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North American Bison (Bison Bison)

Bison with Calf | border of North Dakota | Photo credit: Theresa Bureau | View Enlarged Image

The Whale of the Prairie

The Bison once roamed over the native prairie lands of Minnesota and the Dakotas. Scientists figure that there were once sixty million nationwide. While Native American tribes of the Great Plains relied heavily on the Bison. They used their meat for food, and their pelts for clothing and shelter. The Bison were (and in contemporary times remain) a very integral part of Native American culture and spirituality, and they knew that killing the Bison in large numbers one year would lead to a smaller, weaker herd the next. The only way to assure a healthy herd, and survival of the tribe, was to strike a reasonable balance between their needs and the herd's numbers.

This balance was shattered by the Western expansion United States Government. who slaughtered the Buffalo -- often driving them off cliffs, in an effort to force the Native Americans to capitulate and settle into reservations. Ecologists believe that because of this act of genocide less than one percent (fewer than ten thousand) Bison remain in the wild today. This effort was opposed by many of America's most famous leaders, including Davy Crockett, then a senator.

While these giant mammals once roamed our state in giant herds, Bison are very rare in Minnesota. The only registered population, in fact, can be found in Blue Mound State Park, which has a breeding herd of around 50 bison.

Like the Rhinoceros and Elephant of Africa and Asia, the Bison are massive herbivores with almost no natural predators. While they may appear docile and clumsy, they are extremely unpredictable, fast, and dangerous to provoke. Both the male and the female have sharp, curved horns, and a lot of weight to put behind them (Adult bulls often weigh in at 2,000 pounds or more). We'd recommend you use extreme caution whenever approaching a Bison (or any wild animal) in the wild. Give them as much distance as you can.

They have an excellent sense of smell and sharp hearing. Like deer, chances are that they're going to be aware of you long before you are ever aware of them. They can almost always be found in herds, and there are separate herds for bulls and cows. Bull and cow groups will converge during mating season, during which time bulls "rut" to compete for the attention of the cows. Like White-tailed Deer, rutting in Bison consists of males clashing horns with other males in a competition for dominance. When everyone's been paired up, and the show's over, females usually give birth to one calf per season.

Wallows and tree rubbings are great ways to track buffalo and predict their behavior. Wallows are depressions dug by buffalo, usually ten to fourteen feet across, and eight inches to just over a foot deep. Bison will lie down in these depressions and roll around to get rid of molting hair and annoying, biting insects. These depressions are dug by both sexes and all ages, though if there are a decent number of large wallows in a small area, it's a good sign of males in rut. Tree rubbings are a lot like wallows. When bison's shaggy hide get itchy, they often rub up against trees or boulders with their backs and their horns. Conservationists believe that many of the boulders left behind by the glaciers have been "leveled" by the native bison population, giving the rolling hills of Southern Minnesota their distinctive appearance.

Some interesting Bison facts:

• Bison are also called Buffalo, or American Plains Buffalo.
• Bison are related to cattle.
• Wild Bison are considered an endangered species, and are illegal to hunt or kill in the wild.
• Bison communicate with snorts, grunts, and body language.
• Some farmers raise a crossbreed between Bison and Cattle. This crossbreed is also commonly referred to as buffalo or bison, causing some confusion

Multimedia:

Grazing Bison | border of North Dakota | Photo credit: Theresa Bureau	Minnesota's only remaining Bison herd | Blue Mound State Park

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	National Audubon Society's Field Guide to Mammals
	Tracking and the Art of Seeing

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