2. The Buffalo

    The buffalo is the largest North American animal. It weighs as much as 2,000 pounds. It lives with other buffalo in groups or herds. Two hundred years ago, there were 60 million buffalo. They lived all over the center of North America. There were thousands of herds. One herd was twenty miles long and twenty miles wide. The buffalo followed the grass and the Indians followed the buffalo.

    The Indians used the buffalo for many things. They used it for meat. Sometimes they ate fresh meat. Sometimes they dried the meat in the sun. Then they ate it later. The Indians also used the skin, or hide, of the buffalo. From the hide they made tents, clothes, shoes, hats, and rope. They wasted nothing. But times changed.

    People from other lands came to America. These immigrants crossed the country in wagon trains. They killed the buffalo for food and hides. More and more people came. And everyone wanted leather. Hunters with guns killed the buffalo only for their hides. They wasted everything else. These hunters were very good at their job. By 1900, there were fewer than thirty buffalo alive.

    Today, there are about 30,000 buffalo in America. But herds are very small. You can see them in states like Wyoming. Sometimes you can buy buffalo meat at a restaurant. But you will never see a herd of buffalo as big as a city.

 

QUESTIONS

1. What way of life does the buffalo choose?
a. It lives alone.
b. It lives in a group.
c. It depends on the place, where the buffalo lives.

2. What part of the USA was the best for the buffalo 2000 years ago?
a. The center of North America
b. South America
c. The center of the western America

3. How much waste do the Indians have from the buffalo?
a. Very much
b. It depends on the size of the buffalo
c. Nothing

4. What was the most important for the people from other lands?
a. Meat
b. Hides
c. The whole buffalo

5. How many buffalo were there at the beginning of the 20th century?
a. Less than 30
b. 30000
c. Almost 60 million

6. What changes have happened to the buffalo in our times?
a. They became smaller
b. They don’t have very big herds now.
c. They changed the place where they live.

7. What is the synonym for the word ‘hide’ (paragraph 3)?
a. Clothes
b. Ability
c. Kindness
d. Fur

ANSWERS