Proper etiquette in the presence of bison

FEBRUARY 10, 2020

by Bianca Stefanut, WWF

Since the start of the Life Bison Project in 2016, 56 bison have been translocated from Germany and Poland—55 to reintroduction areas and one to the breeding center in Hunedoara. The bison roam freely at two main reintroduction sites in the Țarcu and Poiana Ruscă Mountains of Romania. These areas comprise one of Europe's largest wilderness areas and encompass 4 national parks and 1 natural park, totaling about 300,000 ha where species and the landscape benefit from their protected status.

However, the animals do not recognize the boundaries and borders that humans draw on maps. Therefore, when rewilding leads to the recovery of wildlife populations—either naturally, or through reintroductions—it is critical to employ measures that promote human-wildlife co-existence. Maintaining harmonious relations between humans and reintroduced European bison is the aim of a new animation produced by the Rewilding Southern Carpathians team and WWF-Romania with the talented artists at Animation Worksheep.

The bison reintroduction to the landscape after a 200 year absence, just like the sturgeon, is an excellent example of our regional strategies to implement the New Deal for Nature and People. The project can help us achieve the zero-half-zero goals by lessening the impact on natural resources and increasing biodiversity in the Southern Carpathians. Through the education and support of the local community, not only is the ecological footprint reduced, but the ecosystem services gained by the reinvigorated protected areas have led to ecotourism and sustainable development benefiting the local economy. More than 100 families are benefiting from the resulting ecotourism packages; goods and services based on the presence of the bison, such as souvenirs and experiences that over 700 tourists enjoy annually.

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Time ticks away at wild bison genetic diversity

NOVEMBER 3, 2019

by Morgan Lee

Evidence is mounting that wild North American bison are gradually shedding their genetic diversity across many of the isolated herds overseen by the U.S. government, weakening future resilience against disease and climate events in the shadow of human encroachment.

The extent of the creeping threat to herds overseen by the Department of Interior—the backbone of wild bison conservation efforts for North America—is coming into sharper focus amid advances in genetic studies.

Preliminary results of a genetic population analysis commissioned by the National Park Service show three small federal herds would almost certainly die off—extinguishing their DNA lineage—within 200 years under current management practices that limit transfers for interbreeding among distant herds.

The study is awaiting peer review by other scientists. It does not include Yellowstone National Park's herd of some 5,000 unfenced bison, the largest federal conservation herd that's seen by millions of people who visit the park annually.

"Some of these herds that lost the most genetic diversity do have a high probability of going extinct, due to the accumulation of inbreeding," explained Cynthia Hartway, a conservation scientist at the bison program with Wildlife Conservation Society who led the analysis.

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How Native American tribes are bringing back the bison from brink of extinction

The continent’s largest land mammal plays crucial role in spiritual lives of the tribes

Jeremy Hance

Wed 12 Dec 2018 13.41 GMTLast modified on Wed 12 Dec 2018 18.11 GMT

On 5,000 hectares of unploughed prairie in north-eastern Montana, hundreds of wild bison roam once again. But this herd is not in a national park or a protected sanctuary – they are on tribal lands. Belonging to the Assiniboine and Sioux tribes of Fort Peck Reservation, the 340 bison is the largest conservation herd in the ongoing bison restoration efforts by North America’s Indigenous people.

The bison – or as Native Americans call them, buffalo – are not just “sustenance,” according to Leroy Little Bear, a professor at the University of Lethbridge and a leader in the bison restoration efforts with the Blood Tribe. The continent’s largest land mammal plays a major role in the spiritual and cultural lives of numerous Native American tribes, an “integrated relationship,” he said.

“If you are Christian and you don’t see any crosses out there, or you don’t have your corner church … there’s no external connection, [no] symbolic iconic notion that strengthens and nurtures those beliefs,” said Little Bear. “So it goes with the buffalo.” 

Only a couple of hundred years ago, 20 million to 30 million bison lived in vast thundering herds across North America. They were leftover relics of the Pleistocene and one of the few large mammals to survive the Ice Age extinction.

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Hidden costs of disease to greater Yellowstone elk

Brucellosis reduces pregnancy say USU ecologists

Date:  October 29, 2018

Source:  S.J. & Jessie E. Quinney College of Natural Resources, Utah State University

For decades researchers have known that a bacterial disease in elk, bison and cattle in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem causes periodic abortions in these animals and chronic illness in humans drinking infected cow's milk. The disease, called brucellosis, poses a financial concern for dairy producers and cattle ranchers, but its effects on the wild elk population have generally been considered minor.

In recent years, however, elk pregnancy rates have become the subject of controversy. Various researchers claim that stress caused by fear of wolves and nutritional deficiencies caused by drought can explain low pregnancy rates in specific elk herds, but until now the effects of brucellosis on elk pregnancy have not been scrutinized.

Utah State University researchers Gavin Cotterill and Johan du Toit report that by mid-winter, elk that test positive for brucellosis are less likely to be pregnant than healthy elk, independent from the abortions caused by that disease later in the year. Cotterill and du Toit, along with colleagues from the Wyoming Game and Fish Department, US Geological Survey Northern Rocky Mountain Science Center, and University of California Berkeley, discuss their findings in Ecology and Evolution published 28 October 2018.

