A 1,500-pound bison attacked a man in Utah’s Antelope Island over the weekend, it was reported.
However, witnesses said the man provoked the animal, and it rammed him into a nearby fence.
The man appeared to be uninjured after he was slammed, but he “is very, very, very lucky that he wasn’t killed,” assistant park manager John Sullivan told KSL TV.
“The [bison] had gone through the gate section that’s located real close to where he got hit and looked like he was going to run off the field,” witness Wayne Ebenroth of Boise told KSL.
He continued that the man, who was not identified “had to have done something to catch the [bison’s] attention, because that’s when he turned around and decided to pay him a visit.”
Elaborating further, Ebenroth said the bison “just was not comfortable with how close he was hanging out with him.”
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Park officials decided not to cite the man so as to not add “insult to injury,” the station said.
Recently, hunters killed more wild bison migrating from Yellowstone National Park this season than they have in decades, with the numbers driven by strong participation from American Indians who harvest the animals under longstanding treaty rights.
Roughly 250 bison have been killed since last fall after leaving Yellowstone for low-elevation winter range in Montana.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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