European Bison

The European bison, also known as the wisent, is the largest surviving land mammal native to Europe, historically found across much of the continent lowland forests before hunting and habitat loss drove it to extinction in the wild in the early twentieth century. It has a massive, muscular build with a pronounced hump over the shoulders, a shaggy brown coat and a beard-like tuft on the chin, and it is closely related to, though distinct from, the American bison. Herds of European bison graze and browse in mixed forest and forest-edge habitat, feeding on grasses, herbs, bark and shoots, and the species plays an important ecological role in shaping woodland vegetation through grazing. Every European bison alive today descends from a small number of individuals preserved in zoos and reserves after the wild population was wiped out, making the species one of the most notable conservation recovery stories among large mammals. Reintroduction programs have re-established free-ranging herds in forests across Poland, Belarus, Russia and several other European countries, and the species has been downlisted from endangered to near threatened as numbers have grown.