# Wild American Bison are captive? **URL:** \ **Category:** General\ **Tags:** question\ **Created:** [June 22, 2021, 4:55am UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143 "2021-06-22T04:55:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![raymie](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/raymie/32/12650_2.png) [@raymie](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/raymie)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 5:17pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/64 "2021-06-23T17:17:52Z")
I am well aware of this fact. The difference is that nothing is stopping the bison from leaving the area. They can and do. Sure, they get killed, but they do leave. ---
**Author:** ![raymie](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/raymie/32/12650_2.png) [@raymie](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/raymie)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 5:21pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/65 "2021-06-23T17:21:55Z")
It was quite a lot of work getting the list on unfenced population, it took me hours of sifting through Google search results. To the average person wanting to know where they can see wild bison, the iNat maps are currently useless (but have the potential to be helpful). Natural barriers aren’t really the same as fences, though I understand your point about the definition being too broad. ---
**Author:** ![cypselurus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/13edae/32.png) [@cypselurus](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/cypselurus)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 5:45pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/67 "2021-06-23T17:45:24Z")
Not to be facetious, but can you please explain to me how a managed but self-sustaining herd of bison in a massive fenced parcel of land is different from a managed, self-sustaining herd of bison on an island where they were introduced? While I understand the intent behind casual-grading these bison herds, I would argue that to many, many people, the thousands of bison that you’re grading as captive on a personal value judgement -are- wild, even if they are living within a constrained area. Tourists visiting game reserves in Africa are there to see wild animals, and generally accept the fact that they are fenced in. Likewise, visitors to sanctuaries in parts of New Zealand, like Zealandia, tend to accept that areas are fenced to protect wildlife from introduced predators. Sure, this is without question a grey area, but I’d argue that many more people would call a bison in a massive fenced prairie restoration area, or a hartebeest in a game reserve (and so on) a “wild” animal, as opposed to a cactus on a Manhattan porch or a betta in a tank in Munich. In which lies what I (personally) feel most at odds with your actions—you’re not only making a value judgment (which in itself is perfectly valid), you’re purposefully going out of your way to change the accepted (in a sense) occurrence of this animal on iNaturalist, acting as official judge and jury to mark down animals that many many others are happy to regard as wild, to no immense detriment (to say nothing of the time, expertise, and effort that has gone into maintaining many of these populations in as natural a manner as possible, in as natural an environment as possible, in our unavoidably altered and artificial world). You claim that you’re going out of your way to help others better recognize where wild bison are, but you’re only really helping them recognize your _own personal view_ of where wild bison are, the literal exact opposite intention-wise of your claimed goal. ---
**Author:** ![cmcheatle](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/cmcheatle/32/37_2.png) [@cmcheatle](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/cmcheatle)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 5:46pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/68 "2021-06-23T17:46:58Z")
The average person would consider animals free ranging, not being fed, not receiving medical care, not getting shelter etc to be wild. ---
**Author:** ![raymie](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/raymie/32/12650_2.png) [@raymie](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/raymie)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 6:11pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/69 "2021-06-23T18:11:03Z")
I’m really not sure that’s true. I think reason so many people consider them to be is because the parks themselves like to claim they are wild, I think if they “admitted” that they were fenced then it would be a different story. So, what would be the minimum fence size for a bison population to be wild? Some reserves have bison on thousands of acres, others on just a few. And obviously there’s quite the range between there. Is a few hundred acres sufficient? When is the line drawn? ---
**Author:** ![cmcheatle](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/cmcheatle/32/37_2.png) [@cmcheatle](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/cmcheatle)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 6:28pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/70 "2021-06-23T18:28:18Z")
Again, if that is the case, why is every other animal within those fences that can’t evade them not captive? Why just the bison? ---
**Author:** ![marina\_gorbunova](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/marina_gorbunova/32/31454_2.png) [@marina\_gorbunova](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/marina_gorbunova)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 7:01pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/71 "2021-06-23T19:01:08Z")
Because intention is/was for bison and all other animals are not stopped by it at all (without destroying it). ---
