How many American bison are there in 2026?
Roughly 430,000 to 530,000 across North America, per the most recent IUCN SSC Bison Specialist Group framing. Only about 20,000 to 30,000 of those are in conservation herds managed for ecology and genetics; the remaining 400,000-plus are commercial ranch animals bred for meat. The largest single conservation herds are Yellowstone (nearly 5,300 in the 2025 NPS estimate) and Wood Buffalo National Park (around 3,000 wood bison, per Parks Canada). It is a recovery from a low of just 1,091 animals in 1889, and the IUCN Red List classifies the species as Near Threatened.
The Conservation Status: Near Threatened
The IUCN Red List currently classifies American bison as Near Threatened (Aune, Jorgensen and Gates 2017 assessment, e.T2815A45156541). The classification rests on the recognition that while the population has recovered from the 19th-century near-extinction event, the species remains conservation-dependent. No truly free-ranging, ecologically functional wild population of adequate size for long-term self-sufficiency currently exists in North America.
The IUCN framing distinguishes three categories of bison:
- Conservation herds (~20,000-30,000 animals): managed by NPS, USFWS, state agencies, tribal authorities, Parks Canada, and a small set of private restoration projects. Bred and managed for ecological function, genetic diversity, and the maintenance of bison behaviour in semi-natural settings.
- Commercial ranch herds (~400,000+): bred for meat production. Most commercial bison carry detectable cattle ancestry from late-19th and early-20th-century crossbreeding experiments. The American Beefalo Association formalised the 5/8-bovine-3/8-bison "full blood" beefalo category in 1974.
- Other captive: zoo, demonstration, and small private herds. Numerically minor.
The European bison or wisent (Bison bonasus) is also Near Threatened on a parallel IUCN listing (Plumb et al. 2020), with approximately 9,760 free-ranging animals across Europe out of about 12,200 in total (mostly in Russia, Poland, Belarus, Romania, and reintroduction sites in Germany, Spain, and Ukraine; European Bison Pedigree Book, end 2024). See the dedicated conservation page for the cross-species treatment.
Recovery Timeline
| Year | Estimated population | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Pre-1500 | 30-60 million | Range of published estimates for the Great Plains and adjacent grasslands before European contact. Estimates, not counts. |
| 1889 | 1,091 | Population low. William T. Hornaday's census for 1 January 1889: 256 in captivity, 200 protected in Yellowstone, 635 wild and unprotected (85 in the US, an estimated 550 in Athabasca, Canada). Source: Hornaday, The Extermination of the American Bison (1889). |
| 2017 | ~430,000-530,000 | IUCN Red List assessment (Aune, Jorgensen and Gates 2017): ~20,000-30,000 in conservation herds, ~400,000+ commercial. Still the current range-wide figure; no newer continent-wide count has been published. |
Major Current Herds
The 20,000-30,000 conservation animals are distributed across dozens of herds in the United States, Canada, and small experimental populations in Mexico. The largest single populations are below; the IUCN SSC Bison Specialist Group maintains the comprehensive register.
