A male Bison attacked a 70 year old California woman on a nature trail in Theodore Roosevelt Nat'l Park. He threw her 20 feet into a tree. Apparently he stuck around to finish the job and was killed by park rangers. Don't know any specifics about what set off the Bison, but I would imagine she was probably trying for closeup pictures.

That's impossible, all she had to do was jump behind a 3 wire fence.

You know, I've been thnking after watching those "Real TV" videos of buffs slinging people into trees. What say someone set up some webcams so we can tune in 24 hours a day and watch these pilgrims go into orbit courtesy of a buff liftoff.

Hell, it be such fun to watch I'd almost even pay. You could set up some online betting where you'd wager on which pilgrim was getting it next. "The Japanese guy on the right in the checkered shirt". You could double down on the distance or height of throw.

Any entrepreneurs out there?

There's probably more injuries in the parks and surrounding areas by buff then bears every year.
They just don't get the press coverage, as they don't often eat the person.
Same with moose attacks. They stomp people into unidentifyable puddles with regularity.
I believe it would be a good idea to carry a section of fence to hide behind. I'm sure you would be much safer. Of course, I watched a herd of elk walk right through a new four strand barbed wire fence yesterday like it wasn't there.
But I'm sure it would slow down a buffalo...

We have about 1500 head of bison (wood and prairie) in the park just east of town, and every year some moron gets punted by one. Usually in the spring, but sometimes in breeding season as well. Watched a bull bison chase a photo nut between a van and a pickup (the vehicles were parked side by side). He (the bull) didn't get the photog, but he sure sideswiped those vehicles. They use elk fencing around the perimeter, but every year a buff or two decide to go for a walk. I don't think there's much fencing that will actually stop them, once they decide to go. - Dan

I wonder if a good hosing with bear/pepper spray would turn them another direction?

I was going through Yellowstone Park on motorcycles with another buddy. We tried to lay back a bit when buffs were in the road and traffic was stopped. As we have had instances in the past of the bison coming WAY too close as you were stuck in traffic on the m/c.
One came up behind us and REALLY made a run at my friend, he barely got the clutch out and the bike moved in time. The bison are really getting bad tempered by this time of the year. Several months of daily annoyance by tens of thousands of clueless tourists must do that. So many people just walk right up to them, groups will even surround them, all to get a picture.

FN in MT

[ 09-02-2002, 23:14: Message edited by: Frank Nowakowski ]

The Westerners and Canadians in this forum would know more about this than I do but I always understood that a man could ride on horseback through bison herds without trouble but that the moment he dismounted, he would be attacked.

Waksupi - You're certainly right about the lack of press coverage. I have been surprised at what I read here about bison aggressiveness.We just don't hear this back East. (Moose aggressiveness I knew about from hunting in Canada but that too isn't really covered in US papers back East even with a moose season in Maine. NY has a few moose in the Adiroundacks but no hunting allowed.)

Don't know about the horse thing, but you're right about the moose. Just had another person killed by moose in this morning's paper. Usually car/moose accidents. They tend to go through the window once you knock the legs out from under them with a car. - Dan

Cap'n Jack- You wouldn't get much reaction from a buff with pepper spray. I believe it would put him on the fight for good.

I once saw a fellow riding horseback through a herd of bison. He got too close to a cow with a calf, and the cow hooked the horse in the flank.
Opened him up like a sardine can, and spilled his guts out to the ground, and was thrown off his feet. The cowboy came down hard, but kept his head, staying behind the horse. There wasn't any good place to run, and we were about fifty yards off in the pickup. The cow gored the horse a couple more times, then left.

The cowboy, the ranch owner, and myself, got the horse on its' feet, pissed on its' intestines to clean them, and stuffed them back inside. The owner sewed the horse up with a leather needle, and hairs from the horses tail. Last I saw the horse, it was fine, but retired to easier business babysitting kids.

A few years ago, a fellow left his cabin down in Red Lodge to go to the outhouse, and was gone way too long. When someone went to search for him, all they found was blood scattered across the snow, rags of his clothes, and fragments of flesh that couldn't be identified as any specific body part. He'd run into a moose on the way to the hooter. Don't remember if it was a cow or a bull, now.

When I last went to Yellowstone (about 11 years ago) a woman had just been gored by a bison as she attempted to place her toddler on the animals back for a photo opportunity. Fortunately God watches over both children and fools as neither were killed. As I recall, I don't the child endured even minor injuries.

At the tender age of 9 I was chased halfway around a High Uintah lake by an angry cow moose. I was just about to ask my dad whose "horse" that was coming down the hill at us when I realized he was already off and running! My little nine year old legs managed to catch up to my temporarily underprotective father and she chased both of us up the hillside on the opposite side of the lake. I'll never forget Dad lifting a really big rock over his head and tossing it down that hill at her. She must have figured we'd had enough exercise as she then trotted off. We then decided that we had best change lakes as there was obviously a moose calf somewhere around the one we were fishing.

Dan,

Another good reason to own a Saab eh! I recall hearing or reading somewhere that the hood angle on the 900 was designed to ensure that a Swedish moose would go over the car rather than through the windshield? Those Swedes are pretty smart when they need to be!

