American Bison

Also called the American buffalo or just buffalo. This is a bit of a misnomer as the bison is one of two species in their own genus, bison. True buffalo are mainly endemic to the continent of Africa.

Once plentiful across all north America, they were hunted to near extinction with numbers as low as 541 animals by the late 1800s. as the result of intense recovery efforts in the mid-1900s bison numbers are recovering and there are as many as 31000 wild bison as of 2019. Their status has recovered to “near threatened.”

The American bison is the national mammal of the United States.

The American bison is the heaviest land animal on the north American continent.