Back to Nature and Ready for Guests in the Great Plains – The American Prairie Foundation

The American Prairie Foundation http://www.americanprairie.org/ , a group dedicated to creating prairie wildlife reserves, has been buying up land in Montana and reintroducing wild American bison, which had largely vanished in the region.

“Five years from now, you’ll have the infrastructure here for a more upscale experience,” said Mr. Bryan of Off the Beaten Path http://www.offthebeatenpath.com/ . Already, the American Prairie Foundation has opened an upscale ranch house on the land it has preserved.

“A lot of folks we’re bringing out here have been to places like Africa and stayed in some of those extravagant lodges,” said Mr. Garrity, the foundation president. The customers, he says, are often pleased to find that the prairie accommodations, though hardly as plush, come near to what they expect.

Outdoors people, big landowners, travel operators and conservationists are now returning much of the Great Plains to its wild state, to a kind of American steppe. Conservationists are reviving native fauna and flora, and wolf populations are returning to the Yellowstone area. In the future, many hope, one giant fenceless region might be created across the entire plains that cover much of central North America east of the Rockies south to West Texas and New Mexico.

By JOSHUA KURLANTZICK New York Times

Full Story: http://travel.nytimes.com/2008/06/08/travel/08journeys.html?scp=6&sq=montana&st=cse