Buffalo Dan's Bison

While observing the bison over the past two months, I've begun to notice a definite behavioral pattern concerning how they interact with each other and the objects in their environment.  Specifically, I've noticed a tendency to frequently test the physical characteristics of the things around them and, if a perceived weakness is found, to often attempt to destroy those weak objects.  In other words, bison like to mess with things. A 100lbs roll of high tensile steel fencing mysteriously pushed over.  If I were to place a chair in the middle of the pasture, I could guarantee you that the next day the chair would be at a minimum tipped over.  It would probably also be pushed about 30 meters from its original location and broken.  The same would be true of any other man-made objects.  One time I had neatly stacked several large pieces of cardboard near our vehicle gate intending to take them away for recycling the following day.  That night the bison came an somehow manag

Finished burning a portion of the pasture for patch-burn grazing in which you burn a different portion of pasture each year.  The bison like the new grass that grows in the burned area the most so grazing will be concentrated in a different area each year.  Immediately after the burn, the bison walked up to investigate, which gave me an opportunity to take some good photographs. The surveillance station not yet painted. An extraordinarily vivid scene of the eastern sky during a sunset. And, finally... The "KISS" Bison.

Over the past few weeks I've worked on my free time to finish implementation of my off-the-grid Raspberry Pi-based remote bison monitoring station.  Currently, the system is programmed to take photographs every five minutes and send those photos to me every hour in an email.  This current method is my first configuration, so it is quite basic. However, while designing the system, I built in the room and flexibility necessary for significant expansion.  It is hard to describe the level of security and relief one feels at being able to receive continuous updates on the condition of your herd no matter where you are located.  I'll describe the system further in future posts when I have time.