Food bank loads up

Volunteers pick up moose carcasses, 13 bison donated from Yellowstone Park area

The Daily Inter Lake

North Valley Food Bank has a bounty of meat, thanks to two unlucky moose and the donation of 13 bison from the Yellowstone National Park area.

Two moose walked into traffic on U.S. 93 near Olney on Tuesday and Wednesday morning.

Their carcasses were picked up by volunteers for the food bank.

June Munski-Feenan, director of the food bank, said eight meat cutters already were at work packaging the bison from Sheridan.

They are dressed out and quartered at a meat plant before they're moved to Whitefish, where they are packaged - right down to soup bones - and given away, Munski-Feenan said.

"That's how come we get by the way we do," she said of the meat collection.

The organization is supported entirely by donations and volunteer work and gives away everything from fresh moose meat to firewood.

For the volunteer meat cutters, there was a tasty payoff Tuesday when the food bank prepared bison stew, biscuits and apple pie to reward them for their hard work, Munski-Feenan said.

She said the meat will be available to people who need it in the next week or so.