credit Photo: Henning Bock
European bison — seen here at a park in Belgium — are slightly smaller than their American cousins, but still weigh between 1,000 and 2,000 pounds when fully grown. They once roamed from southern England to the Caucasus Mountains, but were almost wiped out by the end of the 1920s. "It’s the only large herbivore which has remained alive in its natural condition since 10,000 years ago," says World Wildlife Fund Latvia’s Ints Mednis.
credit Photo: Henning Bock
Dutch conservationist Joep van de Vlasakker (right) is a consultant to organizations working to reintroduce large herbivores to habitats where they’ve been wiped out. He works with zoos and nature parks that have too many bison on their hands, hoping to create new herds in places like Latvia where there is ample open space. "I try not to pay for animals. I don’t want to create a market," van de Vlasakker says. "Once you start paying, people ask for more and more."
credit Photo: Henning Bock
Moving animals as large as bison is risky. Because of Europe’s struggles with a hair-raising range of cattle diseases like mad cow, bluetongue, brucellosis, and hoof-and-mouth, each animal has to be tranquilized and have a blood sample drawn before it can cross any European borders. Tranquilizing a wild animal is largely a matter of guesswork, because, unlike cattle, they refuse to sit still to be weighed.
credit Photo: Henning Bock
Young European bison, like these endangered animals at the Han-sur-Lesse nature park in Belgium, take four years to fully mature. Unlike domestic cattle, they can be unpredictable —and deadly. "If they come full speed towards you, they can kill you," says conservationist Joep van de Vlasakker. "Even these small ones."
credit Photo: Henning Bock
At a wild-animal park near Han-sur-Lesse, Belgium, an endangered European bison gets a stiff dose of tranquilizer administered via a hypodermic dart to the rear before it can be moved.
credit Photo: Henning Bock
Wild-animal vet Olivier Bertrand uses a dart gun to tranquilize a bison.
credit Photo: Andrew Curry
It takes a big needle to bring down a 1500-pound bison: Here an orange-tufted dart used to tranquilize endangered bison to prepare them for transport.
credit Photo: Henning Bock
Tranquilized bison were roped and dragged onto an old shipping pallet at a nature park in Belgium.
credit Photo: Andrew Curry
The bison were lifted into the air using a forklift under the watchful eye of veterinarian Olivier Bertrand (right).
credit Photo: Andrew Curry
The animals were carefully maneuvered into a waiting transport by conservationist Joep van de Vlasakker before vet Olivier Bertrand administered an antidote to the tranquilizer.
credit Photo: Henning Bock
A steady rain falls as a John Deere forklift moves tranquilized bison from a corral to a waiting truck and trailer at a nature park near Han-sur-Lesse, Belgium. The bison will spend nearly four days on the truck, en route to a preserve on the coast of Latvia.
credit Photo: Henning Bock
Belgian wild-animal vet Olivier Bertrand (left) and Dutch conservationist Joep van de Vlasakker move seven agitated bison from a corral at Han-sur-Lesse wildlife park in Belgium onto a truck quickly, to prevent deadly doses of tranquilizer from building up in the animals’ livers.
credit Photo: Henning Bock
A truck especially designed to transport cattle was used to move nine endangered bison from Belgium and the Netherlands to Latvia. Part of the journey was aboard a Danish ferry, the MV Ask.
credit Photo: Henning Bock
Year-old bison calves were loaded into a cattle trailer for the journey from Belgium to Latvia.
credit Photo: Henning Bock
Belgian vet Olivier Bertrand (center) and conservationist Joep van de Vlasakker (left) talk to park staff in Han-sur-Lesse, Belgium, after loading endangered bison onto a cattle truck.
credit Photo: Henning Bock
The bison paddock at Lake Pape, near the Latvian city of Liepaja, is 500 acres of meadow and forest bordered by a fence. Visitors can spot the creatures from a tall wooden watchtower — or try. "We try to fence as big an area as possible so human interference is limited," says Ints Mednis, who runs the project for the World Wildlife Fund of Latvia.
credit Photo: Henning Bock
Last-minute complications meant the bison were released into a temporary quarantine at Kalvene Zoo in southern Latvia, an hour and a half’s drive from the Lake Pape preserve, to wait until blood tests confirmed they were disease-free. After their long journey, the bison were eager to get out of the truck and eat fresh grass.
credit Photo: Henning Bock
At the impromptu quarantine in Kalvene, Latvia, rare-breed cows stare through a wire fence at recently arrived bison. The bison’s temporary paddock was 60 hectares — "more space than they’ve ever seen in their lives," Mednis says. In September, they were moved to Lake Pape.
credit Photo: Henning Bock
Dutch conservationist Joep van de Vlasakker, 47, sees rewilding as a way to restore a balance lost thousands of years ago. "It’s something man needs to do because nature can’t anymore — or nature isn’t allowed to," he says.
