00:00:00.000Hello and welcome to For the Wild podcast. I'm Ayanna Young. Today we are speaking with Jason Baldez.
00:00:10.740Buffalo existed from the west coast nearly all the way to the east coast to Florida,
00:00:18.160from Mexico to the Arctic, from sea level to 13,000 feet in elevation.
00:00:23.720There really is not a place on this continent where buffalo doesn't belong.
00:00:28.900And if we can continue to restore buffalo to its rightful places, those places are also going to heal.
00:00:38.440Jason, an enrolled member of the Eastern Shoshone Tribe, received both his bachelor's and master's degree in land resources and environmental sciences from Montana State University,
00:00:49.260where he focused on the restoration of buffalo bison to tribal lands.
00:00:53.940In 2016, he spearheaded the successful effort to relocate a herd to the Wind River Indian
00:00:59.480Reservation and worked with both the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho tribes in buffalo
00:01:06.940He is an advocate, educator, and speaker on indigenous cultural revitalization and ecological
00:01:12.300restoration, who has also served as director of the Wind River Native Advocacy Center,
00:01:17.880where he was instrumental in the passing of the Wyoming Indian Education for All Act.
00:01:23.340He currently splits time as executive director of the Wind River Tribal Buffalo Initiative, the Tribal Buffalo Program Senior Manager for the National Wildlife Federation's Tribal Partnerships Program.
00:01:35.400Jason sits on the board of directors of the Inter-Tribal Buffalo Council and the board of trustees for the Conservation Lands Foundation.
00:01:46.060Well, hello, Jason. Thank you so much for joining us today.
00:09:39.580You know, we can restore that cultural, spiritual, educational and academic and nutritional
00:09:45.660reconnection that's so important in our communities today.
00:09:49.780Yeah, thank you so much for taking us through some of those points. And I would like to talk a bit more about the complexities of conservation and land rematriation and fee title. And maybe even in your response, you could speak to how people can support that effort.
00:10:09.640Sure. We have to think pretty deliberately about what was imposed on Native people.0.88
00:10:19.540You know, for the tribes, not only the two here on the Wind River Reservation, but others regionally and across the country,
00:10:27.760there's a foundational understanding and interconnectedness and interrelatedness.
00:10:32.620the importance of wolves and bears, for instance, is a demonstration of the tribes working to
00:10:42.760protect that animal is because we understand that they have an important role to play.
00:10:49.320That's a holistic or an ecological worldview. And what was imposed upon us was really this model of
00:10:57.660exploitation or progress that's based in the idea of manifest destiny, that these things that are
00:11:08.560here are for the benefit of man. And for much of the country, which has been plowed up or paved
00:11:16.780over, fenced in, fenced out, it's disrupted the interconnectedness and the interrelatedness of
00:11:23.560many species, the corridors, the populations of wildlife, the wildland urban interface,
00:11:32.420even how fire is used, all have come from this colonial worldview. And so this colonial worldview
00:11:42.840is where we base agriculture, how we have created policies like the prior appropriation
00:11:54.780doctrine about how water is used, the use it or lose it philosophy. That's not a very holistic
00:12:01.780model. It's about exploitation of the resource for the benefit and monetary gain or commodification
00:12:11.200for man. If we think about how we bridge Western science and indigenous science,
00:12:18.740it brings in these ideas of interconnectedness and interrelatedness.
00:12:24.900And that's why oftentimes conservation is aligned with indigenous values and belief systems,
00:12:32.620because it's really to restore the ecological balance that was here prior to lands and
00:12:42.080communities being colonized. So we're in an era today where we can focus on cultural revitalization,
00:12:51.700language preservation. We can think differently about how lands are utilized,
00:12:57.460the importance of buffalo or bison reintegrated into the communities for the healing that needs
00:13:06.520to take place. This is going to create a better future for our young people. And if we look at
00:13:12.940reservations, because of that General Allotment Act, many of our reservations are checkerboarded
00:13:19.580with jurisdiction from the fee title land to the allotted lands to tribal land,
00:13:26.520even states that are assuming jurisdiction on many of those fee lands on reservations.
00:13:32.840Our reservations were created to maintain a way of life. And that way of life was disrupted with
00:13:40.860the extermination of the buffalo when we became reliant upon the federal government for rations.
00:13:46.720And then there was the boarding school era where our grandmas and grandpas were forced from their homes to go to schools, where colonization and even indoctrination was, you know, very influential on our people.
