John Budding, age 14, of Allentown, Penna, for his question:
What is the difference between a plains buffalo and a woodland buffalo?
Strictly speaking, both of these fellows are bison. A true buffalo has no hump on his shoulders and no hairy mane. The carabao of the Philippines and the water buffalo of India are true buffaloes. The shaggy native cattle of North America are bison, distant relatives of the small, almost extinct dark bison of Europe.
Some 200 years ago the great bison herd of North America numbered around 60 million. By 1800 they had dwindled to less than a thousand. Then the governments of Canada and the United States, together with wild life societies, stepped in to protect the vanishing native. By World War I there were almost 3,000 and now over 5,000 graze contentedly in protected areas.
The plains bison always outnumbered his woodland cousin. The vast herd which migrated north and south was composed of plains bison. The woodland bison was found only in the forested uplands around Great Slave Lake in Canada. In times past they may have lived as far south as the United States.
There is but one species of North American Bison, which means that all our bison can interbreed. There are two sub‑species; the plains and the woodland bison. These fellows are different enough for you to tell them apart.
A bull bison of the plains may weigh half a ton and stand five to six feet at shoulder level. His horns, curved up and around, may measure 15 inches in length and 15 inches around the base. In the primp of life his shaggy mane and beard are almost black. This hair grows grey with age. The body is a lighter brown, getting paler towards the rump.
In the vast primitive herd, naturally some variations in color occurred. There were piebald bison and few blondies. A Cheyenne chief named Roman Nose had a priceless robe of white bison, the rarest of all bison colors.
The woodland bison is larger than his cousin in all respects. He is taller, heavier, and his horns, though less thick, are longer. He is also quite a bit darker than the plains bison.
The bison of the woodlands was never exposed to the hunter as was his cousin of the plains. Nevertheless, his numbers diminished. Today, only a few of them exist in their native haunts. They are so rarely seen that some people say there are none of them left at all.
But we know for a fact that the woodland bison is not altogether extinct. Certain of them mixed and interbred with the plains bison now under protection. Being of the same species, they had healthy children, who in turn were able to have children of their own.
True, we may not find any woodland bison wandering around in the wild. We will not find an odd woodland bison grazing with the herd in Yellowstone Park. But some of those shaggy fellows may have woodland grandparents or great grandparents in their family trees. lend the gentle bison herd pays no attention to this mixture of ancestors.