YELLOWSTONE'S WILD WORLD

As I’ve mentioned before the main reason we went to the Tetons recently was to film foxes and we were lucky enough to do that. But we also found some other animals. One afternoon we drove into Jackson, primarily to have aa late lunch/early dinner at the Merry Piglet. A trip to the Tetons is not complete until we have done that and picked up some OSM rolls at The Bunnery. As we were coming up to the Elk Refuge we saw a lot of cars pulled over and found a moose out in the refuge. He was calmly grazing. I think he knew there was a fence between him and us. He didn’t seem to have a care in the world.

As we were watching the Elk Refuge we spotted two trumpeter swans near a nest on the refuge. I found a hole in the fence to photograph the swans. It was a mated pair. They were doing a highly ritualized mating display involving dipping there heads and calling. Trumpeter Swans are beautiful. There call, not so much, unless you like honking that sounds like a really sick car. The female already had eggs in the nest so I guess it was their way of reinforcing the pair bond. After watching the swans for a while they began to move closer to the nest. One of them, I assume the female, swam to the land near the nest and walked to it. Then I noticed something next to the nest. Those swans had a wall of protection on one side of the nest. Look at the photo of the swans. Do you see it? Hundreds of elk shed their antlers in the Elk Refuge every year. The Jackson boy scouts pick them up and sell them. But they missed a couple this year. See them?

One morning we took a drive on the Moose-Wilson Road looking unsuccessfully for a great gray owl. As we were driving a pine marten ran across the road and into the trees. We knew we probably wouldn’t find it but we stopped and tried anyway. One of the nice things about searching for something like a pine marten is you often find something else. We found 3 neat things, spotted coralroot orchids, morel mushrooms, and Deby. She stopped to say hello and help look for the pine marten. We never found it.

Spotted coralroot orchids are really interesting because they don’t have any chlorophyll, the chemical plants must have to carry on photosynthesis. Because they don’t have it they have to get their nutrients somewhere else. They attach their roots to other plants and steal nutrients. Kinda sneaky for a plant as beautiful as a coralroot.

Another morning we got up early to try to shoot the coyotes at a den near Mormon Row. We set up early and waited, and waited, and waited. We finally gave up and realized they must have moved but we did get a couple of cute ground squirrels before we left.

During our time at the cross fox den we took photos of other animals. One was a chipmunk who was eating dandelion fruit. He was really funny to watch. He picked a dandelion fruit and turned it sideways in his hands. When he started eating he rolled it just like we would roll a piece of corn on the cob. Pretty entertaining.

On our last day we drove out of Jackson to go over Teton Pass. Verne wanted to collect mayflies on Henry’s Fork of the Snake River in Idaho so we were going there, and then back home by way of West Yellowstone. At the intersection where you can turn to go to Teton Village we saw an osprey nest. We decided to stop and have a look. We quickly discovered a new little park next to the Snake River and walked around it a little. As we were walking we heard a bald eagle calling close. We looked up and there was a mature and an immature bald eagle sitting pretty close to us. I don’t know if we would have ever noticed if the mature one hadn’t called.