00:14:02.900So that's part of the intergenerational trauma that we're trying to heal.
00:14:07.180And as we bring buffalo back and get them into ceremonies and we get them back into the diet, that's all part of our healing, which is very important.
00:14:17.160And the Wind River Tribal Buffalo Initiative was established so that we could not only raise money to acquire more land, but also facilitate the cultural, educational, nutritional reconnection of youth and community to buffalo.
00:14:36.040So for instance, next week, we have a three-day youth camp taking place out here at the Buffalo
00:14:40.680so that our elementary and middle school and high schoolers are learning about our efforts
00:14:46.520to protect fisheries and water, our wildlife and Buffalo, and ensuring that our young people
00:14:54.520are very knowledgeable and grounded in that relationship, those relationships, so that
00:15:01.800we are creating better leaders for the future. And so the Wind River Tribal Buffalo Initiative
00:15:08.040was set up to help facilitate that. You can go to the website, www.windriverbuffalo.org.
00:15:17.800We have a donate button on that webpage, but you can also learn about the effort,
00:15:22.820learn about the history of the two tribes here on this reservation, as well as see some videos and
00:15:28.800and some articles concerning or related to Buffalo restoration.
00:15:58.800I want to talk a little bit more about the differences between buffalo and cattle because
00:16:10.980I think a lot of people associate buffalo with cattle thinking that they take up the same role
00:16:16.860in an ecosystem. But as you know, they're actually quite different. So could you explain
00:16:22.300the varying roles that they have? Yeah. Well, first off, cattle came from Europe and cattle
00:16:29.440brought a lot of diseases that infected the wildlife. You hear a lot about brucellosis.
00:16:36.180We hear less about malignant cataral fever and mycoplasma bovis. These are livestock diseases0.64
00:16:44.740that are fatal to buffalo, but more often than not, we hear about this brucellosis argument and
00:16:50.840it is really unfounded. We've been able to mitigate that disease to ensure that animals
00:16:57.520can be certified as disease-free and ensure that those genetics are supplementing some of our other
00:17:04.740herds. And so disease often is one that you hear about between cattle and buffalo. But just to make
00:17:12.580that clarification is important. Buffalo, bison, I use that term interchangeably. Buffalo is a common
00:17:23.940term amongst tribal communities. Of course, the scientists argue that bison is the correct term,1.00
00:17:29.940but the correct term for us is the language, is the name in our languages. And so there's
00:17:37.400300 plus, 330 plus languages indigenous to this continent. And so buffalo bison,
00:17:45.860they cannot be replaced on the landscape by cattle. Buffalo have unique grazing
00:17:53.600characteristics. Their physiological behavioral adaptations make them beneficial to the landscape.
00:18:00.880They will do patchwork grazing where they graze heavily in certain areas and leave adjacent
00:18:07.060patches of grass completely left alone. This creates microhabitats for other organisms,
00:18:14.060but it also keeps the soils from drying out. The same area that cattle would use,
00:18:21.260they would graze it down and expose the soil and dry it out. Buffalo will also
00:18:29.220graze on the grasses. They're primarily graminoid feeders, and that's why you have an increase
00:18:35.460in biodiversity of plants is because they focus on the grasses and leave the forbs.
00:18:42.200They have the ability to control their metabolism, to slow it down, so they can rely on less
00:18:48.800favorable forage when needed. Buffalo are also drought tolerant. They need less water than
00:18:55.480cattle. And buffalo won't congregate in riparian areas. They will go down and take a drink and
00:19:02.620then they'll move. They actually move about three miles per day if they have the landscape
00:19:09.040available to them. A buffalo has 22,000 hairs per square inch compared to about 7,000 hairs for a
00:19:19.180cow. So a buffalo can withstand extreme temperatures, cold temperatures, because of
00:19:26.700the hair and the fur that they put on. In the springtime, when they lose that hair,
00:19:33.020it becomes available to many other organisms that need it for their nests. Certain birds
00:19:39.060need buffalo hair for their eggs to reach the right incubation temperature. You don't get that
00:19:44.500with cattle. That hair gets carried down into the ground by mammals. It changes the soil chemistry.0.93
00:19:51.900Buffalo also have this unique behavior where they wallow, creating these depressions on the landscape that's important for seed dispersal, but also water accumulation and groundwater recharge.
00:20:08.560These wallows become microhabitats to reptiles, amphibians, insects.
00:20:17.920And so as it rains and snows, these wallows fill with water.
00:20:23.020And so that's important for the animals, but it's also important for the soils.
