The National Bison Assn. unveiled May 25 a new comprehensive database of scientific literature relating to bison health, nutrition, genetics and other information.

“This new online database is designed to be the go-to site for anyone conducting research, writing articles or simply trying to increase their knowledge of fundamental issues related to bison,” National Bison Assn. executive director Dave Carter said.

The database is the final product of a literature review conducted over the past six months by Dr. Gerald Huntington, professor emeritus in the department of animal science at North Carolina State University. The project was initiated by the bison organization’s Science & Research Committee and was underwritten by the National Buffalo Foundation.

The project began after a delegation of ranchers met last September with Dr. Robin Schoen, chair of the Board on Agriculture & Natural Resources for the National Academy of Science in Washington, D.C. Schoen advised the delegation that a literature review would be the first step in developing formal "Nutritional Requirements for Bison" publication through the National Research Council of the National Academies.

The bison association has built a Zotero bibliographic database containing almost 2,000 references to scientific literature from scientific journals, university reports, conference and workshop proceedings and industry publications such as Bison World magazine.

The database, named "Bison references," can be accessed at https://www.zotero.org/groups/2186447/bison_research/items. This database provides information about the nature and source of bison-related material published before May 2018, when the database was created.

National Bison Assn. members can now access the full documents in the database by logging into the Members' Section of bisoncentral.com and joining a similar Zotero group named "Bison publications."