Buffalo Facts
An Eclectic Collection of Buffalo Facts
Here is a small, but nevertheless interesting, collection of buffalo facts, some well known, others not so well known. There are three species of buffalo in the world today, none of which exist in large numbers. One is the Wild Asiatic Water Buffalo, existing primarily on the Indian subcontinent. The Wild Asiatic Water Buffalo is now an endangered species with only a few thousand remaining, but domestic water buffalo, descended from the wild species, are quite abundant and an important part of many local economies throughout southeastern Asia.
A second species is the African Buffalo, sometimes referred to the Cape Buffalo. The African Buffalo is characterized by a rather unpredictable temperament and is generally considered to be a danger to humans.
In the United States, the American Buffalo is a well known and somewhat beloved animal. To be correct, the American Buffalo is not really a buffalo at all, it is a bison. But the terms American Buffalo and American Bison are in common usage, and often used interchangeably. The American Buffalo is related to its Asiatic and African counterparts, but only distantly.
Anyone familiar with the history of the American buffalo knows that it once roamed the Great Plains in massive numbers, was hunted nearly to extinction, and has since been allowed to recover, although not to the numbers of the past. One theory is that the millions of bison which roamed the Plains in the early 19th century, were actually the result of ecology gone out of control, and not a natural situation. In their heyday, the American Bison, or Buffalo, is believed to have been the most numerous single subspecies on the face of the earth, and certainly the most numerous large land animal in North America.
Among the lesser known buffalo facts is that there are actually two subspecies of the American Buffalo, the Wood Bison and the Plains Bison. The Wood Bison is the larger of the two, and its natural range lies in the forest regions of southern Alaska, the Yukon, British Columbia, and Alberta. The Plains Bison at one time covered much of the United States, except for the southwest and southeast portions of the country.
Buffalo appear to be rather docile and slow moving, but this can be deceiving. The bison can be very dangerous to humans if provoked, and can attain speeds of up to 35 miles an hour, nearly twice as fast as a human can run for any distance. They are also very agile animals, able to leap several feet in the air and over low fences.
The last wild herd in the US is located in Yellowstone National Park, numbering around 3,500 animals. Other herds, nearly as large or slightly smaller, are to be found in North Dakota, Oklahoma, and Alaska. Buffalo are grown domestically in many areas. Buffalo meat is highly prized as being as flavorful as beef, while much leaner. Buffalo hide is also highly prized, one of the reasons behind the great buffalo slaughters of nearly 150 years ago. The total buffalo population in the United States today, wild and domesticated, exceeds 300,000.
Finally, a few buffalo facts you may or may not be familiar with. Seeing an American Buffalo was once an almost everyday event for most Americans. It wasn't the actual animal people saw, but its likeness on the US 5 cent piece, where it appeared from 1913 to 1938. The name of the buffalo on the coin, probably the most famous buffalo in America, was Black Diamond, who died in 1934 - in a slaughterhouse of all places! More recently the buffalo has occurred in our coinage on the Kansas and North Dakota state quarters. The buffalo also appears on various official seals and logos, while a dozen colleges and universities in the US and Canada have the buffalo as their mascot. Buffalo, in New York state, was not named after the animal, but there's a good chance that a few of towns of the same name, scattered across 18 states, were.