Knife River Flint

Knife River Flint

by | May 30, 2023 | Blog

Prized Knapping Stone of the Northern Plains

By Gene Gade

Aerial photo of Knife River Flint quarries shows pockmarked landscape where chunks of Knife River Flint were dug out of soil for at least 11,000 years.

No man’s land on a World War I battlefield? Impact craters on Mars or the Moon? An abandoned bombing range?

From the air, certain pastures near the Knife River in central North Dakota are as pockmarked as any of the above.

However, these pits are not the result of violence or astronomical cataclysms. They are really hundreds of small mines used by Native Americans to quarry a precious resource over a period of at least 11,000 years.

What resource? Native Americans were digging for nodules of a dark brown rock, variously described as caramel or root beer colored, and well known to archaeologists and geologists as Knife River Flint (KRF).

KRF was one of the most sought-after materials used to make tools and weapons and was traded over a vast area of the continent.

Chunks or nodules of Knife River Flint like this were found scattered through the quarries. They were dug out of the soil, fashioned into points and traded to visiting tribes for at least 11,000 years. Traded again and again, they became highly prized and have been found thousands of miles away.

Artifacts fashioned from KRF include Clovis points made more than 10,000 years ago and KRF implements have been found thousands of miles from the quarries . . . from Montana on the west, Alberta on the north, New Mexico on the south and New York state in the east.

Clearly, KRF was a valued commodity in a very large and ancient trade network.

Knife River Flint arrow point recovered from excavations at the Vore Buffalo Jump in Wyoming. The Flint traded from Knife River showed the characteristically root beer or caramel color with extremely hard, sharp edges.

What’s special about Knife River Flint?

Chemically, flint is a type of quartz. The primary compound in flint and related minerals is silicon dioxide a.k.a. silica, one of the most common compounds in the earth’s crust. Silica is slightly soluble, so it often dissolves in water, percolates through sedimentary rocks and precipitates where there are voids in the surrounding rock, forming hard nodules of various sizes.

Flint is usually formed within a chalky sediment. Like other forms of silica used to make tools, flint is hard . . .  about 7 on a scale where 10 is hardest. It is also brittle and fractures into long, thin, cores. When struck by a skilled “knapper,” flint and its “lithic“ cousins in (chert, chalcedony, jasper, agate, etc.), form curved chips called “conchoidal fractures” and can have very sharp edges.

That’s why they make good arrow points and blades. Due to minute impurities, Flint and similar minerals usually have distinct colors and sometimes contain tiny fossils. Often flints are fairly dull and opaque, but some have a shiny luster and are translucent.

Knife River Flint has properties in spades that make it a very desirable tooling stone. Plus its distinctive and beautiful.

Where did the Flint come from?

Knife River Flint from North Dakota as a trade commodity had wide distribution across the US and Canada. Library of Congress.

Nobody knows for certain where Knife River Flint was formed because the parent rock has not been identified with certainty. Most likely it was embedded in rock derived from a peat bog that existed about 50 million years ago. The strata in which it formed were probably part of the Killdeer Mountains.

The flint-bearing rock was apparently carried away by glacial ice or water and deposited in the gravel along what became the Knife River drainage.

Chunks of KRF with diameters of two feet have been found, but most nodules are much smaller. They are distributed in a relatively small stretch of the Knife River valley, but quarrying has been very intense in several small areas along the flood plain.

The largest quarry has been designated a National Historic Site. Another is in a National Wildlife Refuge.

 Knife River Flint in the Trade Network

An impressive trade network linked many parts of North America hundreds of years before Europeans entered the continent and began trading for furs and other goods.

In what is now the Southwest US, pueblo Indians at Chaco Can[1]yon and other sites carried on extensive trade extending in several directions, especially to Mexico and Central America.

In the Northern Plains, Mandan and Hidatsa Indians were the great entrepreneurs. From their earthlodge villages along the Middle Missouri River, the Mandans and Hidatsas often traded part of their abundant corn, bean and squash products for buffalo meat and hides with the hunting tribes that surrounded them.

More than that, they became the middle men and importers where tribes throughout the region came to acquire goods that did not occur where they lived. The Mandan/Hidatsa trade network extended well beyond North Dakota.

Mollusk shells from the Pacific Northwest, Gulf of Mexico and even the Atlantic Coast are found in excavations of Mandan villages Tribes along the Great Lakes were beginning to mine and smelt copper which also became a trade item.

What durable resource of their own did the Mandan and Hidatsa have to trade? Knife River Flint!

What’s This got to do with the Vore Buffalo Jump?

Not surprisingly, Knife River Flint is found among the bones at the Vore Site. About 7 per cent of the artifacts at the VBJ are made from KRF.

This point demonstrates the sharp edges and translucent properties of Knife River Flint. The brown flecks in the stone are fragments of tiny fossils.

While other types of stone from less distant quarries are dominant, the presence of KRF raises intriguing questions for archaeologists. KRF is so distinctive and the area where it was mined is so restricted, there is no question of where it originated. However, it is not certain who brought it to the Vore site.

A 10,000+ year old Clovis Point made from Knife River Flint that was found in southern Iowa.

Pairing modern tribes with prehistoric stone tools is not exact science. At best, its inferential /circumstantial “evidence.” Having acknowledged that, what inferences can be made about KRF and the VBJ?

 Start with what’s known. The Hidatsa lived in large villages at the confluence of the Missouri and Knife Rivers and probably the dominant tribe along the latter during the period of Vore Site use. They are almost certainly among the tribes that quarried and /or traded the famous flint.

 In the late-1500’s the Hidatsa had a major family feud. The schism was significant enough that some portions of the tribe moved away from the central farming area along the Missouri and shifted their economy toward nomadic buffalo hunting.

