The Buffalo is Life: Inside the Symbiotic Relationship Between Bison and Native Communities

The National Museum of Natural History worked with Indigenous experts to spotlight the enduring cultural significance of buffalo in the exhibition “Bison: Standing Strong”

Environmental historian and Indigenous writer Rosalyn LaPier often encounters a common misconception when they collaborate with international colleagues. “People from other parts of the world often think that Americans have all seen bison because they’re the national mammal,” said LaPier, who is a professor at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign. “But many Americans still haven’t seen a bison outside of a zoo.”

This lack of familiarity with bison (which are commonly referred to as buffalo) would have been unimaginable to LaPier’s ancestors, whose entire existence revolved around buffalo. LaPier is a member of the  Blackfeet Nation of Montana and Canada’s Métis people. Both are Great Plains Native communities that revered buffalo and utilized the massive mammals for nearly every aspect of their daily lives including food, clothing and shelter.

The relationship between Native communities and buffalo is a central theme of the National Museum of Natural History’s new exhibition “Bison: Standing Strong,” which opened earlier this month. LaPier and several other Indigenous scholars and representatives worked with the museum as advisors on the new exhibition.

According to LaPier, “Bison: Standing Strong” inspires a new appreciation for the national mammal, whose iconic status often overshadows its ecological and cultural significance. The exhibition features several items created by Native people, including a tool that Native women used to clean bison hides, a painted buffalo scapula that once relayed an important message on the plains and a toy buffalo fashioned in part from the animal’s woolly fur.

The objects attest to the resourcefulness of Native communities on the plains according to Emil Her Many Horses, a museum curator at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian who served as an advisor on the new exhibit. “Lakota and other people on the plains found some use for everything from the buffalo,” said Her Many Horses, who is a member of the Oglala, a subtribe of the Lakota based in South Dakota and northern Nebraska. When referencing the animal, Her Many Horses prefers to use “buffalo” or employ the traditional name “Pte Oyáte (Buffalo Nation).”

In addition to harvesting the bison’s meat, which once dried could be stored for months in rawhide containers, plains communities stripped and tanned bison hides to make clothing and material for the tipi. They then used the sheared fur to stuff pillows. Bison bones were used for tools and play. “Children's sleds were made from strapping together the buffalo’s rib bones.” They also were innovative with body parts that others would have left to rot: they made glue out of the bison’s hooves and thread out of dried muscle fibers.

Buffalo also aided Native communities indirectly through their role as ecosystem engineers, according to LaPier, who recently served as an advisor and on-screen contributor for Ken Burns’s 2023 documentary The American Buffalo. Bison alter their surrounding environments by grazing, producing seed-rich dung and wallowing in the dirt. These behaviors create habitat for other animals and help certain plant species thrive. As a trained ethnobotanist, LaPier studies how these behaviors also benefited nearby human populations, who would harvest the diverse bouquet of vegetation that sprung up in the buffaloes’ wake.

"The Kiowa [Tribe] have a symbiotic relationship with bison. When they thrived, we thrived."
— Amanda Hill, director of the Tribal Historic Preservation Office of the Kiowa Tribe of Oklahoma

In appreciation for everything bison provided, Native cultures viewed bison with reverence and many groups considered the animals to be spiritual relatives. “I think that Indigenous people almost always view the natural world through a religious lens,” LaPier said.

Her Many Horses agrees and mentions that buffalo played central roles in the oral histories of these groups. For example, one Lakota origin story features the arrival of a white buffalo woman who brings a sacred pipe which evolves into the seven sacred ceremonies of the Lakota. As the woman leaves, she morphs into a white buffalo.

The resilience of bison and the Native peoples that relied on them was tested during the late 1800s. In an effort to undermine Native cultures, soldiers and professional hunters armed with high-powered rifles killed bison indiscriminately, removing the most important source of food and spiritual nourishment from the plains. Within just a decade, the bison population plummeted from tens of millions to hundreds.

The disappearance of bison was disastrous for Indigenous people, said Amanda Hill, director of the Tribal Historic Preservation Office of the Kiowa Tribe of Oklahoma. The Kiowa’s existence relied heavily upon the physical and spiritual sustenance provided by the bison. “Buffalo is the center of our spirituality and was necessary to complete our annual Sundance as well as our healing ceremonies,” said Hill. “Every part of the animal was used to feed the people and produce tools and materials used in our cultural lives. They fueled our fires, covered our lodges, and paved trails across the continent for nomadic Plains tribes, including the Kiowa. The bison provided for the People.”

In recent years, Native communities across the Great Plains have attempted to fill this century-long gap by bringing herds of bison back onto their land. According to LaPier, returning the bison to the prairie is a long process and many herds are still carefully managed and fenced in. But the goal is for these bison to one day roam free like their ancestors, restoring patches of prairie as they graze and stomp about. 

The return of bison to these Native communities also means that the next generation of Blackfeet, Oglala and Kiowa must be re-introduced to the animals that sustained their ancestors for thousands of years. According to LaPier, this entails reintroducing young people to eating bison meat and understanding how buffalo shape the landscape. Thankfully, they seem to already have a familiarity with buffalo.

“Today, when you talk to most kids on the reservation, almost all of them have experienced something related to bison, whereas when I was growing up, it was pretty much not at all,” LaPier said.

This growing understanding is fantastic news to Hill, who hopes visitors to the new exhibition will appreciate that buffalo are irreplaceable to the people on the Great Plains. “I want the world to understand that the Kiowa have a symbiotic relationship with bison,” she said. “When they thrived, we thrived and when they were decimated, we were decimated.

“And it is our hope that in their revitalization lies our revitalization as well.”

Jack Tamisiea | | Read More

Jack Tamisiea is a Science Communications Specialist at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History. In addition to covering all things natural history for the museum's blog, Smithsonian Voices, he tracks media coverage and coordinates filming activities for the museum's Office of Communications and Public Affairs. Jack recently completed his masters in science writing at Johns Hopkins University and his writing has appeared in the New York Times, Scientific American, National Geographic and other science-focused publications. In his free time, he loves exploring the outdoors with a sketchbook and camera. You can read more of Jack's work at https://jacktamisiea.com.