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Louisiana Bison

KEDM Public Radio | By Kelby Ouchley

Published January 4, 2016 at 9:00 AM EST

The image of thundering herds of buffalo racing across endless prairies is not one that is often associated with Louisiana, the Bayou State. Historically, though, the scene is not far-fetched. The animals we call buffalo are more correctly termed bison to separate them from true buffalo of Africa and Asia. Early French explorers in Louisiana called them boeuf sauvage - wild ox.

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Kelby Ouchley

Kelby was a biologist and manager of National Wildlife Refuges for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for more than 30 years. He has worked with alligators in gulf coast marshes and Canada geese on Hudson Bay tundra. His most recent project was working with his brother Keith of the Louisiana Nature Conservancy on the largest floodplain restoration project in the Mississippi River Basin at the Mollicy Unit of the Upper Ouachita National Wildlife Refuge, reconnecting twenty-five square miles of former floodplain forest back to the Ouachita River.

See stories by Kelby Ouchley