 As they adapted to the mobile life on the Plains, the breakaway group developed its distinctive identity. They maintained a trade relationship with their farming cousins, but they continued to adapt to the tipi-dwelling hunting culture. They referred to themselves as “the people of the long-beaked bird,” possibly referring to cranes as a spiritual totem.

 However, other tribes, referred to them (perhaps in a derogatory way) by the name of another bird species. They became known as Crows and that name is still applied to them.

 It’s known from oral history, supplemented by archaeology, that the Crows migrated toward the Black Hills and that they were dominant in the region during much of the 1600’s. The artifacts of Knife River Flint that are found at the Vore Site are mostly from that century.

 From archaeological sites such as one along the base of the Bighorn Mountains, the Crows are known to have conducted communal buffalo jumps. If they did buffalo jumps where the Plains meet the Black Hills, they may very well have used the Vore Site.

 So, the inference is that the ancestors of the Crows may well have brought Knife River Flint to use at the VBJ. Additional research is needed to test such inferences and there’s no better place to do the archaeological component than at the Vore Buffalo Jump.

 Guest Article by Gene Gade. As the County Extension Agent in Sundance Wyoming, Gene Gade served 20 years as president of the non-profit Vore Buffalo Jump Foundation, helping to develop and guide the research, education and economic potentials of the Vore site until his retirement to Oregon, where he continued to write for the VBJF Newsletter. Reprinted from the VBJF Newsletter with permission: Vore Buffalo Jump Foundation, 369 Old US 14, Sundance WY 82729; Tel: (307) 266-9530, email: <info@vorebuffalojump.org>

Artifacts made from KRF have been found thousands of miles from the North Dakota quarries in every direction. Clearly, it was highly valued as a trade item over 10,000 years ago.

Most likely the nodules were embedded in rock derived from a peat bog that existed about 50 million years ago. Archeologists suggest the strata in which it formed may have been part of the Killdeer Mountains.

Knife River Flint as a trade commodity—(Library of Congress)

Knife River Flint Artifacts Found in Alberta

Map shows distribution of 243 Knife River Flint artifacts found in Alberta (white dots) and widely across the US and Canada (tan color). Gold color circle shows major outcrops of KRF in western North Dakota and somewhat larger zone of scattered secondary cobbles. Source: Todd Kristensen, ND.

Anthropologists in Alberta Canada have documented 243 Knife River Flint artifacts found throughout the province, as reported by Emily Moffat, Regulatory Approvals Coordinator, Archaeological Survey of Alberta, Canada.

Over the course of the past 13,000 years, Knife River Flint was shaped into projectile points, tools and some unusual eccentric forms.

Moffat notes that this was a time of limited human mobility—with only dog travois to carry their goods in travelling—compared with modern times.

Yet Knife River Flint items were regularly transported hundreds of miles from their source in North Dakota, where it was quarried for all those thousands of years. All of it originated in a relatively small region which contains the majority of quarry pits.

The qualities in the Knife River artifacts that made them so desirable to primitive people were no doubt their ability to flake predictably and stay sharp.

However, in addition, some speculate that bison-hunting peoples of the past may have attributed spiritual properties to these rocks of beauty which often have translucent colors described as root beer or coffee. Often tiny fossils are visible within.

Knife River Flint (KRF) was apparently considered significantly more valuable than other flint materials, so great efforts were invested in procuring it, Moffat says.

Dunn and Mercer Counties of North Dakota were the most intensively quarried regions, and evidence of those activities is still found on the landscape today. Pre-contact quarry pits appear as pock marks on LiDAR imagery, a remote sensing technique that removes surface vegetation.

The primary source area is about 200 hectares and contains 29 pit complexes, each with up to 75 individual pits per hectare. On average these pits are 6 metres in diameter and 1 metre deep, with the largest reaching 20 metres in diameter and 2 metres deep.

The pits visible on imagery represent the most recent quarrying activities but many were excavated two or three times prior, illustrating the high demand for KRF.

Dunn and Mercer Counties of North Dakota were the most intensively quarried regions. Pre-contact quarry pits appear as pock marks on LiDAR imagery, a remote sensing technique that removes surface vegetation. Source: Todd Kristensen with LiDAR data provided by the North Dakota Geological Survey, 2017.

Moffat notes that KRF was first formed when low-grade coal, or lignite, was turned to stone by silica (or quartz) mineralization. These original rock formations, thought to be about 50 to 30 million years old, were eroded by glaciers and water, resulting in secondary deposits of loose pebbles and cobbles.

KRF could therefore be pried from the ground quite easily as opposed to chipped from a rock face or collected as river cobbles like some other lithic materials. Tools typical to the period, such as fire-hardened digging sticks and bison scapula hoes and shovels, would have been used to unearth KRF.

There are difficulties identifying which artifacts are indeed KRF. Moffat says there is an abundance of similar materials in North America made from other silica-rich rocks such as chert, chalcedony and petrified wood which can resemble KRF. Larger pieces of KRF may even have plant fossils embedded within it, similar to petrified wood. The geochemistry of KRF is quite variable.

Ultraviolet (UV) fluorescence can be used to tell some rock types apart. KRF was once thought to fluoresce a specific color, which helped archaeologists identify it, but recent work suggests that it fluoresces a range of colors under longwave UV light—from yellow-gray to orange, with some specimens of KRF that do not fluoresce at all.

The chain of interactions that transported KRF to Alberta and other far-reaching regions thousands of years ago is remarkable, according to Moffatt. KRF cobbles, cores and tools were passed between countless hands to get from the quarries to the people who used the stone on a daily basis.

