Thirty six thousand pounds of bison charge forward as visitors in a wagon approach a 40-acre clearing at the Buffalo Ranch in Hanover, Michigan. After a brief moment of terror for the visitors, the 18 bison slow down, almost as suddenly as they appeared.
The biggest bison of the Hanover herd, Jake and Big Daddy, approach the wagon without hesitation, extending their 2-feet-long blue tongues between the wagon beams. Their nostrils are the size of human fists, and they devour stale corn in single bites.
“They mainly eat grass and hay. Corn is a treat so that’s why they come running for the wagon,” said high school student and ranch hand Rodney McGarry of Brooklyn, Michigan.
This local attraction, more reminiscent of the Wild West than southwestern Michigan, allows guests the chance to feed bison (the technical term for what are more commonly known as buffalo), ride horses, zip-line, and purchase bison meat – including hot dogs, bison patties, and strip steaks.
The ranch was founded in 1976, about a century after the nation’s remaining bison were captured by six individual ranchers, according to Valerius Geist, author of “Buffalo Nation: The History and Legend of the North American Bison.”
Professor of Political Economy Gary Wolfram believes that private ownership of bison by individual ranchers, not government intervention, is what saved the species. He speaks of this concept in his Introduction to Political Economy class.
“American bison represent perhaps the single most spectacular wildlife recovery success in North American history, and it occurred precisely because this one native species made the rare transition from public property to private property,” Ike C. Sugg of the Competitive Enterprise Institute said in an article from cei.org.
Sugg wrote that from 1903 to 1905, the number of bison in the United States fell from 969 to 29, meaning that the U.S. government protected about 5 percent.
Today, 90 percent of today’s bison are privately owned. Nineteen of these bison, including a four-week-old calf, reside at the Buffalo Ranch, which is owned by Terrell Daniels of Clark Lake, Michigan. He bought the ranch from Gary Childs in 2007, and changed the name from “Childs Place” to the “Buffalo Ranch.”
Wolfram remembers visiting the property years ago for one of his children’s field trips with Hillsdale Academy. Wolfram enjoyed the bison meat, but it was not Wolfram’s first encounter with the delicacy.
“I won a race in the state of Washington, and if you won, you got so much buffalo meat. I got a bunch of buffalo meat. It was just a little 10K race, put on by a buffalo restaurant,” Wolfram said.
Daniels decided to purchase the ranch when he found out Childs planned to close the ranch.
“My kids came here before I bought it. My wife Dana and I, we talked it over and thought, ‘there aren’t too many places left like this,’” Daniels said. “We kept it running for my kids and other peoples’ kids.”
Daniels said the biggest change his family made to the property was making it more family friendly. The family re-did the barns and fencing, and is currently in the process of renovating more fencing. They added 19 horses to the property, increasing the number from 22 to 41 for horseback riding.
“Horseback riding is our main source of income. They are the ones that support the ranch,” he said.
When the Daniels family took over the herd, there were 27 buffalo.
“We went to a smaller herd so we could stay in business. It costs a lot to get hay. The price almost tripled in price. We decided it would easier on us to afford a smaller herd, rather than lose it all,” Daniels said. “For the last couple of years the price of hay went from $20 a bail to almost $100 at one time. We are making provisions and adding fencing in different areas and we will bring the herd back up.”
The largest bison the ranch had, Max, was put down a few months ago. He weighed 4,000 pounds, was 7 feet tall at his hump, and measured 35 inches between the horns. His son, Big Daddy, who fought for dominance of the herd and won, then pushed him out of the herd. Max wasn’t receiving proper nutrition and had to be laid down. The Buffalo Ranch sells Max’s meat, which is expected to last for a year’s supply.
“Buffalo are aggressive by nature,” McGarry said. “They fight with their heads flat on the ground and push each other back and forth.”
Daniels bought the Buffalo Ranch without any prior bison-raising experience, and said it is very hard to own and control the animals.
“They’re not like a cow. They are still a wild animal,” Daniels said.
Only a few weeks remain to discover the Buffalo Ranch this season, before it closes in early November. It will reopen in March.