Waksupi,

I heard a really grusome story a few years back in which some fish and wildlife, parks, or law enforcement folks found the body of a man they suspected had been severely mauled by a bear. Upon further examination, however, what they had first perceived as cuts on the body were actually tears from blunt force trauma. Man I get the willys just thinking about it. I mean, how can I put this, there is a certain panache to being taken out by a large predator (bear, lion, leopard etc.). At least it makes a good story for your surviving relatives to tell, right! Even dying under the hoof or horn of SOME large herbivores would be OK like a Cape Buffalo or something. But being killed by a large herbivore like a moose just lacks that appeal entirely I think.
There was a nice little article in Magnum magazine a year or so ago about a guy who was culling impala in South Africa and went to pick up a "dead one" by the horn only to discover that he had only stunned it and the thing started jumping around trying to spear. All this poor Dutchman could think about was how being killed by an Impala would bring great shame to his family. He wound up flipping it over, jamming its horns into the ground and freeing up his hands long enough to kill it with his knife.

Gato,

You're right. All park tourists should be required to carry around and walk around inside a little 3 foot diameter buffalo proof enclosure at all times.
Did you ever look into those fencing costs and what you can get some breeding stock for?

Regards,

JohnTheGreek

JTG, yes, Saabs and Volvos both are supposedly "moose proofed". I don't think I would care to test them though. I was in Golden B.C. some years back and watched them tow in a Buick Lesabre that had hit a mountain goat at night (lot's of them on the highway licking salt). The goat had gone through the front windshield and skewered the driver to the seat. He was DOA, but his wife survived with minor cuts and scratches. Nasty end though, sounds like the punch line to a bad joke. Friend of mine lost the grill of his '68 Impala to a cranky moose on Highway 391 in northern Manitoba one year. Driving back to town at night with no headlights was fun, but at least the car could move under it's own power. - Dan

Dan,

About a month ago, my Godfather was on his way up Huntington Canyon in Utah to the coal mine where he works graveyard. He was in a company vehicle and looked down to adjust the radio. When he looked back up, he saw a sea of ELK! Several went over and under the F150 he was driving. By the time it was over, my Godfather counted seven dead or dying cow elk and one REALLY dead F150. He was, fortunately, without a scratch! The railroad guys he knows around town cannot even remember a TRAIN colliding with that many animals in one incident.

The amusing part of this story is one week later he was driving up the same canyon and totaled a SECOND company truck in a collision with someone's cow. I'm sure neither the company nor their insurance company were too thrilled with this chain of events.

Regards,

JohnTheGreek

LOL John. I'm glad he's Ok. Let me guess, he has a "driver" now? - Dan

No driver for him but that sure was a great way for him to get use of the oldest and most run down company truck the mine has to offer I imagine!

Regards,

JohnTheGreek

Gentlemen,
Another great example why you should be packing a firearm when you are in the bushes

I hope that the anti-hunting and anti-weapons people are the ones that gets the launched or stomped by various critters

/ JOHAN

Johan, I'm all for the packing in the bush idea, but if you can't kill them with your pickup, most anything you can carry won't help much. On the other hand, a local driller just died from being hauled away from the drill site and mauled by a black bear. I'm sure he would have wished that wilderness carry was allowed. Sad but true. - Dan

JG:

Actually, I did. And buffalo seem quite cheap to me. Check this site out..
http://www.overlandbuffalo.com/index.shtml

They are so cheap and so easy to keep that I think you should buy a few and keep them in your backyard. I'll even pay for the 3 wire barbed wire fence posts 15 feet apart, as long as your back yard is smaller than 10 acres, AND as long as you PROMISE to go get them, without fail, if and when they "wander" as you put it.

To be serious, I am really considering it, but I am trying to get more information on how to get new buffalo to adapt to a new fenced area. But at those prices, if you lose them, it ain't like you have bet the ranch and come up snake eyes.

Meanwhile, 2 more decent size tracts of land next to my ranch have become available and that may take all of my buffalo money, both domestic and African. I'm a whore for land. But I only want any that touches mine.

K, which one of you funny guys threw the snowball?

Gato,

Hell, you sure are right about the loss risk being minimal. With prices like that on yearling bulls and 3-6 year old cows, and since I doubt my neighbors would appreciate the livestock in my yard (even though proper fencing wouldn't cost that much ) I really should just buy a bunch and surreptitiously release them down here in the Kaibab! I wonder how the Arizona Deptartment of Wildlife would like that little favor?

Regards,

JohnTheGreek

P.S.

Did you get a look at that top right bull in lot #112! A bit past his prime breeding years, I think, but HOLY CRAP somebody get me my .416 ! ! ! I would love to see that big boy in his prime winter coat!

[ 09-05-2002, 08:55: Message edited by: JohnTheGreek ]

JohntheGreek,

The buffs are already in the Kaibab. A buddy saw one down near Fire Point last year on our muley hunt. We ran into a buff hunter who had a tag and he was trying to locate the herd since they were sneaking in and out of the NP. Last we heard he ate the tag.

Spectr17,

Hey Thanks! I knew there were a couple of herds in Northern Arizona but didn't realize they were there. One, I know, is not really a fair chase hunt but was unsure of the other.

Well, if they are already in The Kaibab, maybe I should just plunk a breeding population down in the Nat'l forest around Mountainaire. Things might get bit interesting on I-17 now and again but what the hell! Too many Phoenix "Soccer Moms" coming north in their Volvo's anyway!

Regards,

JohnTheGreek

Sad part is they killed the buffalo, just for protecting his turf.

Duane.

Are you serious!?!?!? I think that is absolutely criminal!

JohnTheGreek