The presence of KRF and any other exotic material at archaeological sites therefore signals a rich history of human connection and an incredible journey across cultural landscapes of the past.

For more information:

Ahler, S.A. 1986. Knife River Flint Quarries: Excavations at Site 32DU508. State Historical Society of North Dakota, Bismarck, North Dakota.

Clayton, L., W.B. Bickley, Jr., and W.J. Stone. 1970. Knife River Flint. Plains Anthropologist 15:282-290.

Clark, F. 1984. Knife River Flint and interregional exchange. Midcontinental Journal of Archaeology 9:173-198.

Dawe, R.J. 2013. A review of the Cody Complex in Alberta. In: Paleoindian Lifeways of the Cody Complex, edited by M.P. Muñiz and E.J. Knell, pp. 144-187. University of Utah Press, Salt Lake City, Utah.

Evilsizer, L.J. 2016. Knife River Flint Distribution and Identification in Montana. M.A. thesis, Department of Anthropology, University of Montana, Missoula, Montana.

Gregg, M.L. 1987. Knife River Flint in the northeastern Plains. Plains Anthropologist 32:367-377.

Hickey, L.J. 1977. Stratigraphy and Paleobotany and of the Golden Valley Formation (Early Tertiary) of Western North Dakota. Geological Society of America Memoirs 150, Geological Society of America, Boulder, Colorado.

Kirchmeir, P.F.R. 2011. A Knife River Flint Identification Model and its Application to Three Alberta Ecozone Archaeological Assemblages. M.A. thesis, Department of Anthropology, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta.

Kristensen, T., E. Moffat, M. J. M. Duke, A. J. Locock, C. Sharphead, and J. W. Ives. 2018. Identifying Knife River Flint in Alberta: A Silicified Lignite Toolstone from North Dakota. Archaeological Survey of Alberta Occasional Paper 38:1-24.

Root, M.J. 1992. The Knife River Flint Quarries: The Organization of Stone Tool Production. Ph.D. dissertation, Department of Anthropology, Washington State University, Pullman, Washington.

Root, M.J. 1997. Production for exchange at the Knife River Flint quarries, North Dakota. Lithic Technology 22:33-50.

Steuber, K.I. 2018. Geochemical Characterization of Brown Chalcedony during the Besant/Sonota Period. Ph.D. dissertation, Department of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.

VanNest, J. 1985. Patination of Knife River Flint artifacts. Plains Anthropologist 30:325-339.

Written by Emily Moffat, Regulatory Approvals Coordinator, Archaeological Survey of Alberta, Canada.

Francie M Berg

Author of the Buffalo Tales &Trails blog

How to Cook Bison

by | May 16, 2023 | Blog

Don’t be Buffaloed!

There is no reason to be buffaloed when cooking with bison. As many chefs will attest, bison is a delicious and healthy substitute in any recipe that calls for beef.

Individual cuts of bison are identical to beef. Bison can appear to be a deeper red due to the fact that bison has lower fat content, thus less marbling than beef.

Because bison is lean, it will cook more quickly so it is important not to overcook bison.

Overcooked bison is tough bison. Cooking bison correctly is delicious and tender bison.

Use these general guidelines when cooking bison.

Ground bison meat should be cooked to an internal temperature of at least 160°F and the juices should be clear, not red.

Roasts and steaks should be cooked to an internal temperature of 145° F (medium rare) or 160°F (medium). The oven should be set at around 275°F.

  • Oven broiling, move your broiler rack away from the heat about a notch lower than where you normally broil beef steaks.

Expect a buffalo steak to cook one-third faster than a beef steak. Bison steaks are best when cooked rare to medium to maintain the moisture and flavor of the meat.

It is not recommended to cook buffalo meat past medium. If you prefer your steak to this degree of doneness, be aware that your buffalo steak may lose some of its desirable attributes.

Turn your oven temperature to around 275°F for bison.

Plan on the roast being done in about the same amount of time as with a comparable size beef roast.

We recommend using a meat thermometer indicating the internal temperature of 145° for medium rare.

  • Ground bison is also leaner in general. Check the package if purchasing bison retail. You can ask your meat processor for the fat percentage you prefer, if you purchase bison in bulk.
  • Medium-rare to medium is best for a juicy burger.

https://bisoncentral.com/how-to-cook-bison/

In this diagram Gold denotes the most tender cuts of bison meat; Green medium tender; and Bllue less tender. Preferred cooking method for each cut is shown.

Bison Stew

Francie M Berg

Author of the Buffalo Tales &Trails blog

Top Sales at Gold Trophy Bison Show and Sale

by | May 2, 2023 | News Articles

Westminster, CO (January 26, 2023) – Over 500 ranchers gathered last week for the National Bison Association Winter Conference, and brought with them about 100 head of live bison to the National Western Stock show to participate in the Gold Trophy Show and Sale.

The mission of the Gold Trophy Show and Sale is to create an environment where producers can compete to establish the value of their bison in the current marketplace. 

Thank you to all of our consignors and buyers that made the 2023 Gold Trophy Show and Sale a huge success! Thanks too to our great volunteer handling team, the “Buffaleros”, as well as Karen Conley for organizing a great show and sale. Finally, thank you to our GTSS award sponsors, and Rocky Mountain Natural Meats for sponsoring the banquet dinner.

All of the bison growers bring with them a commitment to continue building the market for bison meat based upon the quality of the meat and a dedication to sustainable ranching practices.

John Graves, Yard Supervisor for the Gold Trophy Show and Sale, commented, “The GTSS animals were some of the highest quality we have had, making judging them quite a challenge.”

