As summer rolls along, the Utah Department of Natural Resources’ Division of Wildlife Resources is reminding the public to use caution around the animals, especially at the location they will most likely interact with them — Antelope Island State Park. Last week, DWR even sent out a press release about avoiding conflicts with the bison that roam freely around the park.

DWR Public Information Officer Faith Heaton Jolley told the Standard-Examiner on Monday that conflicts between humans and bison are most common elsewhere, but they still want to remind the public to be careful.

“We try to put out a reminder every year for how to prevent conflicts with bison in Utah,” she said. “It’s not a super common occurrence to see people injured by bison in Utah itself, but it is something that we’ll see quite frequently at nearby Yellowstone National Park where there are people that get injured by these large mammals.”

She said there are three main areas where substantial bison herds are maintained in the state of Utah.

“The most common place that we have people come into contact with bison is Antelope Island State Park,” she said. “We do also have herds on the Henry Mountains in southern Utah and the Book Cliffs in eastern Utah, but both of those populations are pretty remote, so it’s not an easily accessible place to go see bison. Usually, if someone’s going to encounter a bison, it is going to be at Antelope Island State Park. During the last couple of years, we have seen a few instances where visitors were charged and injured by bison.”

Jolley said she is unaware of any charging incidents that have happened this year at Antelope Island State Park.

According to the DWR press release, the Antelope Island State Park’s bison herd is one of the largest and oldest public herds, fluctuating from around 500 in the winter to more than 700 following the calving season.

Jolley said there are several interpretations of how many feet people should put between them and bison, but DWR has one metric that it goes by.

“If you ever encounter a bison and it stops what it’s doing and it starts looking at you, you are too close … and you should start backing away,” she said.

In the press release, Utah State Parks North Region Manager Wendy Wilson said hikers are even told to disregard some well-established trail rules in certain instances when encountering a bison.

“We’ve got trail restrictions on Antelope Island in the backcountry, but safety trumps those rules,” Wilson said. “If you are in the backcountry hiking and you come across any wildlife that’s in your path, we urge you to travel around it. Whatever distance you think you should remain from the animal, double it — that’s how far back you should stay.”

Jolley added that, if people encounter them while driving around the park, the key is to be patient.

“It’s not uncommon at Antelope Island State Park to see bison crossing the road or eating or grazing by the side of the road when you’re driving through the park,” she said. “We definitely recommend that if somebody does see a bison that’s in or near the road that they just stay inside their vehicle to prevent those encounters. … Slowly drive by it, stop and wait for it to pass, but don’t get out of your vehicle.”

For more information on bison and avoiding conflicts with them, visit https://www.wildawareutah.org/wildlife/bison/.