So I found a bison skull. Now what?

[ShortMountain91]

Pretty neat. Keep us posted what you find out about it

 

[Hnthrdr]

Nice stone point find! Never found one in Co. families ranch in AZ I have found some but nothing in that good of shape!

 

[IdahoElk]

Cool!

 

[Hunt eat repeat]

Found this in the bottom of a river, any chance it’s bison as well? Thanks

100% bison

 

[Hunt eat repeat]

I’ve found a couple. Only have a pic of one. I have seen Buffalo bones in cut banks with 15’ of soil over them. Always wonder how old they are. Always gets the wheels turning when ya find stuff like that.

 

[Stalker69]

Well, if the past is prelude, you'll write a book on buffalo, maybe call it, dunno, American Buffalo or something. Do some more writing, maybe move to NY and start a TV show. Then, one day, you'll be a mega star with a huge online store and if you are REAL lucky, someone on the online forum Rokslide will start a thread on you.. then, and only then will you know you have made it. Good Luck.

As an aside, that's a cool skull. You could most definitely have it aged. But might be just as cool to clean it up and set i on a shelf. The point is awesome though - you ain't the first archer to venture that way - something to consider.

Actually, I might have unscrewed my broadhead and left it next to the stone one. Can you image what runs through the next guy's head in 5,000 years?

Thing is in 5000 years that stone point will look just like it does now, and your broadhead will have rusted away and no trace that it ever existed. Cool find.

 

[CMF]

Any update on the age or confirmation if it's bison?

 

[DanP]

Awesome stone point! I have found many skulls but have only ever seen one buffalo skull, a friend found it in MT.

 

[Pmerritt1288]

Thats pretty cool.

 

[Swamp Fox]

Damn, thats cool! Im going to meet with someone at the local state school after Thanksgiving to have this examined and hopefully learn more about it. They seemed to be more interested in the stone point than the bison skull. They were also pretty excited about my having documented the locations of the finds. I.E. OnX waypoints with lat & long.

Well, there goes the neighborhood...

 

[commandoNate]

Time to report back! I just emailed the guy at University of Colorado who sent a sample of the bison skull off for carbon dating for me. This was his response:

Sorry for forgetting to get back to you all - the bison came back as ancient, but only sometime between the 18th and early 20th centuries... Difficult to say with any more precision where it would have fallen within that time period, and suggests that the projectile point you found is from a different component. Pretty interesting though that bison were up there that recently...

 

[commandoNate]

Well, there goes the neighborhood...

They would need a decade or more of PP's to hunt that area so I'm not too worried about spot burning if that's what you are referring to.

 

[huntineveryday]

I found what I'm positive to be a bison metacarpal a couple years ago sticking out the side of a cattle trail washout going down a hill. I have a few bovine metacarpals to compare it to. I have it on a shelf and check that spot every year for anything new showing, only some bone fragments so far.

At that time I had found an article talking about how bones from bison bison are new enough that they would likely still have relatively the same density as recent cattle bones found on the surface. Bison antiquus would have mineralized (or something along those lines) and would be much denser than those of bison bison.

At some point I will take mine in to the university to have correctly identified. Still hoping to find a skull there, but haven't dug out the hillside looking yet!