Yet again, a young person who calls herself a social media influencer has risked serious injury by getting too close to wildlife to take pictures and video of herself.
Identified only as “Maylee,” the young woman has a large following on the TikTok platform. She recently posted footage of herself trying to reach out and pet a bison at the famous Yellowstone National Park. In the video she can be seen leaning out of her car’s window while she asks the driver to get ever closer to the buffalo, which was walking slowly in the middle of the road.
As the car approached the nearly 1-ton animal, Maylee can be seen reaching out to touch it, but she was just an inch away. Disappointed, Maylee complains that she missed the opportunity, saying, “I want to touch him so bad.” She also said what have been the famous last words of park tourists who do not heed the signs to stay away from wild animals: “He wants to be my friend.”
That is unlikely. Most wild animals are not particularly friendly to humans. Though they may tolerate the presence of people, non-domesticated animals are easily spooked. If they believe they are being threatened, animals like buffalo will absolutely charge a human and kill her if they can.
Park rangers at sites such as Yellowstone have a constant headache trying to convince people to take their warnings seriously. The park has many signs warning of the danger of feeding or approaching animals too closely.
Buffalo are among the most dangerous beasts in the preserve. In June, a woman in her 80s was gored to death by an enraged bison who thought she was entering its domain (well, that is what humans are doing). The animal gored her to death.
Bison have lived in the area that is now Yellowstone since before humans started recording history. The American buffalo is one of just two species of large bovines (animals in the cow family) left alive in the world.
Maylee did not “read the room”; her TikTok fans were not impressed with her antics. Users told her she was lucky she had a good driver, and that what she did was reckless and dangerous.
Bison injure or kill more people at Yellowstone than any other animal that lives there. Not only are they huge, but you cannot predict their behavior. Even worse, they can run up to three times as fast as people can; you simply are not going to outrun an angry buffalo.
