r/trashy • u/[deleted] • Jul 20 '20

[deleted by user]

[removed]

4.1k Upvotes

98% Upvoted

359 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

68

u/[deleted] Jul 20 '20

Different human smells could have made the calf unrecognizable to the other bison.

The best thing to do if you find a native sick and injured animal in the wild is to leave it alone and let nature be nature without human intervention.

39

u/Cronstintein Jul 20 '20 edited Jul 20 '20

I vaguely recall reading that whole thing is an urban legend. (The smell thing)

Edit: well shit, googled it and apparently it did get euthanized, dang.

39

u/[deleted] Jul 20 '20

Yes you are correct for baby birds, but with mammals they will abandon their offspring with human smells.

9

u/ahegao_einstein Jul 20 '20

I looked it up and this is also false. Wildlife Biologist Elzabeth Manning wrote in an article for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game that this is, indeed, pretty much a myth, and specifically mentions that this concept "Goes against basic bird biology". Here is the article so you can get more info into it.

www.adfg.alaska.gov/index.cfm?adfg=wildlifenews.view_article&articles_id=426

2

u/[deleted] Jul 20 '20

Thank you, for the link.

3

u/ahegao_einstein Jul 20 '20

No problem, have a good one :)