Ancient beasts to roam the heaths!

We’re so excited to announce a ground-breaking new grazing project coming to a heathland near you.

After many thousands of years, the Thames Bison is being reintroduced to help shape the heathland landscape. These gentle woolly giants – closely related to European Bison – became extinct on the marshy floodplains of the Thames Basin millennia ago, but a small herd has now been reintroduced at a secret location on the Thames Basin Heaths Special Protection Area. Here they’ll browse on the gorse and other scrub, making the perfect habitat for ground-nesting birds like Nightjars and Woodlarks, and other endangered heathland wildlife.

Bison expert Olaf Ripol tells us “if you come across a Thames Bison on your local heath do not approach – they smell terrible!”.

Thames Basin Heaths Partnership