Wolverine Bison Company brought the Grand Champion Male. Buffalo Run Ranch had the Reserve Grand Champion Male. Snyder Land and Development brought the Grand and Reserve Grand Champion Females; and also received the high honors of Producer of the Year. Wrapping up the recognitions was Miller Bison, LLC, landing the Rookie of the Year award.

On Saturday, January 21st, at the National Western Stock Show, the award winning animals were sold by live animal. “Previous winning entries at the Gold Trophy Show and Sale have served as foundation seed stock for most of the top buffalo herds throughout the United States.

“We expect great things from these animals, and the prices reflected the quality charging through these pens today,” said Lydia Whitman, Program Manager with the National Bison Association. 

The Gold Trophy Show and Sale is held annually at the National Western Stock Show by the National Bison Association and the Rocky Mountain Bison Association, which collectively represent nearly 2,000 members in 48 states and 10 foreign countries.

Information on the National Bison Association is available at www.bisoncentral.com.

Francie M Berg

Author of the Buffalo Tales &Trails blog

How Much Meat Could Meat Hunters Eat if they Could Find it?

by | May 2, 2023 | Blog

Doing Math on Plains Indian Diets, by Gene Gade

An artist’s image of the pirogues and canoes that the Lewis and Clark crew paddled and dragged up the Missouri River in 1805.

“The men’s labor was again such that each private ate as much as 9 or 10 pounds of meat per day.”

 So historian Stephen Ambrose described the food requirements and diets of the members of the Lewis and Clark expedition in April of 1805 in his prize-winning book, “Undaunted Courage.”

The men were working hard, paddling or sometimes dragging heavily-laden canoes for 20 miles or more per day up the Missouri River, against the current and prevailing wind.

When not with the boats, they were walking even greater distances over the prairie. The 30 or so members of the expedition ate a few roots and other edible plant parts (usually provided by Sacagawea), but the vast majority of their diet was meat. The famished group consumed about 300 pounds of meat every day!

It’s useful to consider this example when one thinks about the nutritional requirements and diets of the Plains Indians and their use of the Vore Buffalo Jump.

Buffalo “jumps” were usually conducted in autumn with the goal of obtaining enough meat and hides to provide for tribal needs during harsh winters. If a winter proved mild and hunting conditions were favorable, men could provide fresh meat.

However, quantities of dried meat and pemmican were needed as supplements during most winters and were an emergency meat supply when the winter was severe and hunting was difficult or impossible.

Winter camps were usually along sheltered river valleys and camp chores were constant and strenuous. This Edward Curtis photo shows a Crow woman carrying a load of firewood to a tipi in winter.

In very successful communal hunts at the Vore site, 200 to 300 bison were sometimes killed. That’s tons of meat. Could they really eat that much meat? Wasn’t there a great deal of waste?

Is it possible, or healthy, for humans to be almost totally carnivorous for their entire lives? Let’s let modern science help us find the answers to these and other questions.

How much Meat was Available from a Vore Site Hunt?

Most hunts at the Vore site occurred in the fall, after the bison breeding season. When breeding is finished in August and September, buffalo bulls often wander away, leaving herds of predominantly cows and calves. When a “jump” occurred, the herd would consist of mostly mature female bison, some yearling or 2-year-old females, calves from the previous spring and a few lingering bulls.

Bulls often weighed 1,500 to 2,000 pounds (the very biggest weigh a ton and a half!). Mature females tip the scales at 1,000 to 1,400 pounds, probably averaging about 1,200. Two-year-old bred-heifers weigh about 900. Yearling heifers are about 750 pounds. Calves in that season will weigh 450 to 575 pounds, depending on gender, say 500 pounds on average.

Let’s assume a herd of 100 animals comprised of 40% mature females, 10% two-year-old bred heifers, 15% yearling heifers, 15% calves and 10% bulls. Using average weights for those animals, its reasonable to assume that the total weight of that herd would be about 86,500 pounds or 43.5 tons as live weight.

Hunts in the fall after breeding season meant herds of mostly cows and calves with young bulls and females, and a few lingering bulls. Photo Chris Hull, SD GFP.

On really successful hunts at the Vore site, the Indians may have killed two to three times that many animals.

About 60% of a carcass would be useable (recoverable muscle meat and organs) with the hide and skeleton accounting for the other 40%. Given our assumptions, that means the yield from a typical herd of 100 buffalo would be about 51,900 pounds of meat (25.95 tons) plus 3 to 4 tons each of marrow bones and hide.

The rest of the carcasses, (15-25% of the total original weight, mostly non-marrow bones) were left behind. These are the remnants archaeologists find and analyze at the Vore site.

Calories Available vs. Required

If a person doesn’t get out of bed or do any physical work, he/she will still “burn” calories as the body performs basic functions like breathing, digesting, pumping blood, thinking and maintaining normal body temperature. This is called “basal metabolism” and it varies according to the size, age and gender of the person in question.

Let’s take a 30-year-old male Indian who is 5’10” tall and weighs 166 pounds. If he did nothing at all, he would still require about 1,790 calories daily to maintain basic life functions. Likewise, a woman of the same age who was 5’5” and 125 pounds would need approximately 1,365 calories per day for maintenance.

 If you add physical activity (exercise), to the energy equation, the caloric requirement increases. Hunting, butchering and processing buffalo is hard work. Using our male Indian from the previous example, if he were completing strenuous work required during the buffalo hunt and its aftermath, his total estimated energy expenditure (TEE) would be between 3,940 to 4,725 calories. The woman in our earlier example would have a TEE value of 3,000 to 3,600 calories daily. Adolescent requirements are similar to adult women. A child (10 years old) would require up to 3,000 calories. These values are what is needed to maintain body weight.