**Author:** ![harrier](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/harrier/32/8726_2.png) [@harrier](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/harrier)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 7:10pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/72 "2021-06-23T19:10:14Z")
Besides bison, pronghorn, elk, and mule deer are all contained within the fence at Wind Cave NP (see [https://www.researchgate.net/publication/303249417\_Evaluating\_Diet\_Composition\_of\_Pronghorn\_in\_Wind\_Cave\_National\_Park\_South\_Dakota](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/303249417_Evaluating_Diet_Composition_of_Pronghorn_in_Wind_Cave_National_Park_South_Dakota)). There are enough fences criss-crossing the American West that I wouldn’t be surprised if you could draw quite a few populations of pronghorn and other megafauna as being “fenced in.” Edited to add: Incidentally, most of the time the fenced-in reserves are designed as barbed-wire fences enclosing an area with cattle grates at road crossings. Cattle grates are designed to inhibit hoofed mammal movement, but they aren’t perfect–sometimes animals can jump across or delicately walk on the bars. While browsing literature I found evidence of bison crossing cattle grates in Yellowstone, so even reserves we’re calling fenced-in are still somewhat permeable, and animals could get out. Citation: [https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/3782030.pdf?casa\_token=Gyonfb6HzRcAAAAA:ukSC43BcwU5j4Hgw-qITyeko\_I3KrA-XM0yKtRHoiU2Yu7cl4vh8zcJHBtwR-NvnCtR9zbmybhEIuXQpC5bzv3GBfpRpelBl1gfm3PjStgmyeLcBSjg](https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/3782030.pdf?casa_token=Gyonfb6HzRcAAAAA:ukSC43BcwU5j4Hgw-qITyeko_I3KrA-XM0yKtRHoiU2Yu7cl4vh8zcJHBtwR-NvnCtR9zbmybhEIuXQpC5bzv3GBfpRpelBl1gfm3PjStgmyeLcBSjg) ---
**Author:** ![marina\_gorbunova](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/marina_gorbunova/32/31454_2.png) [@marina\_gorbunova](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/marina_gorbunova)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 7:14pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/73 "2021-06-23T19:14:53Z")
If they’re not built to keep those in they shouldn’t count, but we need to find it out, I guess in many places they were. ---
**Author:** ![DianaStuder](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/dianastuder/32/43358_2.png) [@DianaStuder](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/DianaStuder)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 7:29pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/74 "2021-06-23T19:29:41Z")
Hello? scroll back up and you will see @tiwane is iNat staff, and has joined this conversation already ---
**Author:** ![dduff](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/dduff/32/1422_2.png) [@dduff](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/dduff)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 7:36pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/75 "2021-06-23T19:36:08Z")
> Besides bison, pronghorn, elk, and mule deer are all contained within the fence at Wind Cave NP [Wind Cave’s fences are actually designed to keep elk out](https://www.nps.gov/wica/learn/news/elk-fence-nears-completion-at-wind-cave-national-park.htm). The elk that stay there are doing so by their own free will. Yes, any captive animal could escape their enclosure, just as any prisoner can potentially escape from a penitentiary institution or animals sometimes escape their zoo enclosures. And one might argue that for that moment they _are_ briefly wild. ---
**Author:** ![dduff](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/dduff/32/1422_2.png) [@dduff](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/dduff)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 7:38pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/76 "2021-06-23T19:38:17Z")
Sorry for not clarifying. I had seen that one staff member had weighted in, but was really hoping that the staff might finally clarify the site’s provided definition as this has come up repeatedly and in different contexts. ---
**Author:** ![DianaStuder](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/dianastuder/32/43358_2.png) [@DianaStuder](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/DianaStuder)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 7:42pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/77 "2021-06-23T19:42:33Z")
Many threads about captive versus wild. And about separating Needs ID from that captive / wild. But for now we need to try and reach a workable consensus. ---
**Author:** ![harrier](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/harrier/32/8726_2.png) [@harrier](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/harrier)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 7:44pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/78 "2021-06-23T19:44:12Z")
> [Wind Cave’s fences are actually designed to keep elk out](https://www.nps.gov/wica/learn/news/elk-fence-nears-completion-at-wind-cave-national-park.htm). The elk that stay there are doing so by their own free will. Thanks for that link! That adds a really interesting wrinkle–the gates are closed during hunting season. Does that mean that the elk within the park are captive during that period, but wild when the gates are open? Could other species get through those open gates? ---
**Author:** ![harrier](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/harrier/32/8726_2.png) [@harrier](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/harrier)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 7:53pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/79 "2021-06-23T19:53:32Z")
My point by bringing up details of fencing design, etc., is not to get down into the weeds but rather to show that there’s a lot of nuance and disagreement in how people draw the line—as raymie said, how big of an enclosure does it have to be to be considered wild? What if it’s fenced only part of the year? What if humans intended water bodies to act as barriers? As I described above, in gray areas like this, I’m generally in favor of including data and letting people filter it out themselves. Raymie’s done all this research into which ones are fenced and which ones aren’t—perhaps they could share that information for those interested in finding wild, unfenced bison through a journal or blog post? I’m personally really interested in bison from an ecological standpoint, so I’d be interested in seeing iNat records of conservation herds on areas large enough to have a significant ecological impact on the landscape (e.g. to compare iNat observations of other prairie species with bison on large free-range areas). I think most of the people on this thread agree farmed bison are pretty clearly not wild, but the gray area seems to mostly be in these conservation herds on large areas of public lands. ---
**Author:** ![psweet](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/psweet/32/3156_2.png) [@psweet](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/psweet)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 8:04pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/80 "2021-06-23T20:04:20Z")
Fair enough, but it shouldn’t be hard to find other species that the fence would impact, if they ever ran across it. The point is that just because a fence exists on the landscape doesn’t mean that an organism is actually constrained by it. ---
