Florida to Yellowstone National Park is a long way to travel just to suffer a typical, Florida man fate.
This is a bit of a “when worlds collide” moment for me. Here at Whiskey Riff, we make sure to keep a close eye on interesting happening coming out of Yellowstone National Park, and we also like to keep a pulse on the latest “Florida Man” stories out of the Sunshine State.
Here we have a story that combines both.
Apparently a 47-year-old Florida man from Cape Coral traveled all the way to Yellowstone National Park just to get gored by a wild animal there. There are plenty of animals and creatures in Florida that could gore him in his home state, but he evidently wanted a change of scenery.
So he traveled over 2,400 miles away from his home and got way too close to a bison. It’s estimated that somewhere around 5,000 bison call Yellowstone National Park home, and the 2,000-pound beasts are generally easy to spot for tourists – which can be both a good thing and a bad thing.
The National Park Service advises tourists to stay 25 yards away from animals that are deemed “non-violent.” That list includes bison, elk, and other creatures that tend to be relatively docile – though docile is a relative term. When it comes to bears, wolves, and other apex predators, the NPS warns park goers to keep 100-yards between them and the animals.
Maybe they should just go ahead and stretch that number out to 100-yards for every animal, eh? I’m just saying that because we get far too many press releases from Yellowstone National Park (like this one below) explaining how a somehow unaware tourist dangerously approached a wild animal inside the park, then proceeded to pay the price:
“On May 4, 2025, a 47-year-old man from Cape Coral, Florida, was injured by a bison in Yellowstone National Park. At approximately 3:15 p.m. in the Lake Village area of the park, a man was gored by a bison after he approached it too closely. The individual sustained minor injuries and was treated by emergency medical personnel. The incident is currently under investigation, and no further details are available at this time.
This is the first reported incident of a person injured by a bison in 2025. There were two reported incidents in 2024 and one in 2023. Wildlife in Yellowstone are wild and can be dangerous Bison will defend their space when threatened and have injured more people in Yellowstone than any other animal. They are unpredictable and can run three times faster than humans.”
The poor National Park Service just can’t get it through everyone’s head for some reason, despite their best efforts. They’ve even playfully warned visitors to “not pet the fluffy cows” in the past, and even saying it in a joking fashion apparently doesn’t get through the thick skulls of “Tourons.”
Though this was a Florida man, and they don’t have that great of a track record when it comes to making safe, educated, wild-animal-averse decisions…