If weight gain was desired or growth in stature was occurring, these values would need to increase by about 500 calories a day! Pregnancy, lactation and other variables can also increase caloric requirements.

So How Much Meat is Required?

The caloric content of meat varies with the tissue and fat content, but according to the US Department of Agriculture lean, raw buffalo meat provides about 496 calories per pound. Cooking lowers the nutritional content slightly, providing about 445 calories per raw pound. Assuming our hypothetical hunter only consumed cooked buffalo meat he would require up to 10.6 pounds daily to meet his TEE calorie recommendation.

A hunter probably wouldn’t carry that much meat with him and couldn’t have consumed it even if it were available. So he’d either have to consume a more calorie-rich food or he’d lose weight fairly quickly. Probably he’d do both in the days leading up to and following the “jump.”

Let’s follow one of the hunters through a hypothetical hunt at the Vore Buffalo Jump.

First, if he participated in gathering the herd, our young man would be sent out several days prior to the “jump” to find and collect a critical mass of bison. It’s likely that he’d be walking fast or running for at least 12 hours per day.

After driving the buffalo over the “jump,” another very strenuous phase would begin immediately. The Indians butchered the bison which involved skinning and cutting them into transportable chunks that were easy to move quickly before the meat spoiled.

They had, perhaps, a 3 to 5 day period to butcher 60 to 300 buffalo. They undoubtedly worked in teams from dawn to dark (at least 9 to 10 hours) per day in late-autumn.

After the kill, hunters had perhaps a 3 to 5 day window to butcher 60 to 300 buffalo. This meant at least 9 to 10 hours of hard work for all, per day. Early peoples poster, ND State Historical Society.

They’d pull a carcass out of the pile, skin it, remove the entrails and internal organs and chop the skeleton and associated muscles apart at the joints.

If they trapped 200 bison in a communal hunt, they’d have to butcher an average of 40 carcasses daily for five days. Perhaps 100 people would be involved in the butchering and they probably worked in teams of four to six persons per carcass at a given time. If they had five people on a team, then each team would need to completely butcher at least two bison a day.

Transporting the tons of meat, bone and hide from the Vore site to a processing camp may well have been the job of adolescents, using dogs with drags (travois) to help. This task would have involved numerous trips into and out of the sinkhole carrying heavy loads and probably many round trips from the jump site to the main camp each day. The camp was probably one to three miles away over broken terrain. This too used a lot of energy by both youth and dogs, with the primary fuel being meat.

Finally, there was the enormous task of processing all of the meat into products that concentrated the nutrients and that would last for at least a few months without refrigeration.

The hides were tanned via an arduous multistep process involving scraping, soaking and stretching of the hide, removal of the hair in most cases, and a treatment with brain tissue to keep the leather soft and pliable. These tasks probably required every able-bodied woman working full time for a couple of weeks.

From the time the small, scattered hunting groups came together for the communal hunt through the jump, butchering and processing phases, it is likely 300 Indians would have been working hard on the endeavor for two to three weeks.

Assuming this group is divided roughly in thirds…1/3 men, 1/3 women and 1/3 children…there would be approximately 100 in each group. Using the TEE values discussed earlier, the communal hunt itself possibly required up to 1.1 million calories daily for the group to maintain its current body weight.

This would amount to nearly 20 million total calories if they were working together for 18 days at this high intensity level. Just that effort would require the equivalent of about 45,000 pounds of cooked buffalo meat. That’s just priming the pump. The meat supply from this and other jumps may have been needed to keep these three hundred folks alive for four months or more in a bad winter.

Activity may not have been so intense and strenuous on a daily basis during the routine of a winter camp, but men may still have walked many miles a day to hunt. If successful, they had to partially butcher the carcass and carry the game home. Women and children still had heavy duty with camp chores.

Also, the environment in which they were living (including extremes of temperature) increased physical stress that could lead to a higher energy requirement.

Let’s not forget the dogs. They were working animals and probably needed several pounds of meat per animal daily as well.

All totaled, it would be surprising if the group and dogs involved in the hunt didn’t require a minimum of 875,000 calories per day (about 1,965 pounds of cooked buffalo meat).

If a hard winter came, as it inevitably would, and the Indians needed to stay close to camp for four months with minimal supplemental hunting, the group and their dogs would have used over 100 million calories (equal to about 240,000 pounds of cooked lean meat or 100 tons!). Recall our estimate that if they killed 100 bison in a hunt at the Vore site, the yield would be about 26 tons of raw meat providing up to 23 million calories!

We’ve answered the first two questions. How much meat was required? Some winters the requirement was 4 to 6 times more than a successful buffalo jump would likely produce. Would there have been a lot of waste? No, the Plains tribes needed large quantities of meat and used what they ac[1]quired as efficiently as possible.

A Nutritional Puzzle

A final interesting question remains: Is an almost totally carnivorous diet healthy and sustainable?

Any one of the three major energy nutrients of our food: carbohydrates, fats and proteins, can be broken down to produce the energy required by our bodies. Fat offers the most energy (9 calories per gram) while carbohydrates and proteins are equal (4 calories per gram).

Carbohydrates are the body’s preferred source of energy. Once carbohydrate stores are depleted the body starts to breakdown stored fat into a usable form of energy. As fat stores become depleted the body begins to breakdown stored protein. The protein is often taken from the muscles where it is stored. When stored protein is used for energy the body begins to make higher levels of ketones and ammonia, which can become toxic.

Proteins are large molecules composed of smaller sub-units called amino acids. The “amine” groups that give these compounds their name contain nitrogen (as –NH2). To use protein for energy, it must first be reduced to amino acids and the amine groups have to be removed. The amines are filtered from the blood via the kidneys and excreted in the form of urea.