"Mid-winter elk pregnancy rates are often seen as an indicator of an elk herd's health and viability," says Cotterill, a PhD candidate at USU and lead author of the paper. "If we're interested in figuring out the effect that predators or climate are having on elk we need to also account for disease."

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First IVF bison calf joins wild herd

Reproductive technology has implications for conservation efforts

Date:  March 26, 2018

Source:  Colorado State University

Summary:

Eight bison -- four calves and their mothers -- were released in mid-March on public lands in northern Colorado. A 10-month-old calf known as IVF 1 was among the newcomers.

And then there were... 44. Eight bison -- four calves and their mothers -- were released in mid-March on public lands in northern Colorado, bringing the total number of animals in the Laramie Foothills Bison Conservation Herd to 44.

A 10-month-old calf known as IVF 1 was among the newcomers. She is the first bison calf conceived using in vitro fertilization, or IVF, at Colorado State University.

Jennifer Barfield, a reproductive physiologist with the CSU Animal Reproduction and Biotechnology Laboratory, was beaming with pride as she described the landmark moment.

"It's a really good feeling to see a herd grow and to know that the animals from our research are going to have a real impact, not only in our herd but as we produce animals in this herd and help support other conservation herds," she said.

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Volunteer hunters wanted to cull Grand Canyon bison

The National Park Service is looking at a reduction plan that would allow volunteers to shoot bison using non-lead ammunition

Associated Press

Monday 11 September 2017 23.04 BSTLast modified on Monday 11 September 2017 23.26 BST

The National Park Service plans to thin a herd of bison in the Grand Canyon through roundups and by seeking volunteers who are physically fit and proficient with a gun to kill the animals that increasingly are damaging park resources.

Some bison would be shipped out of the area and others legally hunted on the adjacent forest. Within the Grand Canyon, shooters would be selected through a lottery to help bring the number of bison roaming the far northern reaches of the park to no more than 200 within three to five years.

Some 600 of the animals now live in the region, and biologists say the bison numbers could hit 1,500 within 10 years if left uncontrolled.

The Grand Canyon is still working out details of the volunteer effort, but it’s taking cues from national parks in Colorado, the Dakotas and Wyoming that have used shooters to cut overabundant or diseased populations of elk. The park service gave final approval to the bison reduction plan this month.

Sandy Bahr of the Sierra Club says she’s hopeful the Grand Canyon will focus mostly on non-lethal removal.

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Bison return to Banff national park in Canada

6 February 2017

A herd of plains bison have been successfully reintroduced to Canada's oldest national park, more than 100 years after they were nearly hunted out of existence.

The 16 bison were moved to the Banff National Park in Alberta last week. 

On Monday officials said the transfer had gone smoothly and the animals were adapting well to their new home.

The move will restore their role in the park's ecosystem, officials say, and has been welcomed by indigenous groups.

The bison will be kept under observation in an enclosed pasture of the park in the foothills of the Rockies until the summer of 2018, Parks Canada officials say.

Image copyright Parks Canada via Reuters Image caption The animals were prized by aboriginal Canadians for the food and clothing they supply Image copyright Parks Canada via Reuters Image caption If the phased release goes according to plan, the bison will be allowed further into the park next year Image copyright Parks Canada via Reuters Image caption The bison have been arriving at Banff since the end of January 

The animals were once the dominant grazers in the park, in addition to being spiritually significant to Canada's aboriginal groups, supplying them with food, clothing and shelter.

The herd will eventually be released into a far wider area of the park where they will be at liberty to interact with other native animals and search for food, The Calgary Herald reported.

It said the hope is that natural barriers and wildlife fencing will stop the bison from wandering astray.

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Mystery beast in ice age cave art revealed as cow-bison hybrid

18 October 2016

By Alice Klein

Cow, bison or both? DNA fingerprinting has revealed that a strange bovine creature painted by European cave artists during the ice age was a cross between a cow ancestor and bison.

Ancient European paintings depict two types of bison: one with long horns, a large hump and robust forequarters, and the other with short horns and a small hump. The former is more common in cave art painted more than 22,000 years ago, while the latter emerges about 17,000 years ago.

But DNA sequencing of bones and teeth from 64 ancient bison has revealed that there was another species in the mix. Over 120,000 years ago, interbreeding between steppe bison and aurochs – the now-extinct ancestors of modern cattle – created a hybrid animal.

The finding explains why the two bison forms appear in ancient paintings, and why bison bones uncovered from the ice age are not uniform in size and morphology.

It also helps to solve the long-running mystery of where modern European bison – or wisent – come from. These animals are genetically distinct from American bison, which are descended from steppe bison.

Julien Soubrier at the University of Adelaide, Australia, and his colleagues analysed ancient bison DNA to show that European bison are descended from the hybrid bison. Analysing the DNA of modern animals was not sufficient to understand this process because they went through a genetic bottleneck of only 12 individuals in the 1920s, due to decline in habitat and hunting.

Cave art and fossil dating suggest that the short-horned hybrid bison and long-horned steppe bison swapped dominance multiple times from at least 55,000 years ago.

This was most likely a response to major environmental shifts, says Soubrier. “We know there were dramatic changes in temperature occurring every few thousand years in the late Pleistocene,” he says. “It’s possible that when it became colder, the steppe bison migrated elsewhere, while the hybrid found a niche and stayed.”

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