Five New Baby Bison Are Coming to Golden Gate Park!

Image: @RecParkSF via Twitter

The Buffalo Paddock at the far west end of Golden Gate Park is getting set to add a little more cute overload, in the form of five little itty-bitty bison joining the herd! OK they are not actually “baby” bison, San Francisco Recreation & Parks describes them in a tweet as “yearlings,” which means they are older than calves, and generally one to two years old. That’s a still a little bison, and they’re pretty damned cute!

Golden Gate Park welcomes 5 new bison! We are doubling the size of the herd with five yearlings, just in time for SF Rec and Sesquicentennial Celebration. On April 4, Community Day, the bison will be introduced to the public. Join us for this special occasion. #GGP150 pic.twitter.com/OcF7qMTBst

— SF Rec and Park (@RecParkSF) March 3, 2020

The little junior bison have not arrived at the meadow yet. As we see from the above announcement from SF Rec and Park, the little nippers will be let loose in the park on Saturday, April 4, for the Golden Gate Park 150th Anniversary Celebration which will also feature the 150-foot ferris wheel, the largest ever SF display of the AIDS Quilt, and whatever other surprises Rec and Park has up their sleeves.

Image: York Eagles via Flickr

According to the Golden Gate Park history of the Buffalo Paddock page a bison couple was originally plopped there in 1890. The herd peaked at 30 in 1918, though a bout of bovine tuberculosis thinned the herd. The current batch are descendants of the bison that Dianne Feinstein’s husband bought for her birthday in 1984, a factoid I did not see coming.

Image: Jitze via Flickr

Indian Creek Bison Ranch’s Bison Facts page says the little yearlings will already weigh around 600 pounds. And they are already old enough to breed! They can also run faster than horses, but they very rarely do this.

Image: Yellowstone NPS

The plural of bison is just “bison,” there is no ‘s’. Just more bison information for you to get ready for those baby bison coming to Golden Gate Park!