Rewind to a few weeks ago, when I was lucky enough receive an invitation to participate in South Dakota Governor Mike Rounds’ 43rd Annual Buffalo Round-up at Custer State Park, easily one of the most exciting adventures of my lifetime. Although it is great fun & games, the real purpose is to keep the park’s free-roaming bison population, which number around 1500 by the summer’s end, on a par with the available grassland forage, which supports only about 1000 bison for the winter. The process begins when the whole herd is driven into the corrals by a handful of expert cowboy and cowgirls on horseback assisted by park rangers in pick-up trucks (and me.) Next the rangers brand, vaccinate, and select about 400 buffalo for the November auction releasing the rest back into the park. The sales revenue helps support this 71,000-acre park, home to one of the world’s largest publicly-owned bison herd park.