Research has shown that low carbohydrate diets supplemented with high fat and protein may lead to reduced vitamin and mineral intakes, increased risk of heart disease, kidney disease, fatty liver and bone loss.

Current nutrition recommendations encourage 45-50% of calories from carbohydrates, 15-20% from protein and 20-25% from fat. This diet composition has been shown to reduce risk of heart disease.

It is clear that Plains Indians could not have functioned as they did exclusively on the lean muscle meat from buffalo. It would not have provided them with adequate carbohydrates, vitamins or minerals. The high protein content would have likely led to intestinal complaints and gout as well.

The tribes did consume some carbohydrates in the form of tubers and roots, and fruit such as berries. These foods provide about 15 grams of carbohydrate (60 calories) per serving. Also, some tribes, like those that lived in earthlodge villages along the Missouri River grew corn, beans, squash, sunflowers, amaranth and other crops, but hunted buffalo and other wild animals as well. Many of the more nomadic Plains tribes are known to have traded with their farming neighbors or relatives, exchanging meat and hides for corn, among other items.

In any case, the over-all diet of the Plains hunters was very low in carbohydrate and fat was used as the primary source of calories. Excavation at the Vore site as well as abundant evidence from other sources support this observation.

Nearly all of the bison bones were broken open so the marrow could be used. The marrow pulp is rich in fat, proteins and calories that could be extracted or rendered from the bones.

The pemmican “sausage” that was used by the Indians as a high-energy food concentrate was a combination of pounded dry muscle meat mixed with a high quantity of fat from the marrow or from around the buffalo organs and, sometimes, dried berries added for flavor, texture, sugar

The Perfect Atkins Diet?

Buffalo steak, just as delicious today as over an ancient campfire. Photo courtesy of National Bison Assoc.

The late Dr. Robert Atkins gained fame for his promotion of a diet that emphasized very low carbohydrate intake and essentially unlimited protein and fat from meat.

Atkins claimed that sugars and starches (the two most common forms of carbohydrate in the American diet) are the primary cause of problems such as obesity and diabetes. Atkin’s theory was that carbohydrates should be minimized, forcing the body to meet its energy requirement from metabolism of fats and proteins.

Historical evidence indicates that many, primarily carnivorous, Indians functioned well and lived relatively long lives. Its interesting to compare a Plains Indian traditional diet that was high in fat and protein and low in carbohydrate to that of current diet recommendations which emphasize low fat and moderate intakes of lean protein and complex carbohydrates.

Today’s dietary recommendations are directed towards preventing chronic disease and achieving longevity while the Plains Indian diet was likely designed for day-to-day survival. Today, food is readily available in most developed countries, reducing the need to store excess energy as fat.

In comparison, the fat consumed by the Plains tribes was able to sustain them during inevitable times of famine. Additionally, energy needs in our current society are likely lower due to reduced physical activity levels.

The traditional high calorie, high fat diets of Plains Indians likely worked because of their high activity level which is an effective means of keeping blood vessels healthy and maintaining a balance between energy intake and expenditure.

Questions remain as to how the traditional Plains Indian diet affected general long-term health and longevity. The answers to these and similar questions are not completely known and need to be researched. Archaeological evidence from the Vore site can contribute to our understanding of such questions.

Related Buffalo Hunting Information from the Author

Plant Foods in Plains Indian Diets

Although Plains Indians ate primarily lean meat, they did supplement their diet with portions of many plant species. Some plant materials were consumed seasonally, others were dried, stored and used year-round. Here’s a partial list:

Tubers and Roots—Arrowhead, yampa, balsam root, scurfpea, wild onion, mariposa/sego Lily, evening primrose;

Stems– some thistles, cattails;

Leaves– Fireweed and many other plants used as “salad”;

Seeds-Sunflower, amaranth, Indian ricegrass;

Fruits-Cactus fruits, strawberries, Oregon grape, buffaloberry, huckleberry, currants, gooseberry, acorns, serviceberry, wild plum, sand cherry, chokecherry, wild rosehips, raspberry, thimbleberry and river grape.

Hundreds of other plant products were used as medicines.

Today’s Buffalo Meat

The nutrient analysis for cooked buffalo meat from one pound raw is: 445 Calories

97.6 grams of protein (87.7% of total calories)

8 grams of fat (16.2% of total calories)

0 grams of carbohydrate

Note: one pound = 454 grams. The unaccounted for mass is primarily water and minerals.

What’s the 2008 market value of a Vore site hunt?

Some representative prices found on the Internet:

Buffalo Meat—Hamburger, one pound = $4.50 to $6.50; Steaks, one pound = $9 to $25 depending on cut; Brats (similar to pemmican), $15 per pound; Buffalo jerky, one pound =$40.

Buffalo Hide Products—Buffalo robes commonly sell now for $900 to $1,500 each, depending on size. Heavy, decorated buffalo hide coats sell for up to $3,500. Fancy gloves = $75 to $150.

 Skulls—Decorated skulls go for $500 to $1,000 each. Mounted trophy bull heads sell for about $2,000 to $2,500 each.

100 buffalo = 26 tons of meat. Assuming an average price of $9 per pound. Total value = $468,000;
100 robes at $1,000 each = $100,000. Decorated skulls and/or mounted heads, 25 at $1,500 each = $37,500.

Very conservatively, products from a moderately successful hunt at the Vore site = $700,000!

Sources:

(italic) Frary, C.D. & Johnson, R.K. (2004). Energy. In Mahan, L.K., Escott-Stump, S. (Eds.), Krause’s Food, Nutrition and Diet Therapy (11th ed.). WB Saunders Company. Philadelphia, PA. pp. 21-36
Harris J, Benedict F.1918. “A Biometric Study of Human Basal Metabolism”. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 4 (12): 370-3.

