What happened to Bison No. 4 at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science?

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Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite
John Demboski, curator of vertebrate zoology at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, and a taxidermied bison in the institution’s basement archive. March 1, 2023.

There’s a family of Bison in Colorado that hasn’t moved a muscle in over a century. They’re housed in the archives of the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. And one of them is missing.

Every single thing in the museum’s collection – all 4.3 million pieces – has its own number. That includes these bison, cataloged as specimens Nos. 1, 2, 3 and 5.

So how did these bison get these numbers? As the curator of vertebrate zoology, John Demboski cares for this taxidermied herd, among many other specimens in the museum.

“These were part of a founding collection for the museum,” Demboski said. “There were three founding collections here at the museum back in 1900.”

Read the full story on Denverite.