| Herd | Count | Category | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Yellowstone National Park (WY/MT/ID) | ~5,300 (2025) | Conservation (NPS) | Largest single conservation herd. Plains bison. NPS 2025 pre-calving estimate of nearly 5,300; recent years have ranged from 3,500 to nearly 6,000; population managed via the Interagency Bison Management Plan including controversial Stephens Creek capture-and-cull operations. |
| Wood Buffalo National Park (AB/NT, Canada) | ~3,000 | Conservation (Parks Canada) | Wood bison; Parks Canada calls it the largest free-roaming, self-regulating wood bison herd left in the world. Disease-management challenges from historical introgression of plains bison and bovine tuberculosis. |
| Custer State Park (SD) | ~1,200-1,500 | Conservation (State) | Plains bison; annual round-up and surplus auction. Managed for ecological function within Black Hills grassland. |
| Wind Cave National Park (SD) | ~400 | Conservation (NPS) | Plains bison; small but genetically important herd with low cattle-gene introgression. Source for many other conservation reintroductions. |
| National Bison Range (MT) | ~350-450 | Conservation (CSKT, returned 2020) | Operated by the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes after federal restoration in 2020. Genetically important plains-bison herd. |
| Henry Mountains (UT) | ~325 | Conservation (State) | One of only a handful of free-roaming wild plains-bison populations on public land. Originally translocated from Yellowstone in 1941. |
| American Prairie Reserve (MT) | ~750+ and growing | Conservation (Private) | Long-term private restoration project working towards a 3.5-million-acre prairie ecosystem with free-ranging bison. |
| Wood Bison Recovery (AK) | ~140 wood bison | Conservation (USFWS / ADF&G) | Reintroduced to interior Alaska in 2015 after extirpation. First free-ranging wood bison in Alaska in over a century. |
| Commercial ranching herds (US + Canada) | ~400,000+ | Commercial | Industry-association (National Bison Association) figures. Bred primarily for meat production. Most commercial bison carry some cattle ancestry from late-19th and early-20th-century crossbreeding experiments. |
The 19th-Century Slaughter
The collapse of the bison population across the 19th century, steepest from the late 1860s to the mid-1880s, is one of the largest large-mammal extirpation events in recorded history. The drivers were a combination of:
- Commercial hide hunting: industrial demand for bison hides (used as drive belts in eastern US factories and for buffalo robes in eastern markets) sustained professional market-hunting operations from the late 1860s through the mid-1880s. The completion of the transcontinental railroads provided the shipping infrastructure.
- Military and political tolerance: the US Army and federal government did little to stop the slaughter, and many officers welcomed it as a way to undermine the Plains Indian nations whose economies depended on the herds. The best-known statement of that view, General Phil Sheridan urging the Texas legislature to thank the hide hunters rather than protect the buffalo, comes from hide hunter John R. Cook's 1907 memoir The Border and the Buffalo, which introduces it with "so the story goes"; it is a remembered account, not an official record.
- Cattle disease: bovine diseases introduced via domestic cattle (notably Texas fever) affected wild bison populations during the same decades.
- Drought and competition: extended drought in the 1860s-1870s reduced range carrying capacity at the same time as expanding cattle herds competed for forage.
William T. Hornaday's census for 1 January 1889 found only 1,091 bison alive across North America: 256 in captivity, 200 under government protection in Yellowstone, and 635 running wild and unprotected, of which 85 were in the United States and an estimated 550 in the Athabasca region of Canada. Hornaday's The Extermination of the American Bison (1889) and the federal action that followed established the framework for the next century of recovery.
The Recovery Framework
Recovery from 1,091 in 1889 to ~430,000-530,000 by the 2017 IUCN assessment rested on three pillars:
- Federal protected lands: Yellowstone National Park (1872), the National Bison Range in Montana (1908, returned to the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes in 2020), Wind Cave National Park, Custer State Park, Wood Buffalo National Park (Canada, 1922), and a growing network of NPS and USFWS conservation herds.
- Private commercial ranching: bison ranching from the 1970s onward built a parallel commercial population (~400,000+) that economically stabilised the species, though commercial herds are managed for production rather than ecological function or genetic purity.
- Tribal restoration: the Inter-Tribal Buffalo Council (founded 1992 from a 1991 Native American summit) coordinates bison restoration across more than 80 member tribes today. The 2020 federal restoration of the National Bison Range to the CSKT marked a substantive shift in federal-tribal management.
The 2008 Department of the Interior Bison Conservation Initiative and the subsequent USFWS Bison Conservation Initiative provided the contemporary policy framework. The current direction of effort is on (a) expanding free-ranging populations on public and tribal land, (b) reducing cattle-gene introgression in conservation herds where possible, and (c) re-establishing migration corridors via projects like the American Prairie Reserve in Montana.