The Genesee Herd

If you pass the high meadows of Genesee Park west of Denver, you may see bison grazing, and those animals carry a remarkable lineage. In nineteen fourteen the city of Denver acquired bison and elk from Yellowstone National Park, whose herd held some of the last truly wild bison left on the continent, and established a herd at Genesee as part of an early conservation effort to keep the species from vanishing. In nineteen thirty-eight, twenty animals were moved south to establish a second herd at Daniels Park.

Both herds trace back to that Yellowstone stock, which makes them a living thread back to the animals that once darkened the plains by the millions. The herds are managed by Denver Mountain Parks, and surplus animals have over the years been transferred to Native American tribes, helping restore bison to lands where they were nearly exterminated. Seeing them from a Front Range overlook is a small encounter with a much larger story about how close the American bison came to disappearing, and how a city park helped pull it back.