The founder of the dynasty. The bison bull came today to the females in a new nature reserve
The transport of the bison bull from the Tabor Zoo to the nature reserve near Rokycany in the western part of the Czech Republic was successfully completed without a single problem this morning.
The three-year-old male set off on a journey before ten o’clock in the morning. He arrived at his destination about half an hour before noon. After a few minutes, he came out of the shipping box and began to examine the acclimatisation enclosure. In a few days he will join three female bison bred in the nature reserve of large ungulates in the former military area of Milovice near Prague. They were brought to the reserve in January. In this way, a new breeding herd of endangered European bison was composed in Central Europe.
“The creation of a new breeding group is very important. There are about seven and a half thousand bison in the world. It will be possible to consider this endangered species saved only when its number exceeds ten thousand,” said Dalibor Dostal, director of the conservation organisation European Wildlife.
In the new reserve, the bison herd will have at its disposal an area of approximately 50 hectares consisting of pastures and forests. “Bison will live there as freely as in the wild,” says Evzen Korec, director of the Tábor Zoo. For the first time ever, a bison bred in a domestic zoo was released in a Czech nature reserve. Until now, Czech zoos have exported their additions to nature reserves in Poland, Slovakia and other countries.
The nature reserve near Rokycany was established last year. Since then, large ungulates have been helping to maintain a site of European importance where rare species are protected on the site of a former military training ground. In October last year, a herd of wild horses arrived there from the Milovice nature reserve.
The former military training ground, which became the basis of the new reserve, is rich in rare species. The stone crayfish lives there, and the grass snake, the agile frog, the common toad and the red-backed shrike are found there. Of the rare plant species, the Siberian iris, the globeflower and the shining meadow rue grow there.
