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A dying cattle ranch in the Mexican desert got handed to 47 bison last year. Within months the land started repairing itself, because bison and cattle treat the same ground in opposite ways. Cattle camp. They park near water, eat everything in a radius, and compact the soil until rain runs off instead of soaking in. A century of that turned this stretch of Coahuila into crust and shrub. Bison roam. They graze a patch and move on. Their hooves punch through the hardened crust so water soaks in again. They eat the dead grass that fuels wildfires. Their dung pulls in beetles that aerate the soil, and seeds hitch rides in their fur and get planted miles away. Every behavior that made bison a nightmare for ranchers is exactly what degraded desert soil needs. The animal is a walking restoration crew. The results showed up fast. Camera traps at the reserve are catching pumas, lynx, and collared peccaries moving back in. Local birds are already lining their nests with shed bison fur. Hunters wiped bison from this region around 160 years ago. The herd that fixed it descends from just 23 animals brought to Chihuahua in 2009. Sixteen years from 23 bison to a desert that heals itself.