Watching bison up close is fascinating, like watching a grass fire about to leap out of control. With their huge, wedge-shaped heads and silver-dollar-size brown eyes, the 2,000-pound animals are symbols of another place and time. More than 100 bison now roam the 30,000-acre American Prairie Reserve in eastern Montana — the first time they’ve inhabited that region in a century. Direct descendants of the tens of millions of bison that once populated the Western plains, they represent an epic effort： to restore a piece of America’s prairie to the national grandeur that Lewis and Clark extolled two centuries ago. During that famous expedition across the Western states to the Pacific, the two explorers encountered so many bison that they had to wait hours for one herd to pass.
In order to protect what’s here and reintroduce long-gone wildlife (something the World Wildlife Fund is helping with), the American Prairie Foundation began purchasing land from local ranchers in 2004. It now owns 30,000 acres and has grazing privileges on another 57,000. Its goal over the next 25 years is to assemble three million acres, the largest area of land devoted to wildlife management in the continental United States.
Already, herds of elk, deer, and pronghorn antelope roam the grasslands, where
visitors can camp, hike, and bike. Cottonwoods and willows are thriving along streams, creating habitats for bobcats, beavers, and other animals.
Not everyone shares APF’s vision. Some residents of Phillips County (pop. 3,904) worry that the area could become a prairie Disneyland, overcrowded with tourists. But the biggest obstacle is the ranchers themselves, whose cattle compete with prairie dogs and bison for grass and space.
“People like me have no intention of selling their ranches,”says Dale Veseth, who heads the Ranchers Stewardship Alliance of 35 families in Phillips County and whose family has been ranching here since 1886.“They’ve been a labor of love through the generations.”Instead, he wants APF to pay or subsidize ranchers to raise bison. This would be far less costly for the foundation, he argues, than buying the land directly.
63．If you go to the American Prairie Reserve in eastern Montana, you will see ________.
A．the burning fire moving across the grassland
B．hundreds of bison travelling through the prairie
C．tens of millions of bison occupying the farmland
D．groups of experts examining the dead bison
64．What measures have been taken to protect the wildlife by APF?
A．They have borrowed much money and developed new habitat.
B．They have hired many farmers to raise bison on their farms.
C．They have turned grassland into Disneyland to attract tourists.
D．They have bought large land from farmers for bison to live on.
65．The underlined word“subsidize”in this passage means ________.
A．give money to B．borrow money from
C．provide land to D．exchange land with
66．Which would be the best title for this passage?
A．The exciting scenery in eastern Montana
B．Great changes in raising bison in America
C．The return of the American prairie
D．The challenge in
protecting the grassland
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