YELLOWSTONE'S WILD WORLD

Yesterday morning I woke up to temperatures past chilly to downright cold and did not want to get out of bed at 4 a.m..  Who would when it was cold under the covers too?  But, I wanted to visit the bison rut in Hayden Valley, which meant that an early start was absolutely necessary.

I got up, turned on the stove to heat water for the French press coffee that has kept my coffee addiction in check during this past 7 weeks of camping and tried to turn the heat on in the trailer but no go!  Well, messing with that warmed me up and irritated me some and so it was time to get dressed and out the door.  (The heat came on last night so it is still working, thank goodness).

It is tough to drive past the wolf watchers and not stop to see what is going on but other than a quick hello, I continued, only to find out that a group was seeing wolves but never let anyone know.  Quite a coup to pull that one off as it turned out to be the big news everyone has been waiting for.  More later.

Just as I had hoped, Hayden Valley was fogged in and the first thing that I saw was this beautiful bison bull getting down and dirty with the earth and nearly obscured by the fog.

I would not be messing with that guy.

Alum Creek was barely visible and I can not get enough of how it looks with a glimmer of sun coming through the fog and the outlines of the trees on the opposite shore.

I found this camera capturing the morning in a time lapse.

And, there were a few birds flying in the fog.

The bison rut action was going on further down the road, near Trout Creek and I spent a couple of hours capturing the bison in stills and video.  Have not had time to look at the images yet – could not keep my eyes open last night after such a long day.

Back down by Alum Creek I stopped to look for wolves and got to talking to some people who were hoping to see a bear.  I was busy telling them where they might find bears when Dawson, a videographer, spotted a grizzly in the distance.  The visitors did not have binoculars or a scope and I was not going to let them come all this way just to see a bear dot and so got the scope out and let them use the binoculars.  The bear came closer, nearing a heard of bison, and we thought maybe we might get some action but no go.  But, the folks really enjoyed being able to watch the grizzly.

I was told this morning that two grizzlies are being seen pretty much every day near Alum Creek, which is where the wolves are being spotted also.  Pretty good place to hang out if you can see bears and wolves in the same area.

Back in Lamar I discovered that the bison calf that was attacked by wolves the previous day had died along the Lamar River.  Mom was holding vigil and crying her heart out.  Meanwhile, up the road a short ways, the osprey chick also lay dead with mom holding vigil.  I did finally see the other parent and so feel somewhat better that the two are still okay.  But, what a sad, sad day.

Other than a long hike in Slough Creek, talking to folks and watching some more bison rut action in Lamar, the rest of the day was pretty mellow.  I was mellow about the harshness of nature.  It is nice to get back to the trailer before sundown, which is what I did but my eyes would not stay open very long.

This morning it was cold again but I had heat.  And, a little bit of a late start so I knew that returning to Hayden was out of the question.

Well, great wolf news!  The Junction Buttes have returned to Slough Creek to rendezvous!  We saw them hanging near the Marge Simpson Tree (I’ll try and post a photo tomorrow) and out front of that.  Still 5 pups – three grey and two black.  Thank goodness for black because they are so much easier to see!  And aside from the two alphas, three of the four yearlings were present.  The male yearling, some times called JB, was not there.  Nike Swoosh, Drab and 907 were around though.  Drab has a pretty good limp on her right front leg.  And the pups were running all over the place and playing.  Makes me wonder even more why we never seen the Lamar pups because these little ones (and they are little) were really getting around.  Sure could not get enough of watching the pups this morning and I did get to hear them howling, which is always a treat.

But, the big news is the number of pups in the park.  When the 7 Lamar pups were spotted, that brought the total to 35 – well, now Rick says there are 50 pups and 86 or 87 adults.  I asked where the extra pups came from and Rick told me that they have now found 16 pups with the 8 Mile pack.  Can you imagine?  Between the hunt, avalanche, dispersal and possibly poaching, the pack had been down to about 9 but they sure grew again.

So, we now have two decent and fairly reliable places to view wolves – Hayden Valley and the Canyons without pups and Slough Creek with 5 pups and 3 to 4 yearlings.  That pack is almost back up to the number it was last year.

Absolutely nothing on the Lamars, except that someone saw one near Trout Lake yesterday and Rick either gets their signals in the den area or does not.  They continue to go to the den area and so that is a good sign that pups are doing fine.  I just hope that they are getting plenty of food.

And, I hope to some day get photos of wolf pups!  The JBs are so darned far out that it is impossible.  I might hike out in the hills and see if I can get closer than a mile to them – the fishermen were fishing Slough Creek and the wolves seemed oblivious so I don’t see any reason for having to stay so far back if they are not being disturbed.  Touchy subject but there really should not be a problem as they would still be a long ways away.

Stay tuned!