The fourth and final gold coin in the Royal Canadian Mint's exciting 2014 O Canada series featuring iconic images celebrating all that makes Canada unique! 

The North American continent's heaviest land animal is Bison bison, known commonly as the American bison. For millennia, the American bison and its ancestor dominated much of central North America, from what is now Alaska, down through the Canadian prairies and American Midwest, as far south as central Mexico and as far east as near the Appalachians of the United States. In the tens of millions, they wandered along ancient feeding routes so well worn that they are still visible from the air today. Many of these routes, particularly in the United States, were eventually used as wagon trails and, later, for railway beds. By the end of the nineteenth century, though, over-hunting and large-scale exterminations by European settlers had reduced bison numbers from more than 60 million to only a few hundred. Concerted conservation efforts throughout the twentieth century helped to bring the numbers of wild bison up in both Canada and the United States. In total, there are estimated to be about 30,000 non-domesticated bison in Canada and the United States today and several hundred thousand raised on ranches.

Coin displays a full-body profile portrait of a bison in its natural habitat. Viewed from its right side with its head and hindquarters arched toward the viewer, a massive American bison bull stands with one hind leg raised in mid-stride. Its shaggy beard, blunt nose, small eye, and upturned horns are presented to stunning effect through the masterful use of varied finishes and engraving. The powerfully muscled, hunched back and fur-lined forelimbs give way to a low sloped hind section ending in a short fringed tail. On the bison's abdomen we see scars from ancient battles with other bulls and perhaps predators like wolves. The dust seems to rise from beneath the bulky mass of the plains giant as its feet stir the scraggly open grassland.