00:20:30.240You know, they just have a whole host of things that make them beneficial on the land.
00:20:36.280Cattle cannot replace the hair, cannot replace their grazing style on the landscape.
00:20:42.760And so that argument really doesn't hold up anymore because we know and can see and witness the influence that bison or buffalo have on the landscape that you just don't see it with cattle.
00:21:00.220Actually, with cattle, you have a decrease in plant and animal biodiversity because they don't provide those things that I've just mentioned.
00:21:08.100Mm-hmm. Yeah. I really enjoy hearing the specific examples of how they work as ecosystem
00:21:16.020engineers. It's really incredible. And there's a quote from migrating bison engineer, the green
00:21:23.940wave from the National Academy of Science, where scientists explain that, quote, prior to European
00:21:29.260settlement, 28 to 30 million planes bison roam North America, migrating in vast groups across
00:21:36.160immense latitudinal and elevational gradients. Overhunting virtually eliminated North American
00:21:42.040bison such that by 1900, only a few hundred remained, 26. Today, bison occupy less than
00:21:49.0801% of their historic range. A remnant population of up to 5,500 animals in Yellowstone National
00:21:55.900Park, which still migrate up to 100 kilometers, is the last truly migratory herd, end quote.
00:22:02.400Yeah. So I'm wondering, how does the current American landscape reflect the deep influence of buffalo in the past? And what are we losing in their absence?
00:22:14.940Well, you know, I focused my undergraduate and graduate degrees around tribal buffalo restoration. And for my thesis, it took me some time to come up with, but I recall seeing, you know, my dad pointing out these relic wallows growing up as a kid when we were hunting in the northern boundary of our reservation, hunting elk and deer and antelope.
00:22:39.940But he would point out these depressions that were on the land that they were made by buffalo.
00:22:47.360Even though buffalo haven't been there for over 140 years, there is still these depressions that these buffalo created.
00:22:57.420and so digging in the literature I found some articles about cultural plants foods tools and
00:23:06.080medicines that were associated with relic wallows in the tall grass prairie further east and there
00:23:14.240was very little in the literature about high elevation desert plants cultural plants that
00:23:20.420were associated with wallows. And so that kind of became my research project was
00:23:27.300going out in the northern boundary of the reservation and measuring
00:23:32.380cultural plant biodiversity within these relic wallows and comparing that to the plant biodiversity
00:23:40.240outside of the relic wallows, suggesting that, you know, maybe these relic wallows still serve
00:23:46.860a purpose in the abundance of these plants. And so I measured plant biodiversity on 75 wallows
00:23:57.480that randomly sampled from over 100 to measure that. And so the data suggested that there is
00:24:06.940several plants that still benefit from the presence of these wallows as opposed to them
00:24:12.480not being there, suggesting that these relic wallows do serve a purpose in cultural plant
00:24:18.200biodiversity in a high elevation desert ecosystem like we have here. You know, when there were 28
00:24:25.400to 30 million, that's actually a conservative estimate. We think that there could have likely
00:24:30.780been 60 million buffalo across the continent. That if there were millions of buffalo, that
00:24:38.040there would have been equally millions of these wallows. And that would have been very important
00:24:43.920for the water accumulation, for the microhabitats, what the buffalo did for biodiversity. Now being
00:24:52.6801% or less than 1% on their former range, we obviously lack those wallows. And you get up in
00:25:01.680the air on an airplane and you fly east and you look down on the ground, it's carved up into
00:25:09.000squares and circles that is evidence of that idea of progress or manifest destiny that all of the
00:25:19.540land is here for man's benefit. There is few places where there is still intact migratory
00:25:27.380pathways for ungulates to utilize, water bodies that the migrating birds can use. We see a
00:25:39.380decrease in biodiversity of birds and amphibians across the world. Globalization has really
00:25:48.080influenced the animal kingdom. And when you have millions of buffalo, you would have also had
00:25:57.300you know, a 10% die-off rate that would have really been important for the soil.
00:26:06.040As these buffalo died, were predated upon, or other species utilized as carrion, you know,
00:26:15.820these buffalo bodies would have disintegrated and provided extensive nutrients to the soil.
00:26:23.140most of these lands now are being, are turned into monocultures. They're also inoculated or
00:26:31.440fertilized with synthetic fertilizers and pesticides and insecticides. And so there's
00:26:39.600just a, you know, a lot of people don't think about the Dust Bowl as also being a result of0.94
00:26:45.620the extermination of the buffalo, because if the buffalo was gone, then it made way for these
00:26:51.800people coming in to utilize those lands for agriculture. These were grasslands that were
00:26:58.120millions of years old and had been formed over that period of time from the presence of Buffalo.