National Nutrient Data Base for Standard Reference. USDA. Ag. Research Service. http://www.ars.usda/ nutrientdata

Grateful acknowledgement is due several people who reviewed this article and provided specific editorial suggestions. These individuals included Jacqueline Wyatt, Jan Truchot, Muriel and Caitlin Gade and, especially, Sarah L. Francis PhD, MHS, RD.

Gene Gade, the author of many well-researched articles in the Vore Buffalo Jump newsletter took the job as County Extension Agent in Sundance Wyoming many years ago. When the Vore sinkhole literally “fell in their laps” he must have thought to himself from his County Agent vantage position, “‘I know how to do this; I need to help.” And he put in over 20 years as president of the non-profit VBJ Foundation. From his extensive USDA Extension connections he helped to develop and guide the research, education and economic potentials of the Vore site for all those years.

We thank the non-profit Vore Buffalo Jump Foundation for generously allowing us to reprint these educational articles about Buffalo hunting and the Vore site in Wyoming. Donations and comments may be sent to: Vore Buffalo Jump Foundation; 369 Old U.S. 14; Sundance, WY 82729; Tel: (307) 266-9530; Email: info@vorebuffalojump.org

Francie M Berg

Author of the Buffalo Tales &Trails blog

Bison Center Opens in Custer State Park

by | Apr 18, 2023 | Blog

Rapid City Journal Shalom Baer Gee , May 20, 2022 Updated Jun 25, 2022

Custer State Park held the ribbon cutting and grand opening of its new $5 million Bison Center on May 20, 2022. Photo by Matt Gade, Rapid City Journal.

About 100 people gathered on Friday for the grand opening of Custer State Park’s Bison Center, located near the bison corral complex off Wildlife Loop Road.

The barn-style building tells the story of the park’s bison herd through a mixture of interactive and educational exhibits, including samples of an American Bison’s summer coat beside a winter coat.

A timeline of the history of bison, specifically the herd of nearly 1,400 that now live in the park, spans the three walls. The herd started at a mere 36. 

A computer screen features footage of the annual Buffalo Roundup and Auction where the bison are given health checks, vaccinations and some of the herd is auctioned off to maintain a sustainable population at the park. Several full-body bison mounts also adorn the building.

The center was made possible by a $4 million grant from The Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust, $500,000 allocated from the South Dakota Legislature, and an additional $500,000 in private donations raised by the South Dakota Parks and Wildlife Foundation, according to a Custer State Park press release.

Speakers at the event included Lt. Gov. Larry Rhoden; Walter Panzirer, a Trustee for the Helmsley Charitable Trust; Cabinet Secretary of Game, Fish & Parks Kevin Robling; and Custer State Park Superintendent Matt Snyder.

Engaging exhibits tell why the park does a roundup each year and how the bison are managed—from genetic testing, research and range management. Photo by MG, RCJournal.

“I love this park,” said Kevin Robling, Cabinet Secretary of Game, Fish & Parks. “For more than a century, Custer State Park has been known as the state’s crown jewel.

“Today that jewel just got a little bit brighter. We strive to serve and connect people and families to the outdoors, and our vision is to enhance the quality of life for current and future generations, and this facility will do just that.”

Snyder thanked the staff at Game, Fish & Parks in Custer State Park, the state engineer’s office staff, Perspective, Inc. and architectural design studio, Brett Olson and his staff at Mac Construction, Betty Brennan and her staff at Taylor Studios, who designed the interior of the building, and “so many subcontractors who put forth a tremendous effort to see this (happen) quickly.”

“For those who may have been with us last year at the roundup at the end of September (2021), we had a little bit of concrete coming out of the ground, and just a few short months later, look at where we’re standing today. It’s amazing,” Snyder said.

The park’s interpretive programs manager, Lydia Austin, said she and her team worked with the Helmsley Foundation for the building itself, and her team worked together on designing the displays, writing text and photo selection. In the early planning, meetings centered around what type of bison story the new center would tell.

“The bison story is such a huge part of North America. It was hard to take it and reduce it down to our building,” Austin said. “In the end of the conversations, we decided we wanted to tell the story of the Custer State Park herd, how we became a conservation herd, how we still manage our animals. We still protect them for future generations, and we said that was the story we wanted to stick to.”

Small visitor is attracted to a mounted prairie dog and box that speaks. Photo by MG, RCJ.

For many Native American cultures, the bison is a significant cultural and spiritual animal. Austin said the park recognizes this, but chose to focus primarily on Custer State Park’s herd. There is a small section on a poster recognizing the significance of bison to Native Americans, but the center doesn’t include materials elaborating on that. 

“Buffalo are attached to so many stories. Whose story do we tell? Is it our story to tell? In the end, we really decided we’re going to tell Custer State Park’s story. That’s the one we’re comfortable with, and we know we’re telling the correct story,” Austin said. 

A timeline of the history of bison, specifically the herd of nearly 1,400 that now live in the park, spans the three walls. The herd started at a mere 36 from the Scotty Philip herd. Photo by MG, RCJ.

Rhoden spoke at the ribbon cutting. He told the Journal afterwards the center will enhance visitors’ experiences at the buffalo roundup.

A computer screen features footage of the annual Buffalo Roundup and Auction where the bison are given health checks, vaccinations and some of the herd is auctioned off to maintain a sustainable population at the park.

“I think it’s really special because we have tens of thousands of people that come to the roundup. They see the roundup, but they don’t know what’s going on. They don’t know the history behind the buffalo, so this gives them an idea of what it’s all about,” Rhoden said. “The buffalo is such a big part of our culture and heritage in South Dakota that sometimes we tend to forget about it.”

