The Blackfeet and other tribes were disproportionately vulnerable to cuts in food-assistance programs because of the government shutdown, so they decided to bridge the gap by slaughtering some of their buffaloes and giving away the meat.
"It's what the herd is for," said Slew Costel, who helps manage the Blackfeet Nation's herd. "In times of need, we need to feed the people."
Even as the shutdown nears the end, the uncertainty and need it generated are certain to linger in low-income communities like the Blackfeet Nation.
Last week, the tribe harvested 18 buffalo from its herd of 600 and turned them into more than 3,000 pounds of hamburger.
The tribe distributed the meat in packages along with Spam, milk, and fruits and vegetables to elders, young families and other tribal members who might need them, whether or not they receive food stamps.
For thousands of years, bison were the indispensable animal for Native Americans across the Plains and Mountain West -- a vital source of meat for food; hides for tents, blankets and clothing; and bones for tools and arrowheads.
Government-approved mass hunting in the 1800s drove the animals nearly to extinction, but after a tribal-led buffalo renaissance in the West over the past decades, their population has rebounded to about 400,000.
Tribal officials said it was only fitting, then, that bison might now become a lifeline to help the Blackfeet endure the longest government shutdown in American history.
"Buffalo means life," Costel said. "Throughout history, the buffalo provided everything. You can survive."
Many tribes were hit especially hard as the shutdown threatened to halt or cut food assistance. About 1 in 4 American Indian or Alaska Native families nationwide relies on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.
On the Blackfeet reservation, donated produce has been trucked in from Washington state, and some tribal officials have hunted elk to aid with hunger-relief efforts.
The Blackfeet slaughter four bison every month to help feed elders, but tribal officials said the demand for food donations had more than doubled during the shutdown, requiring a larger harvest. About 2,300 families have received the bison slaughtered last week.
On Thursday last week, a pair of butchers drove out to a pen where the buffaloes were being held, and killed them with a shot to the head. Working quickly as a biting wind raked the rolling plains, they cut up the bison, giving the animals' heads, hides and tongues to the tribe to use for ceremonial purposes.
The meat was hauled back to the butcher shop in the town of Valier, where it was ground up and packaged. Some of the meat was given out at a distribution site, while the rest was ferried to more remote corners of the reservation.
Firefighting crews on their winter break also pitched in to deliver the meat and food packages across the sprawling reservation, bumping along reservation roads in the shadow of Glacier National Park's snowy peaks and dropping it off at the doors of people like Denise Heavyrunner.
Food is expensive at the reservation's few grocery stores, and Heavyrunner, 68, said she balked when she saw ground beef going for $7.95 a pound recently. She does not get food stamps but said the free bison delivered to her door had at least helped to ease her financial worries.