00:27:05.140And that was all, you know, drastically disrupted with westward expansion and colonization. So,
00:27:13.320you know, the landscape is obviously much different today than it was prior to European arrival.
00:27:19.360And so we're not going to see 30 to 60 million buffalo in our lifetime, but there is plenty of opportunity to restore buffalo to specific landscapes where they can exist and effectively create the ecological change that we need to see.
00:27:39.040but we have to reprioritize or question what our motive is as a society. Most of it, again,
00:27:47.280is based on exploitation or commodification or what you can gain monetarily. For us as tribes,
00:27:55.100it's much more about the interconnectedness and the interrelatedness, the holistic,
00:28:01.160reciprocal relationship that we have with our food and our water and our land.
00:28:07.320And so, you know, the hope is that, you know, what we do here on the Wind River Reservation for Buffalo restoration, that there's going to be some lessons learned there that we can apply to other areas, other public lands that belong to all Americans, where we can think differently about what we want to see for our future.
00:28:30.280what we want to put back that was taken from us and do some restorative justice for the Buffalo,
00:28:40.240but also the people that depended upon them. And also now that it's, you know, widely recognized,
00:28:48.340you know, with media like the Ken Burns American Buffalo film with some of the issues around
00:28:54.780Yellowstone, that the American people are gaining access to a little bit more knowledge
00:29:00.280and taking that energy and supporting efforts like what we're doing here at Wynn River to
00:29:08.700reacquire land for buffalo habitat, but also restore this buffalo protected as a wildlife
00:29:18.280And that's going to be able to maybe give us a little bit of hope or give a hope for
00:29:24.020our young people for the future that it's not as colonial as it once was and that we can actually
00:29:32.060exercise our sovereignty and self-determination to create the change that we want to see.
00:29:40.100Yeah, I'm really grateful for all your work and excited to see the shift and really kind of
00:29:48.260sitting with the complicated place that Buffalo has lived within the quote American imaginations,
00:29:57.920you know, because they have represented both this odd colonial idea of freedom, you know,
00:30:03.820thinking of the wide open plains and the land where the Buffalo roam, but also something to
00:30:10.240be controlled. So I'm just holding that complexity of the belief system around Buffalo and who gets
00:30:20.620control of them and why, but also maintaining this idea of manifest destiny and the open lands
00:30:28.980of the American West. And I can only imagine that these ideologies continue to try and control and
00:30:39.160manipulate the way that bison get reintroduced and yeah who gets to control the fate and the
00:30:46.360future of them yeah the the western paradigm is is like you say much about control and
00:30:56.080you can look at cattle as an example of that i believe that you know any intelligence that
00:31:04.180cattle once had was bred out of them so that they could be easier to handle by human beings.
00:31:12.420They became reliant upon human beings for, you know, for feeding themselves, for even calving.
00:31:21.720A buffalo doesn't need our help. The buffalo does just fine on its own if it has food and water
00:31:28.220and each other as a herd animal. And so, you know, I think actually buffalo are easier than cattle
00:31:36.440because they don't need as much care. Not that we're trying to, you know, ranch buffalo,
00:31:43.720but we had to start small in order to grow for them to exist. And so there is a relationship
00:31:51.900there. I go out and I see the buffalo every day. They're used to seeing me on the side by side,
00:31:57.960but they are not in any way domesticated. These animals can exist without me being there or
00:32:07.660checking up on them or doing anything because they are very intelligent. You know, they're just
00:32:14.300conscious of their surroundings. They know what's going on. There's a millennia old relationship
00:32:20.640there that native people had, it's in our DNA, that the buffalo have, it's in their DNA,
00:32:29.240and that's that reciprocal relationship. We aren't trying to domesticate buffalo,
00:32:36.240but they are well used to seeing me and others. They're visiting them. They know what's going on,
00:32:44.940But it's not like they're a pet or it's not like they're domesticated.
00:32:52.100You know, this is a seed population of various genetics.
00:32:58.420Our herd comes from six different sources of conservation genetics.
00:33:03.720And once they have a large enough land base to roam around on, they will distance themselves from human beings like any other animal would.
00:33:14.940And so I think people get confused a bit because buffalo exists in the world as livestock,
00:33:23.600but it also exists in the world as wildlife.
