Malt Buffalo Harvest 2023
This year marks the 10th anniversary that the Montana Wounded Warriors has been taking our Montana Veterans on a trophy Buffalo Hunt in Malt, Montana on the Keating Ranch. The partnership with the Keating brothers began during a hunt in Round Up Montana, when the landowner Jim Johnson made a call to the Keating’s to see if they had any buffalo available for our Wounded Warriors. They had one trophy bull available that year and we took John Bennett, a MT Wounded Warrior who is paralyzed from the waist down, on this hunt and the partnership was born. Ever since then the Keating’s have been donating one buffalo per year to the Montana Wounded Warriors as their way of giving back to our Veterans for all the sacrifices they’ve endured.
This year’s hunt was just as incredible and rewarding as the past 10 years. The Wounded Warriors meet up a day prior to the hunt and get to hang out, enjoy each other’s company and tell stories before heading out for the trophy Buffalo Hunt. Once we’re on the ranch both Steve and Dave load up the Wounded Warriors and head out to find the trophy buffalo. After the harvest has been taken the ranchers continue to give back and invite us into their house for a meal and our traditional Buffalo Trace Whiskey shot. The shot symbolizes so much more. It’s a thank you to all the Veterans for all of their sacrifice, a thank you to the buffalo who will provide a year’s worth of food to our Veterans and this year was a special toast to Jim Johnson, who recently passed away of cancer, the one who created the relationship with the Montana Wound Warriors and the Keating Buffalo Ranch.
-Jesse Mann, MTWW Board President
