BULL HOLLOW, Oklahoma, USA — Ryan Mackey quietly sang a sacred Cherokee verse as he pulled a handful of tobacco from a resealable bag. Reaching his arms over a barbed wire fence, he scattered the leaves over the grass where a herd of bison grazed in northeastern Oklahoma.
The offering represented a respectful act of gratitude, the 45-year-old explained, and a desire to forge a divine connection with the animals, their ancestors and the Creator.
“When tobacco is used the right way, it’s almost like you make a contract with the spirit, the spirit of our Creator, the spirit of these bison,” Mackey said as a strong wind blew across the grassy field. “They say everything has a spiritual aspect. Just like this wind, we can feel it in our hands, but we cannot see it.”
Decades after the last bison disappeared from their lands, the Cherokee Nation is now part of a nationwide resurgence of indigenous people trying to reconnect with the hunchbacked, hairy animals—popularly known as American buffalo—that hold a crucial place in traditions. and centuries-old beliefs.
Since 1992, the InterTribal Buffalo Council, a federally chartered entity, has helped relocate surplus bison from places such as Badlands National Park in South Dakota; Yellowstone National Park, in Wyoming; and Grand Canyon National Park, in Arizona, to 82 tribes in 20 states.
“Collectively, those tribes care for more than 20,000 buffalo on tribal lands,” said Troy Heinert, a member of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe who serves as executive director of the InterTribal Buffalo Council, based in Rapid City, South Dakota. . “Our goal and mission is to recover buffalo in Indian Country because of that cultural and spiritual connection that Indigenous people have with the buffalo.”
Centuries ago, an estimated 30 to 60 million bison roamed the Great Plains of North America, from Canada to Texas. But by 1900, European colonizers practically pushed the species to the brink of extinction, hunting them en masse for their prized fur and often leaving their carcasses to rot on the prairie.
“It is important to recognize the history that native peoples had with the buffalo and how the buffalo was practically decimated… Now, with the resurgence of the buffalo, often led by native nations, we are also seeing that spiritual and cultural awakening that comes hand in hand with him,” said Heinert, who is a South Dakota state senator.
Historically, indigenous people hunted and used all parts of the bison: for food, clothing, tools, and ceremonial reasons. But they did not consider the bison as a mere product, but as beings closely linked to people.
“Many tribes considered them like family,” Heinert noted. “You can see that in the ceremonies, the language and the songs.”
Rosalyn LaPier, an Indigenous writer and scholar who grew up on the Blackfeet Nation reservation in Montana, said there are different mythological stories about the origin of the bison among the various peoples of the Great Plains.
“Depending on which indigenous group you talk to, the bison emerged from the supernatural realm and ended up on Earth for humans to exploit,” said LaPier, an environmental historian and ethnobotanist at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign campus.
“And there’s usually some kind of story about how humans were taught to hunt bison, kill bison and slaughter them,” he added.
His Blackfeet tribe, for example, believes that there are three kingdoms: the heavenly world, the world below—that is, the Earth—and the underwater world. Tribal tradition, LaPier says, states that the Blackfeet were vegetarians until an orphaned bison escaped from the underwater world in human form and was adopted by two loving humans. As a result, the divine leader of the underwater bison allowed more to come to Earth to be hunted and eaten.
In Oklahoma, the Cherokee Nation, which with 437,000 registered members is one of the largest native tribes in North America, had a few bison on its land in the 1970s. But they disappeared.
It wasn’t until 40 years later that the tribe’s contemporary herd emerged, when a huge cattle truck driven by Heinert arrived in the fall of 2014 with 38 bison from Badlands National Park. He was welcomed with prayers and emotional songs by the tribe.
“I still remember the dew that covered the grass and the songs of the birds that were in the trees… That day I could feel the hope and pride in the Cherokee people,” Heinert said.
Since then, births and the arrival of more bison from various places have increased the population to about 215 individuals. The herd roams a 500-acre (2-square-kilometer) pasture in Bull Hollow, an unincorporated area of Delaware County located about 70 miles (113 kilometers) northeast of Tulsa, near the small town of Kenwood.
For now, the Cherokee are not slaughtering the animals, whose males can weigh up to 900 kilograms (2,000 pounds) and stand nearly 2 meters (more than 6 feet) tall, as leaders focus on growing the herd. But in the future, bison, a lean protein, could be used as a food source for Cherokee schools and nutrition centers, said Bryan Warner, the tribe’s deputy chief.
“Our hope is not just for the sake of food sovereignty, but to really reconnect our citizens to the spiritual path,” said Warner, a member of the United Methodist Church.
The reconnection leads in turn to discussions about other fauna, he added, from rabbits and turtles to quail and pigeons.
“All these animals… put you more in tune with nature,” he said, as some bison walked through a nearby pond. “And then it basically puts you more in tune with yourself, because we all come from the same clay that these animals are made of… from our Creator.”
The Cherokee, originally from the southeastern United States, were forced to relocate to present-day Oklahoma in 1838 after gold was discovered on their ancestral lands. The 1,600-kilometer (1,000-mile) journey was known as the Trail of Tears and claimed nearly 4,000 lives due to disease and difficult travel conditions.
Although bison are more associated with Great Plains tribes than those native to the East Coast, the Cherokee newcomers had a connection to a slightly smaller subspecies, according to Mackey. The animals currently on the tribe’s lands are not direct descendants, he explained, but rather close cousins with whom the tribe can have a spiritual bond.
“We don’t speak the same language as the bison,” Mackey said. “But when you sit with them and spend time with them, relationships can develop over… other means than just language: sharing experiences, sharing the same space and just having a sense of respect. Your body language changes when you have respect for someone or something.”
Mackey grew up with Pentecostal roots on his father’s side and Baptists on his mother’s side. He occasionally attends church, but finds much greater meaning in Cherokee ceremonial practices.
“Even if (tribal members) are raised in church or synagogue or wherever they choose to pray, their ancestors are Cherokee ancestors,” he said. “And this idea of relationship, respect and guard with the soil, with the Earth, with everything that resides in it, passes from generation to generation. “It still permeates our identity as a Cherokee people.”
That’s why he believes the return of the bison to Cherokee lands is so important.
“Bison are not just meat,” he said. “They represent abundance, health and strength.”
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