A Dung Deal: Get Your Bison Pies Here!

Denver has two bison herds, one at Genesee Park and one at Daniels Park, two of the most popular spots in the Denver Mountain Parks system. As a result, Denver also has plenty of bison shit: The great beasts basically poop through the day, producing about three gallons of dung daily.

Now you can pick up where the bison leave off. On Saturday, April 26, the Denver Mountain Parks Foundation, which supports the 22 mountain parks, is hosting its inaugural Bison Pies for Gardening event. Head to the Genesee Park North Bison Enclosure with a shovel, bucket and gloves, and you can enter the pasture (the bison won't be there) to collect your own personal supply of bison manure to fertilize your garden.

Although the announcement of the event came out April 1, this "is not an April Fools' joke," says Kate Fritz, executive director of the foundation. "It's just a fun thing to do for a fundraiser." While entrance to the pasture will be free, donations are definitely welcome. "Anything we get goes back to mountain parks," she notes, adding that volunteers will be on hand to help out.

And the poop harvest should be bountiful. The city doesn't clean up after its bison; it lets the waste degrade naturally...and slowly. To speed things up, Denver Mountain Parks worked with the Denver Zoo Conservation Alliance to introduce native dung beetles at Genesee Park late last year. "While bison were reintroduced here over 100 years ago, we now know it takes an entire community of species to create a thriving ecosystem," the Zoo notes. "These tiny recyclers help break down bison dung, pulling nutrients underground where they fuel plant growth and improve soil health."

Fritz has been impressed with their work. "They're pretty amazing little animals, and we'll have some educational materials," she says of the dung beetles. "They burrow into ground, aerate and fertilize the ground, and restore the grasslands."

Denver's bison herds are a restoration project, too. They're descended from the last wild bison in North America. By 1908, eighteen bison at the Denver Zoo were all that remained in Colorado. The herd was moved to Genesee Park in 1914 and expanded to Daniels Park in 1938; today, the city has an estimated sixty bison.

And plenty of bison pies.

Bison Pies for Gardening runs from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday, April 26, at the Genesee Park North Bison Pasture, Beaver Brook Trailhead, 27661 Stapleton Drive in Golden. Admission is free, but registration is encouraged.