THEODORE ROOSEVELT NATIONAL PARK - Rain, wind and impending winter weather were the ultimate snow day for about 80 bison that got to stay home.

Theodore Roosevelt National Park staff staged its first bison roundup in three years last week, hoping to reduce the herd by 180 animals.

But Old Man Winter arrived before the roundup could be complted.

Only 105 animals were run through the park corrals, loaded out and shipped to new pastures, primarily in North Dakota and some to Montana, including a pair to Dakota Zoo in Bismarck.

Wednesday's fog ended any chance to drive in more animals by helicopter and Thursday's snow and whipping winds sealed the deal.

The roundups are the park's way of thinning a growing herd. Superintendent Valerie Naylor said the remaining 245 is a sustainable number for the South Unit's forage base and habitat, which can support as many as 500.

"This is fine," she said. "It's not as many as we'd planned, but it's enough."

She said the veterinarians, biologists and others were quick and efficient at working the animals in pens and the jump chute. Most importantly, none of the animals sustained any significant injuries, she said.

They were needle-poked to get a brucellosis test blood sample, affixed with a federal aluminum ear-tag if they didn't have one and some had a microchip inserted in the cartilage of their ear.

The bison are especially magnificent this time of year, with their thick dark coats coming on, nature's protection from the worst winter can dish out.

Raymond Jetty, bison handler for the Spirit Lake Sioux near Devils Lake, took 31 back home with him from the roundup. He said the animals would stand away from the existing 200-head herd for six to eight months.

"They kind of have to earn their way in," he said.

At Spirit Lake the bison are the heart and soul of a diabetes program, where the addition of naturally lean bison meat in the diet is reducing the severity and onset of the disease, he said. Other bison are butchered for powwows and special occasions.

Kristine Reed is the wildlife biologist for the InterTribal Bison Cooperative, established in 1992 to restore bison to tribal lands.

Reed was at the roundup and said she is not worried about the fate of the 17 bison that were shipped Wednesday to the Three Affiliated Tribes on Fort Berthold Indian Reservation.

The tribes had trouble with starved and injured bison and were suspended from getting any in the park's last roundup until they put together a better management program.

Reed said Three Affiliated has reduced its herd and convinced her that its range condition can support the bison.

"The reduced numbers definitely helped," she said.

Tribes that take the bison must agree they won't sell or slaughter for the first year, she said.

The pair going to Dakota Zoo will lead a much more pampered life.

There, they'll replace an aging male and female and be part of a small group of three animals on display for the public.

Director Terry Lincoln said it's time to bring in some new blood and younger animals. He said the zoo gets all its bison from Theodore Roosevelt.

"They're very healthy. It's been an ideal arrangement in the past," he said.

The Dakota Buffalo Foundation left with 18 new bison for its herd along Interstate 94 at Jamestown, where an albino chromosome has produced three white bison offspring.

Arnie Becker, a board member for the foundation, said the new animals would replace culled older bulls and cows.

Another 21 bison bulls went to the Blackfeet Tribe in Montana and 16 went to the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe near Fort Yates.

In the end, nearly as many bison left as stayed home because of the weather. For that, one imagines, they're as tickled as a kid who wakes to learn school was cancelled.

(Reach reporter Lauren Donovan at 888-303-5511 or lauren@westriv.com.)