**Author:** ![dduff](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/dduff/32/1422_2.png) [@dduff](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/dduff)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 8:32pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/81 "2021-06-23T20:32:43Z")
> …the gates are closed during hunting season. Does that mean that the elk within the park are captive during that period, but wild when the gates are open? My opinion would be that those that stayed are captive during hunting season, as it seems they are unable to leave (unless they’ve constructed the one-way fences you sometimes see out here designed to get animals off of highways, but prevent them from getting back into the highway area). > The average person would consider animals free ranging, not being fed, not receiving medical care, not getting shelter etc to be wild. I agree that an average person would and am _somewhat_ in agreement with it myself, though there’s a whole spectrum of management practices of even the NPS herds that most people are simply not aware of. I have come around to the idea that open range animals (cattle, horses, sheep, etc) are essentially wild because they can generally go where they want, when they want. And I kind of get the arguments that a small enough herd on a large enough tract of land is _almost_ open range. Though, in truth, many of these public herds are really at capacity and require regular culling, so it’s kind of open range… without the “open” part. So I can understand what I believe @raymie’s position is, which I would summarize as this: With fenced animals (with a fence built specifically to contain them) you can draw a shape on a map and say you are effectively certain that the animals are within that boundary. With open range animals you can only say that there’s a high probability that the animals are in any specified area because you would not _expect_ them to stray too far from areas that should meet their needs. Like _The Truman Show_, but without the cameras to truly ensure that they’re still there. > Many threads about captive versus wild. And about separating Needs ID from that captive / wild. But for now we need to try and reach a workable consensus. > My point by bringing up details of fencing design, etc., is not to get down into the weeds but rather to show that there’s a lot of nuance and disagreement in how people draw the line Agreed. There is a lot of nuance here and the platform creators seemed to decide that things which are not clearcut should be decided through votes. I still wish that the “wild” question wasn’t a binary choice, as it loses much of that nuance and I am regularly surprised at how nasty/offended people can get when you disagree with their assessment of their observation. In my mind, the debate itself is actually more interesting than the designation. There’s more to be learned if we allow identifiers to provide reasons for their vote instead of chastising them for how or why they voted, which has largely been my personal experience on this issue. What I will say is that if you go backpacking in, say, Badlands NP it’s not entirely unreasonable to worry about having an on-foot confrontation with a bison. _That certainly **feels** wild_. But if you pitched your tent on the other side of the fence I would argue that you have zero reason to worry about that happening. So I’m pretty comfortable with a fence being a large factor in my decision, but I’m also quite sure that even the fence separation wouldn’t be enough to put some people fully at ease. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![cmcheatle](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/cmcheatle/32/37_2.png) [@cmcheatle](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/cmcheatle)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 8:58pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/82 "2021-06-23T20:58:48Z")
No the intention is to stop bison and cattle interacting. It is equally valid to say this is done by limiting the movement of bison as to say it is done by limiting the movement of the cattle. It’s only a ‘bison fence’ if your desire is to say the bison are captive. If anything the goal is given that the land is federally owned in most cases is to stop the cattle getting onto the land to avoid the liability of cattle catching something from the bison. ---
**Author:** ![sedgequeen](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/sedgequeen/32/1928_2.png) [@sedgequeen](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/sedgequeen)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 9:04pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/83 "2021-06-23T21:04:18Z")
(1) If the system changed so that marking observation Captive/Cultivated didn’t send them to iNat purgatory with defective observations that lack locations, photos, etc., this would be an interesting and fairly important question but trivial as far as iNaturalist functionality goes. Everyone who has commented on this topic should go to this link and vote! [https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/make-captive-cultivated-not-automatically-no-id-needed/112/25](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/make-captive-cultivated-not-automatically-no-id-needed/112/25) (2) I can’t see a difference in the status of Wind Cave bison fenced by a physical fence and wild Yellowstone bison fenced by the invisible fence of being shot if they leave. (3) If @raymie votes a population “captive” and you disagree, you can vote it wild and call all your friends to do the same. This would seriously annoy @raymie and be much less efficient than resolving this issue for everyone, but the option is there. ---
**Author:** ![raymie](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/raymie/32/12650_2.png) [@raymie](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/raymie)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2021, 9:09pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143/84 "2021-06-23T21:09:34Z")
It would annoy me a little, but I literally told everyone to do that above. [Previous page](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143.md?page=3) [Next page](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/wild-american-bison-are-captive/24143.md?page=5)