Animal Database

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Animal Database
Holocene Bison
Bison occidentalis
Bison occidentalis restoration
Scientific Classification
Kingdom Animalia
Phylum Chordata
Class Mammalia
Order Artiodactyla
Family Bovidae
Genus Bison
Species †B. occidentalis
Conservation Status
EXSpecies
Extinct

Bison occidentalis is an extinct species of bison that lived in North America during the Pleistocene. It probably evolved from Bison priscus. B. occidentalis was smaller, and smaller-horned, than the steppe bison. Unlike any bison before it, its horns pointed upward, parallel to the plane of its face from nose to forehead, instead of pointing forward through that plane. Around 5,000 years ago, B. occidentalis was replaced by today's smaller Bison bison. It has been theorized that B. occidentalis declined in numbers because of competition with other grass eaters of the megafauna epoch.

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