Catalina Island, CA

If you were given a home where the buffalo roam, you’d expect it might be in the plains of Wyoming or South Dakota somewhere, but for about 3,800 Californians, it means a piece of paradise in the Pacific known as Catalina Island.

They don’t often mingle with the locals, but a healthy, happy herd of about 225 bison populates Catalina, freely roaming the island’s interior.

“It’s the last place in the world I’d expect to see buffalo,” says visiting New Yorker Kathy McKenna, “yet there they were, standing around, minding their own business.”

Buffalo probably shouldn’t come as a surprise on an island whose only town, Avalon, has a casino with no gambling, a Third Street, but no First, Second or Fourth, shops that deliver, and a post office that doesn’t. Yet people are amazed and delighted.

“They say, ‘It’s fantastic!’” says Herman Saldana, who’s the head of herd management. “They can go places and see them in a corral, but to drive by and see them next to the road makes it exciting.”

Many of the buffalo are the descendants of 14 head brought to the island in 1924 for the filming of a movie version of author Zane Grey’s The Vanishing American.

About 10 years later, another 11 were brought in to increase the herd. “Mr. Wrigley was real sharp about tourism, and it was his idea,” says Herman, referring to William Wrigley Jr., owner of the Chicago Cubs who bought the island in 1919. In later years, the Wrigley family established the Santa Catalina Island Conservancy, which owns about 86 percent of the island’s 76 square miles and ensures its conservation and preservation.

The Conservancy oversees the buffalo stamping grounds; rugged and rolling hills, lush with plant life; over a hundred species of birds; and animals including foxes, goats, and deer. Visitors can hike into the interior (permit required) to see the buffalo, which Herman says are “real friendly, but still classified as a wild animal, so you don’t want to get too close.”

Most island visitors opt for the inland bus tour and usually get to see part of the herd. “Every time a tour bus goes by, the oldest ones that look like they can barely stand are always next to the road,” Saldana laughs. “The younger, real nice- looking ones are probably just over the hill.”

Or taking a hike. “People from the Bison Association have come and seen some on the steep cliffs and couldn’t believe it. “Everybody thinks this is rough country for buffalo, but they’re accustomed to it.”

They’re not only adaptable, Herman thinks they’re pretty intelligent animals as well. “For years, the herd stayed at around 60, and as they got more vegetation, they started breeding a little more.”

Buffalo are low-maintenance animals, Saldana says. “They graze, they roam, during droughts we feed them hay.” Most live about 20 years and remain pretty healthy. “Once in a while, we have to put down an old buffalo that’s getting pretty shaggy,” he adds.

To keep the herd around 225, about every other year they sell some. They go to places in Oklahoma, Montana, Kansas, and Nevada, where they’re used mostly for breeding.

Rarely do the buffalo cause a problem, but Saldana recalls an incident about 20 years ago: “One went right through the school ground while all the kids were out at recess playing hopscotch. The teacher yelled, ‘Freeze!’ and the buffalo went all around the kids and right through their game.”

On occasion, one ambles into town. “About a year ago, we had an old female who just walked all the way into Avalon, wound up on the golf course. We chased her out, and next morning she was walking back again.”

Who can blame her? The town is post-card charming, with houses and hotels pressed into the hillside and pleasure boats anchored in the harbor. It’s one of the reasons Catalina’s long been known as an amorous getaway for folks in metropolitan Los Angeles.

The rest of the world discovered Catalina Island in the late 1950s, when the Four Preps recorded the song Twenty-six Miles. They called it the “island of romance,” but the few thousand fortunate residents living here today call it home, where the buffalo roam.

Alice Ross is a freelance writer from Locust Valley, N. Y.

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