The Best Places in Oklahoma to See Buffalo Still Roaming Free

If Oklahoma is famous for one thing, it's definitely tornadoes. As the list grows, there's no telling what will end up on it. College football. Presidential election history. The Murrah Building bombing. The list goes on, but as you roll through the famous things in the Sooner State, eventually you'll land on buffalo.

Like most plains states, Oklahoma once had a historic and fair share of North American Bison thundering down the plains. Failed federal policy and Native American genocide led us down a path nearing extinction for the great roaming buffalo, but Oklahoma played a major part in restoring this purely American animal to greatness.

Well, not as great and widely spread as they were, but the Sooner State has several herds within driving distance of anywhere.

When I was a kid, the road to Grandma's house for the holidays took us past one of these herds. It was somewhere out west of OKC at a KOA campground travel center type of thing. Maybe between El Reno and Yukon? I can't remember because we were just kids looking out the window, excited to see buffalo as Dad drove us as quickly as possible down the highway.

Little did we know, that campground with the pet bison was only the tip of the Oklahoma buffalo iceberg. There are many other places to see, not only lots of bison, but wild, unhindered thunder on the plains.

The Obvious

When I first moved to Southwest Oklahoma, the biggest surprise was the mountains. In a state mostly known for the Great Plains, how did the world forget about the ancient granite boulders swelling from the red dirt? Of course, after twenty years of exploring Oklahoma, you learn the "plains" are just a small portion of the state covered in mountains, rolling hills, and low swamps, but the mountains hold a special place.

In the early 1900s, when the American bison was literally on the brink of extinction, it was a forward-thinking naturalist president who took the first step in saving America's treasures for the future. Of his first five National Parks, one was here in Oklahoma. Platt National Park - which is now part of the Chickasaw National Recreation Area outside of Sulphur - but he also helped reestablish a wild bison herd in the Wichita Mountains near Lawton.

From 15 buffalo transplanted here from a zoo in the Bronx, New York, the herd has grown and been culled several times over the last 120-ish years. Add in the mountains as a backdrop, and it makes the Wichita Mountains the best place to experience bison in the state.

The Manufactured

While the mountains are a great place to spot bison, you're not always guaranteed to see them even remotely close to the road or trail. I've probably seen them as often as I haven't. If you want to really up your odds of watching these beasts, you might opt for a more curated option to see them.

The place is called Woolaroc, and it was a sort of love letter written and built by one of Oklahoma's oil pioneers up near Bartlesville.

Frank Phillips - of Phillips 66 - built Woolaroc as his personal retreat from the hectic and stressful world of oil booms and busts. He not only loved the Wild West, which was alive and well in Oklahoma in his era of the late 1800s, but also the unbelievably rich history Oklahoma never seems to get credit for. Our history is preserved there all the way back to the French fur trappers, conquistadors, and likely the most comprehensive collection of prehistoric, pre-European Native history, including animals.

While the zoological attractions include a ton of native species, there are a ton of what Oklahoma considers "exotic" animals to be seen there too. 10/10.

The Ultimate

After moving to the Oklahoma mountains in my 20s, my life outside of work went pretty much like many others. I spent my off-time walking around the refuge. I wanted to see it all. On those weekends when I'd have to go home to the plains in Northern OK, I'd quickly get super bored, so we'd go exploring the place we grew up, and I'll admit, it was shocking to see what we'd missed.

There is a preserve in Northern Oklahoma that hasn't changed in thousands of years. It's miles and miles of native grasses and undisturbed soils. It's called the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve. It's the biggest protected tract of tallgrass prairie in the world. It's also home to a shocking amount of buffalo.

In the other bison locales around Oklahoma, seeing a dozen of these grazing animals is a special experience. When you roll through Tallgrass, you can encounter a herd of hundreds and thousands of buffalo living a similar existence they have for millennia.

They're pretty used to cars driving down the gravel road through the area, but when you step out of the vehicle to get better pictures, all eyes are on you. It's a surreal experience. 10/10

More Options

While these are the big three bison destinations in Oklahoma, there are countless other small and limited options too. While it would be hard to expect a corporation to still be maintaining those few buffalo at a KOA on I-40 in Western Oklahoma, there are places you can spot them all over the state. You can even watch them out the window of my doctor's office in the middle of Lawton.

If you'd like to get a better look and discover a part of this great state you haven't seen before, plan a trip and have fun.