Reprinted with permission from the Rapid City Journal, as reported by Shalom Baer Gee. Photos by Matt Gade, Rapid City Journal.

To the far right on the second photo are the buffalo working chutes and the corral complex—off Wildlife Loop Road— where the new Bison Center is located. Last year at the buffalo roundup only a concrete platform could be seen. Now the new Bison Center is ready for visitors all year long, as well as for the September Roundup. Photos by FM Berg.

For the many hundreds of visitors who come for the Bison Roundup in September and stay for a buffalo dinner and working the smaller herd of bison it may be a long walk to the working chutes. Or if you can easily find your car where you parked on the hills behind where you settled in your lawn chairs, you can drive over to the corrals.

The smaller herd is rounded up and brought in a few days early to familiarize them with the new pasture, which eases them for the stress of being worked and perhaps held too long in the chutes. The larger herd brought in that day on the run needs to calm down a few days before being worked, according to the handlers.

Upcoming events in Custer State Park

 

More Comments on Opening Day

“I think some of the unique features of the Bison Center are, one in particular, is just the timeline of how we got bison in the park, you know from 1913 into the current day. That’s always a neat, unique feature,” said Matt Snyder, Custer State Park Superintendent.

“And then we also have a map here in the park that ever since we started the auction back in the early seventies, of where have all the bison gone that have left Custer State Park to start other herds or to supplement other herds. That’s quite an interesting thing too that people like to see.”

“The Bison Center will be a landmark destination for visitors from across South Dakota and around the world to understand the North American bison’s rich history and learn about Custer State Park’s role in preserving this magnificent animal,” said Walter Panzirer, a Trustee for the Helmsley Charitable Trust. “It has been exciting to be part of the project since inception, and I am honored to see it come to fruition with the ribbon cutting and grand opening.”

Lieutenant Governor Larry Rhoden, spoke at the event announcing that he will introduce legislation next year to make bison, the iconic symbol of the American West the official South Dakota state animal.

Snyder said that the center will add to the annual Custer State Park Buffalo Roundup.“Now, after the Roundup, a lot of people leave. Some will come down and see the crowds and watch the bison get work(ed), but now they have another opportunity to come and stay a little bit longer and see the center,” said Snyder. “I think it’s going to aid in educating the public as to what we are really doing and why are we doing what we’re doing,” he said.

Governor Kristi Noem announced the fund raising campaign during the 2020 Custer Bison Roundup.. She said the Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust had awarded a $4 million grant to SDPWF to construct the Bison Center.

“Achieving this campaign goal”—(of 5 million dollars)—”will require support from private and public partners who share the dream and vision of the Bison Center. Custer State Park has played a key role in bison conservation for over a century,” she said.

“This one-of-a-kind center will allow the park to tell its story and educate future generations on the importance of the bison. I urge you to support the South Dakota Parks and Wildlife Foundation’s 2020-2021 Custer State Park Bison Center fundraising campaign.”

History of Custer State Park

A timeline of history:

Custer State Park is South Dakota’s first and largest state park. Its history dates back to 1897.

Just 8 years after South Dakota joined the union, Congress granted to the state, sections 16 and 36 in every township as school lands. South Dakota had difficulties attempting to administer the scattered blocks of state school lands within the Black Hills timberland.

In 1906, negotiations opened to exchange the scattered lands for a solid block. In 1910, South Dakota relinquished all rights to 60,000+ acres of timberland within the Black Hills Forest Reserve in exchange for nearly 50,000 acres of forest in Custer County and about 12,000 acres in Harding County.

Together, these two parcels were designated Custer State Forest in 1912. After action by the State Legislature, having been prompted by the urgings of “prairie statesman” Governor Peter Norbeck, Custer State Forest became Custer State Park. 

    • 1914: 36 Bison purchased from the Scotty Philip’s herd near Pierre
    • 1916: 12 pronghorn antelope added
    • 1919: On July 1, Custer State Park officially became a state park
    • 1921: C.C. Gideon opened the Game Lodge on August 8, it burned on October 19 and was reopened on June 15
    • 1922: Needles Highway was completed and 8 Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep were introduced
    • 1924: Bison herd totaled 100 animals
    • 1925: Badger Clark completed his cabin “Badger Hole”
    • 1927: President Calvin Coolidge and Mrs. Coolidge spent three months at the Game Lodge, “Summer White House”
    • 1932: The Civilian Conservation Corps completed Iron Mountain Road, connecting State Game Lodge and Mount Rushmore National Monument. The Civilian Conservation Corps completed multiple projects within the park
    • 1941: Construction completed on Mount Rushmore. It began in 1927
    • 1946: Black Hills Playhouse productions began in a tent near Legion Lake
    • 1951: 60 bison purchased from Pine Ridge Indian Reservation herd
    • 1953: President Eisenhower visited State Game Lodge
    • 1961: Visitation reached 1,000,000 people
    • 1966: In February, first live buffalo auction held with 100 animals
    • 1979: The park museum and welcome center, built by the Civilian Conservation Corps, dedicated as Peter Norbeck Visitor Center
    • 1988: Galena Fire, started by lightning, burned 16,002 acres; 1990: Cicero Peak Fire, spark from logging equipment, burned 4,510 acres inside park, 14,203 acres total; 2017: Legion Lake Fire one of the largest wildfires in SD history.
    • 2016: New Visitor Center unveiled
    • 2022: Bison Center Opens near the buffalo working chutes and corral complex

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    NEXT: Blog 83-How much meat could a Buffalo hunter eat?

    Francie M Berg

    Author of the Buffalo Tales &Trails blog

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