One minute, she is waiting for a group of bison to clear the trail. The next she’s running for her life as a bison charges at her. The phone falls as the bison gores her back, off camera, sending her tumbling into a thorny bush yelling in pain. In the following video, Clark uses profane language.
@rebeccaclark Solo hiking at Caprock Canyons State Park & Trailway in Texas. I was charged and gored by a bison because I was to CLOSE to be passing them on a trailway They are beautiful creatures protected by the Texas Parks & Wildlife Department (TPWD) and are a part of the Texas State Bison Restoration Project where the park has restored the historic Charles Goodnight Bison herd (The Official Texas State Bison Herd) to a portion of its former range in the park. I am posting to support safety while enjoying Texas State Parks #TPWD #bisonetiquette101 #hikingsafety #llbean #chaos #rei ♬ dumb dumb – sped up – mazie
With limited cell service, she told The Washington Post, she managed to get word to her son, and rescuers reached her about 50 minutes later. The attack left Clark, 54, hospitalized for six days with a large gash in her back, but she expects to fully recover and return to exploring the outdoors by December.
“I was very lucky,” said Clark, an early-childhood specialist from Boyd, Tex., who described herself as an avid and experienced hiker. She said she forgot she had been recording during the attack, but when she rediscovered the clip in the hospital, she decided to post it on TikTok to warn even the most experienced hikers to never be complacent around wild animals.
“The more I watched it, I thought, wow, I was just too close,” she said. “And there are people out there just like me who get confident.”
She credited Caprock Canyons for having extensive warnings not to get too close to bison, including a large display in the visitor’s center, but she said it was her second time visiting and she did not pay as close attention as she should have.
Bison can run three times faster than humans, despite weighing up to one ton, according to the National Park Service. Officials at Yellowstone National Park, which is home to the country’s largest and oldest wild bison herd, warn that bison have injured more visitors than any other animal in the park, including three people attacked in a one-month span earlier this year.
Texas Parks and Wildlife spokesperson Stephanie Salinas Garcia said the agency is aware of Clark’s attack and has kept in touch with her during her recovery. Visitors to Caprock Canyons should stay at least 50 yards away from bison, Garcia added.
On its website, the agency recommends following the “rule of thumb”: If you close one eye, stretch an arm out and hold your thumb up to the bison, it should completely cover the view of the animal — otherwise, you are too close.
In Clark’s video, the animals’ tails begin to swish before one of the bison charges at her. According to Texas Parks and Wildlife, anxious bison will raise their tails in a question mark, a sign that you are disturbing the animal.
“Other signs of agitation or disapproval are pawing the ground and lowering its head,” the agency says. “In bison culture, a head-on gaze can communicate a threat or just simply rude behavior, especially to dominant males. If you see any of these behaviors, leave the area.”
As a general rule, the…
Read More: A bison gored a hiker at Texas’s Caprock Canyons. She posted the video to
