American Bison Conservation

American Bison Conservation. American Bison (Bison bison). , The American Bison was once thought to number 30-60 million animals, and ranged throughout North America from Alaska to Mexico. By the late 19th century, the Bison population was ravaged by commercial hunters, frontiersman, soldiers and ranchers. In addition to commercial hunting the U.S. Government sanctioned the slaughter of Bison as a strategy to force Native People onto reservations. Ultimately, the unsustainable Bison slaughter led to its collapse. In 1867 the North American Bison population was estimated to be 15 million, by 1884 the wild population was thought to be 541 and the American Bison was near extinction! Desperate times called for desperate measures., President Theodore Roosevelt remarked at the time "Never before were so many large animals of one species destroyed in so short a time". So Roosevelt partnered with William Hornaday, the director of the New York Zoological Park (currently known as the Bronx Zoo), and formed the American Bison Society in 1905., Their goal was to work with captive Bison in Zoos and transfer specimens out west to re-establish herds. Between 1907 and 1913, 75 captive Bison were re-introduced to protected ranges in Oklahoma, Montana, Nebraska and South Dakota. The work done by the American Bison Society and Zoos helped stave off extinction for the Bison., A century later, the American Bison's comeback is ongoing. Today more than 20,000 Bison freely roam the wild as their ancestors once did. We may never see the great herds that our forefathers once saw, but with support to groups like the American Bison Society and the Cape May County Zoo the American Bison will continue to rebound.