00:33:27.840And it's really up to us as human beings to kind of dictate what kind of scenario we want
00:33:37.660And that makes them unique in that, you know, we don't do that with elk or deer or moose
00:33:43.160or bighorn sheep or pronghorn antelope. Those are wildlife. Buffalo has this interesting
00:33:50.300way about itself that allows that relationship. And I really truly believe that's because of the
00:34:00.380genetic memory between buffalo and the native people. And I think that's why people get into
00:34:07.100bison ranching is because the buffalo is this iconic species, this magnificent being, this
00:34:16.860great beast of an animal. But it really is up to us as human beings to take care of that buffalo
00:34:27.140the way that it used to take care of us. And that's why I'm very focused on ensuring that
00:34:33.500they can be protected as wildlife and exist as such on this reservation. Because growing up with
00:34:40.200my biologist father, he helped to instill the way buffalo should be treated. And that is like
00:34:48.320those other species. And so it's very important that we continue to move in that direction,
00:34:55.460in that paradigm shift. Yeah. And going back to some of what you were speaking to around
00:35:03.740the restoration and even comparing the domestication of cattle and buffalo,
00:35:11.360I'm wondering when we allow buffalo to roam freely rather than keeping them contained,
00:35:17.300how does their migration impact the environment? Well, like you mentioned that green wave,
00:35:23.480you know buffalo uh would would follow that and enhance it as the seasonal vegetation cover changes
00:35:33.560throughout the growing season i know buffalo will move about three miles a day they you know do
00:35:41.480their wallowing they don't have to go to water sources as often as cattle do they will have
00:35:48.380you know, birds following them. We, you know, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has0.93
00:35:53.760listed the ferruginous hawk, the mountain plover, and the burrowing owl as species of concern. And
00:36:02.120we noticed that those species come back, along with many others, when buffalo are restored.
00:36:10.920And so, you know, as we put buffalo back on the landscape and they can grow in population,
00:36:16.040we can anticipate seeing an increase in birds, insects, even mammals over time and the plant
00:36:26.740community change over time because of their selective grazing. They're pollinating when
00:36:33.000they walk with their beards. They spread seed when they wallow. And so you would see the formation
00:36:41.140of these wallows even and trail systems, you know, buffalo doesn't know where to go until it learns
00:36:49.120that, you know, buffalo doesn't just instinctively have, you know, an urge to, to, you know, get out
00:36:56.980and go to Yellowstone, which I've actually heard before. They have to learn what's available to
00:37:04.300them and then they utilize that. And that's why when we started on 300 acres, you know, those
00:37:10.460animals learned that 300 acres. We've now grown to 2,000 acres. The buffalo have learned where
00:37:17.260they can go and get water and eat specific plants in that 2,000 acres. It's no different
00:37:23.340when we expand their habitat. They're going to go and they're going to find out what the
00:37:29.680perimeter is and they're going to learn what's available to them. They have a homing instinct
00:37:35.020and so there's been over 40 calves born on this ground where we started and so this is going to
00:37:42.040always be a place that those buffalo will return to and that's something that I've come to learn
00:37:48.520and understand as I've spent more time with buffalo is that they have those behavioral
00:37:54.300characteristics that are innate and and once they learn what they know and what they can have access
00:38:02.380to, that's what they use. And so just learning from them and watching has been really beneficial
00:38:10.160and it's been part of my healing as well to be able to spend time with buffalo and get them
00:38:16.800into the ceremonies and being able to eat buffalo more regularly. It's certainly part of my healing,
00:38:24.380my family uh and and community members that now have access to to buffalo in the diet and that's
00:38:32.540only going to increase as we build our population and ensure these animals can exist here protected
00:38:39.240as as wildlife yeah thank you for sharing about that and i was reading from the wind river tribal
00:38:50.360Buffalo Initiative. And it says, quote, Buffalo back on the Wind River Reservation signifies
00:38:55.960change, a return to the beliefs and values held by our grandmas and grandpas. We are helping them
00:39:02.020so they can once again help us. They are here once again for our nutrition, ceremony, and tradition.
00:39:09.080The buffalo have been absent from our lives for over 130 years, but the teachings are not forgotten.
00:39:15.320end quote. I would just love to hear more about how does connection to these modern buffalo also
00:39:23.780bring about connection to past generations? It certainly does. You know, our ceremonies
00:39:32.140were outlawed up until 1978 with the American Indian Religious Freedom Act.
