European bison specimens from 1811-1914 in European science collections - little known aspect of the 19th century game management in Białowieża Primeval Forest

The 19th century game management in Białowieża Primeval Forest (BPF), especially hunts for European bison, have been a subject of several works. The aspect of hunts motivated by research and museum needs have not been described in detail yet. The paper attempts at describing the administrative process behind such hunts and collecting all records of bison hunted or captured and carcasses acquired in BPF for museums, natural collections and universities in 1811−1914 (period covered by manuscript sources and published historical works with data on bison hunts available). Based on available sources, we calculated that in the period in question a total of 153 bison were hunted during ‘recreational' hunts (by tsars, their families and exalted guests with special tsars' permissions) and 56 were shot for purposes of study and research – therefore 27% out of 209 hunts had research motivations. Furthermore, 72 bison were captured alive (for zoos, cross−breeding and taming experiments) and carcasses of 89 bison (plus another 9 of unknown origin) were sent to museums and universities all around Europe. We believe that this little known aspect of the 19th century game management in BPF has had a significant impact on informing the scientific world and especially the general public about the European bison species, which in turn could have contributed to successful, international collaboration after the extinction of the species in the wild in 1919