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Over the course of the $6.5-million five-year trial project, Parks staff will evaluate the health of the herd, their movements, survival and reproductive rates, and how well they adapt to the environment and predation from wolves packs and bears.

Karsten Heuer, the bison project manager, said the successful translocation was emotional for him and his team.

“If it works, we are actually setting the seeds for just one of four plains bison populations in North America that are actually interacting with their environment,” he said. “That will be a first in over 140 years in Banff National Park, and that’s really why we’re doing this is to make them wild again.

“They’ve been absent from this landscape for too long and so I think today is the hooves on the ground beginning of trying to bring that back.”

Ten pregnant females and six young bulls with radio collars were transported in three-metre-long shipping containers from Elk Island to Ya Ha Tinda Ranch in late January. They were then airlifted by helicopter to the paddock.

“Within a few hours they were feeding, they were drinking out of the trough. The next morning a couple of the bulls were rubbing horns and bucking, which is a good sign that they were feeling calm and settled,” Heuer said.

Backcountry travellers will be able to access the remote reintroduction zone by a two-day hike, ski or horseback trip, but require a backcountry camping permit to do so. For the rest of the public, a homecoming celebration is planned for March 3 at the Cave and Basin National Historic Site.