YELLOWSTONE'S WILD WORLD

Today began cold but without the precipitation we have been having.

It was an early morning mad dash to Slough Creek by photographers eager to capture grizzly bears on carcasses.  I picked the wrong carcass because Scarface was till on the Junction Butte feast, just past the Slough campground road.  My carcass, a natural death bison that collapsed and died near the Slough road yesterday morning, was still not touched.

But, we weren’t out there long before a beautiful grizzly headed our way, only to stop short.  The grizzly stood up, looked at the crowd that was waiting for him and left.  I believe he went up on the hill and hid in the trees, waiting for nightfall.

Given that the new carcass was just over the hill from Scarface, I would have thought that he would come over for a real feast.  But, instead, he eventually headed back into Lamar and was grazing amongst the cottonwoods when I left tonight.  Another grizzly also went in on that carcass but I did not see that one either.

And, there was another bison calf carcass in Lamar with a grizzly on that one.  I saw some great photos of this beautiful bear as it headed towards the road and crossed to the north.

Meanwhile, I am still sitting at Slough, and there is a courting pair of grizzlies across the road at Crystal, with a black bear wandering through the same area.

Later, I heard about a sow on Junction Butte.

We saw the Junction Butte wolves across the way from the carcass and there was a speculation that they had made a kill while we were sitting there as they had food and ravens.  But, I think it was a chunk from their elk kill that they had hauled over.  They went up the hill and bedded until later in the day when the three, 890, 968 and the grey yearling, all headed up towards Buffalo Plateau.  My guess is that 907 is denning in her mom’s den site and these three have left 970 and 911 to themselves so that they can take care of their own.  If 907 is denning there is a good chance that the pups would belong to 890.

I eventually left Slough for awhile and went wandering.  A lot of bison in Lamar but did not see any wolves, nor did I hope to today.  But, I was pleasantly surprised later.

Then I went out towards Tower.  The Picnic sow with her two COY were still under the bridge. I heard that there was another bridge fiasco when bison came across – it is now closed to pedestrian traffic.

And then up around the curve was a crowd watching a big black bear boar.  He is no doubt the daddy to Rosie’s cubs.  Big and ugly!

And, around the next turn was Rosie and the three cubs.  That makes 6 black bears in one half mile, 150 people, many of whom came to see the famous family after their traumatic moment went viral and hit national news.  The poor bears tried to cross the bridge when it was filled with people.  The bears did absolutely nothing wrong and did not try to harm anyone but the news is trying to spin it that she is dangerous and tried to attack.  I hate the lying scumbag sensationalistic news – the news stations are bigger predators than the wolves.

Well, back to Slough to wait and nap but when I heard that Scarface had gone east it was time to wander.  Not much remarkable going on except hundreds of bison running down the valley.  Not sure what has gotten into them but the bison are running all over the park.  And, I did see mama coyote out hunting.

I headed towards home and at the last second decided to turn around and drive out to Pebble.  Nothing there and so driving back, thinking that I could have been halfway home by then, I noticed an elk running down the hill with a wolf chasing it.  Could not believe my eyes – my dream moment happening and it was just myself there to witness the event.

926 was chasing a bull elk down the hill, in the general direction of the road but a long ways off.  I quickly scanned for other wolves that might be helping her but saw none.

Something seemed off because the bull was not running all that fast.  I later discovered that he has a bad case of scabies, which must be depleting him some.  Very typical of the wolves to choose an animal that is weakened in some way, whether by injury or illness.

926 grabbed the bull’s right haunch and held on as the bull dragged her along.  It was as if the wolf was riding the bull’s leg.  At about 80 lbs, 926 was outweighed by a great deal.  But, she was holding her own and not letting go.  The one time I saw 925 hunt, this was the method that he used.  He grabbed the right hind leg and held on until the bull went down.  Our little girl was doing the exact same thing.

She only let go one time and then just for a split second.  Funny thing is that while watching and photographing this I was wondering if it was possible the guys had left her again and she was all alone.  Because, where in the heck was her help?  No where in sight!

She held on and the bull drug her in my direction.  This all happened so quickly – one second way out and the next second they were nearing the creek close by.  Elk always run for water when attacked because they can often get away.  Right before they got to the creek the bull stopped a couple of times and it looked like she had him.  But, he got another surge of energy, shook her off and plunged into the creek.

By this time some other folks had discovered the action and stopped.  Unfortunately, they began running towards the animals, as did some others later.  I don’t blame them – it was exciting, but sort of disrupted the hunt.  I did manage to get everyone to stop and had them come over to me so they could watch.  But, then it was pretty much done.

926 tested the water and the elk but it was standing in the deeper part of the creek and the current was swift.  There was nothing she could do, particularly by herself.

When there was no dinner, Twin decided it was time to head for home.  But, 926 said no, and they headed back out to continue hunting.  The elk had moved out of sight but was still in the creek when I left.  And, guess who else joined after the hunt attempt was over?  Yep, Mottled was also out there.  The three wolves headed east and got some more bison running.

What a thrill to witness an event such as this, particularly without a large crowd around.  The more I see out there, the more I want to see.  Never enough.

Here is Judy’s report from the last two day:

For the last 2 days we have been near lots of bears.  Notice I say near.  In the Lake – Fishing Bridge area we missed one of the subadult Hayden Valley sow cubs crossing the Yellowstone River.  We missed Hobo up near the lake. We missed Scarface on the road going into Lamar Valley, but we did see him a long ways away along the Lamar River. We missed Rosie and her 3 cubs crossing the Yellowstone River bridge twice.  We saw the black bear with 2 cinnamon cubs but never got good photos.  We missed a weasel and we missed a badger rolling in the grass.  But then finally this evening when it was almost too late to shoot we found Rosie and her 3 yearlings slightly east of the Roosevelt horse corrals and NO ONE else was there. We had her to ourselves!! That only lasted a few minutes but the people that stopped were nice, no one tried to get close and we never saw a ranger.  We got them grazing and coming out to get a drink of water.  I’ll post photos tomorrow. A great ending to two days of frustration!

See you tomorrow,

Deby