00:39:39.080And fortunately for our tribes here, we were able to keep secret the songs, the ceremonies, the rituals, the protocols, the practices, despite it being illegal for many decades.
00:39:56.320And so, you know, not all tribes can lay claim to that.
00:40:01.000Many tribes lost their languages. Many tribes lost their ceremonies. Many tribes lost semblance of who they were.
00:40:11.340Fortunately for many of the tribes out west, because of the period of time, we were able to hold on to these things.
00:40:20.600And so as we restore that buffalo to ceremonies, as we provide it again, a relationship again, there is the feeling that our ancestors' prayers are being answered, that there were our grandmas and grandpas who were praying for what we're seeing happen now.
00:40:46.900and so we feel their presence we don't we don't believe that they're gone we believe that that
00:40:55.540our ancestors are still here with us and so that part of the healing the songs that can be sung
00:41:03.800again in ceremony you know that is the the result i think of of many many people's prayers before us
00:41:15.300coming to fruition in front of our eyes you know today so i i certainly do believe that
00:41:21.620that our grandmas and grandpas are still with us and it's it's the spirit of the buffalo it's the
00:41:28.760the spirit of of our people before us that are helping to ensure that this relationship
00:41:37.080this identity of our people can remain
00:42:11.660another thing from the wind river tribal buffalo initiative which writes quotes we need healing
00:42:20.360the evidence of loss of connection manifests as addiction trauma and unhealthy behaviors that is
00:42:26.380not of our traditional belief systems there is potential for healing and recovery from addiction
00:42:32.400or trauma and finding inspiration from buffalo and a reconnection to mother earth and our relatives
00:42:38.000found in nature. And I've read you say, quote, we offer visits to the buffalo herds for individual
00:42:44.440and groups in recovery. And love to hear if you have any stories to share about these programs
00:42:52.920that you support or anything that brings you the hope that you've seen.
00:42:59.000You know, we have the social dilemma of our circumstances in our communities is challenging.
00:43:10.140You know, we have, I think, 12-year lower life expectancy than the national average.
00:43:16.280We have high suicide rates, high high school dropout rates, and other problems that is directly attributable to the intergenerational trauma.
00:43:29.860a lot of people turn to alcohol, substance abuse, even gambling as a coping mechanism to deal with
00:43:40.840that trauma. And that isn't healthy for us. It's not good for us. It's not
00:43:48.360ensuring that our people have a foundation to grow from.
00:43:54.340And even my own struggles with alcohol, I've got over five years of sobriety now that I found my help in Buffalo.
00:44:09.880I found my help in returning to ceremony and really, you know, submersing myself in this work to help the Buffalo, to help, you know, myself.
00:44:24.340to help my family, my community from many of these issues that we all face
00:44:29.860that touch all of our families in some way or another.
00:44:35.640And if we look across the country at other tribes and the things that they're doing,
00:44:43.420for instance, the Intertribal Buffalo Council now has a membership of 82 or 83 tribes
00:44:50.680restoring buffalo for the cultural and spiritual importance. It's very similar. It's also
00:44:58.260restoring ancestral foods, eating healthier, thinking more holistically about how we treat
00:45:06.980our bodies, what we're ingesting, how we treat each other, a holistic medicine wheel approach to
00:45:15.060thinking about our growth and development as human beings. That medicine wheel philosophy
00:45:21.680is integrated into everything that we do. And it's a very big part of our healing.
00:45:32.080And Buffalo are really foundational to that. And I don't really know how to describe it
00:45:39.000other than it's in our ceremonies, it's in the lessons that we learn as we transcend the four
00:45:48.320hills of life from baby youth to adult to elder. It's in the balance that we find mentally,
00:45:55.520physically, spiritually, and emotionally. That medicine wheel is kind of the paradigm,
00:46:02.480is the worldview that our grandmas and grandpas had. And that's what we're trying to
00:46:08.720help our people with in finding their own healing. And when you find balance mentally,
00:46:15.660physically, spiritually, emotionally, and you can integrate that medicine wheel thinking and
00:46:22.000belief system into your everyday life, well, that is part of restoring what was taken from us.
00:46:32.020and that's foundational to our healing whether it's moving away from alcohol
00:46:38.780or or substance abuse or any kind of addiction that that we may have or carry and so you know
00:46:47.240healing myself and finding sobriety and recovery was because of buffalo because of the the work
00:46:56.240or the platform that it allowed me to work from.
00:47:00.020And I wanted to be able to share that with anyone else that can relate,