Debra Russell, age 14, of Staten Island, N.Y., for her question:

HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE TO HAVE A BABY BUFFALO?

The genuine buffalos are wild cattle that belong to Africa. Strictly speaking, our so called buffalo is the North American bison. In any case, the buffalo and the bison are mammals that bear live calves and feed them on mother's milk. It takes a long time for the unborn babe to develop inside the mother's body  and this is called the gestation period.

The African buffalo, alias the Cape buffalo, may stand 5 feet high and weigh almost a ton. The sturdy fellow wears a rather scrawny brownish black coat and a wide pair of horns that curve up and down like a wicked mustache. Our native bison, often called a buffalo, may weigh one and a half tons, and the hump on his shaggy shoulders may reach a height of 6 feet. He wears a pair of rather short upturned horns, and his thick coat may be light or dark brown

Both these animals are classed as wild cattle, but obviously they are not the same species. Because of several outstanding physical features, they are classed as separate species of the cattle family, Bovidae. One of these differences is the gestation period, during which the mother cow carries her unborn calf.

One might expect the larger American bison to carry her unborn infant longer than the smaller African buffalo. But this is not so. Our bisons mate in the fall, between July and September. The baby calves are born between April and June. The average gestation period is about nine months  the same as for human babies.

The African buffalos mate in January, though the mating season comes earlier or later in different parts of the continent. The females carry their unborn calves for 330 to 340 days. The average gestation period is about 11 months, two months longer than for the American buffalo.

Both of these wild cows bear one calf at a time which feeds on mother's milk. In both cases, the long gestation period gives the baby calf time to become fully developed.

He is alert and fully clothed. It takes about 10 minutes for his devoted mother to lick him spanking clean, after which he struggles to stand on his own feet. He does not care whether he is a bison or a buffalo  but he is mighty eager to keep up with his herd.