Remote Delivery Vaccination Program

Under the bison management plan agreed to with the state of Montana in 2000, the National Park Service is committed to the development of a safe and effective means of vaccinating free-ranging bison in the park. Park staff are involved in testing the technology that could be used to remotely deliver the vaccine, and field methods to determine when, where, and how young bison can be most safely approached without disturbing them. Field studies have shown that the ability to work around a group of bison and individually approach each calf and yearling to within 30 meters depends on the size of the group: the larger the group, the more difficult a systematic vaccination effort becomes, as group members move around before all the calves and yearlings have been vaccinated.