The Water Buffalo is also one of the threatened species, for which the National Park of Kaziranga is a stronghold. The Asian Wild Buffalo is a tropical to subtropical water-dependent species, which has nowadays very scattered and isolated populations all over Southern Asia. Wild populations still occur in the floodplain of the Brahamputra, which are the biggest populations nowadays (a little less then 1000 individuals). Tiny populations occur also in the East of Central India, Nepal, Bhutan, Thailand and Cambodia, in total no more then a (few) hundred individuals. Asian Wild Buffalos are herbivorous grazers and are apparently more specialised then other Asian wild cattle, given their preference for aquatic habitats. As most of the fertile floodplain species, their habitat suffered severe declines over the past centuries, and in particular the past decades. But nowadays the biggest threat to the species seems the genetic purity of the few remaining individuals because of interbreeding with the domestic forms. Other threats include the ongoing habitat degradation, as well as loss and fragmentation of their preferred wetland habitats, poaching and disease transmission with domestic cattle.
The Asian Wild Buffalo is now classified by IUCN as Endangered.