the vally formed by the Missouri is void of timber or underbrush, exposing to the first glance of the spectator immence herds of Buffaloe, Elk, deer, & Antelopes feeding in one common and boundless pasture?"

The objective of the American Prairie Reserve (APR) is to recreate an untamed landscape in Montana so that 21st century Americans can similarly be exhilarated by the sight of thousands of wild bison, elk, deer, and antelope roaming free over vast areas of unfenced, native prairie. The APR is working to create the largest wildlife park of any kind in the lower 48 states--and it's doing it all with private money.

In the late 1990s, the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) sought examples of various biomes that remained largely intact and could become a focus for conservation. Identifying the unplowed prairie grasslands of Eastern Montana as one such area, the WWF initiated the Prairie Reserve project in 2001.The organization's priorities later shifted and the APR became a standalone private organization in 2004. It reintroduced bison to the region in 2005 and the herd now numbers around 600 animals.

The ultimate goal is to create a 3.5 million--acre reserve, an area about the size of Connecticut and one and a half times the size of Yellowstone National Park. Once completed, the reserve will consist of contiguous parcels of purchased private land (500,00o acres), permanently leased Bureau of Land Management grazing land (1.5 million acres), and the adjacent Charles M. Russell National Wildlife Refuge that already stretches along the Missouri River. So far, the APR has acquired 65,000 acres of private land and leases 270,000 acres from the government.

As the reserve grows in size over the next couple of decades, so too will its wildlife herds. As noted earlier, the region is currently home to 600 bison and perhaps 3,500 elk. Managing Director Pete Geddes says that the APR plans to nurture those herds to as many as I0,000 bison and 4,000 elk. In addition, the APR aims to be a "catalyst to bring many wildlife populations, such as mule deer, white-tailed deer, big horn sheep, elk, cougars, and grassland birds, back to significantly larger populations than currently...