this post was submitted on 19 Feb 2025
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Why don't we see any restaurants that make a big deal about cooking buffalo?
Oh... Right.
I've always heard about this buffalo skull pile, but I didn't actually look at a picture of it.
And damn, that is striking to see so many dead buffalo in one place under the heel of colonialist scumbags. Thousands upon thousands...
I've seen bison burgers on the menu at a few local restaurants
Yeah, the reintroduction of buffalo to America is the single most successful repopulation effort in history. Buffalo were nearly extinct in America. To start the reintroduction efforts, they had to buy a few breeding pairs from private owners who had captured them for their ranches. If I remember correctly, every buffalo in modern north America came from that group of only 3 bulls and 9 cows. And now the buffalo population has resurged to the point that they’re not even on the threatened list anymore. Their population will never reach the same point that it was at its peak (c.1700, there were an estimated 29 million buffalo in North America), but they’re at least not in danger of going extinct. They reproduce relatively quickly, and babies are likely to survive, so herds grow relatively quickly if left unmanaged.
The issue with buffalo burgers (and the reason they’re not in more restaurants) is that buffalo are hard to farm commercially. They make bad animal husbandry candidates, because they’re extremely territorial and get aggressive towards people. So farming them is something that needs to be done with a lot of caution, and buffalo farms likely won’t ever reach the same kinds of sizes as modern cattle farms.
Given the climate impact of farming meat its probably for the best that they can't be farmed as easily. And yeah, I'd expect most species on Earth reached a peak before I was born and won't recover for at least decades after I'm dead, if ever.
Yeah farmed bison is certainly a specialty meat, but not a rare one. And yes, wild is an endangered species
Iirc a lot of the farmed bison is from bison that we hybridized with cows. So not technically the same as wild bison
That's true, although some groups are trying to preserve non "cattle ingressed" bison. Like these guys: https://americanprairie.org/
That's actually really cool! Thank you for sharing a link!
That makes sense. I've heard you can fence in bison only if they don't care to leave.
Yeah there's a small (5-7 bison) farm near me that uses telephone poles as fence posts, with metal fencing wrapped around 12 feet up (4m).
It has serious Jurassic Park vibes
They offically went extinct. I think there's efforts now to reintroduce them and get wild populations happening again, but some time in the 80s they were declared extinct.
Antelope Island in Salt Lake, Utah has a herd of bison that are carefully managed. There's a restaurant on the island as well that serves bison burgers.
Lots of restaurants around me have Buffalo wings on the menu.
Yeah they were domesticated and bred smaller and smaller, dang shame. Their wings used to be the size of a mans arm.
And it's made them aggressive, unlike the common house hippo.
Quick clarification...
Buffalo will fucking kill you.
Bison will also kill you, but they live in North America.
Bison also live in Europe, and I'm guessing they'll also kill you.
My god that is disturbing.
Would have been a very awesome source of beef if properly sustained.
Not really, buffalo are notoriously difficult as livestock. They're stubborn, defensive, and enormous. A buffalo is more likely to bust any fence before it can be domesticated. Cows on the other hand are pushovers.
I meant as game really, kind of like deer. Permits and such for hunting. But I appreciate your comment as I did not know any of this.
You can get them, but it's not very fun since they're confined to certain regions and are super easy to kill. There's a reason they nearly went extinct...
There's something to be said for a wild source of meat.
Migratory herds disperse seeds and fertilize soil with their manure, while cutting back on overgrowth without overgrazing.
Restaurants near me sell buffalo meat, like buffalo burgers, steak, etc. You can also get it at the grocery store, and it's basically leaner beef.
its a revival but its a very long way off
Ranching buffalo is more trouble and cost over cows. It's sort of like trying to swap out your house cats for bobcats.
What happened there
Colonialism...
Buffal-oh...