Wild Memories Photography Tours

Only a couple of days ago a bison cow was seen stumbling around and unable to stand on her feet.  Josh reported that she would stand up, take a few steps and then collapse to the ground.  A calf tried several times to get the cow up but then eventually returned to the herd, leaving her to die some time in the night.

I was told that the cow did not look all that old or sick but just “weird.”  Makes me curious as to why she died because bison usually die of injury or old age and only after hanging on for a long, long time.

At any rate, it did not take long for the predators to find food and they came calling quickly.  First, the birds and the coyotes and then this morning a grizzly came running along Soda Butte Creek to find his breakfast.

The carcass appeared to be intact this morning, although the coyotes had been feeding on the rear.  However, when I look at some video footage it appears as though an animal had already gotten into the cow.  Hard to say.  At any rate this grizzly had to do some tugging and tearing but he must have gotten his fill quickly for he did not stay long, much to our disappointment.

We are speculating that food must be more plentiful in the area because this year we have not had bears coming and staying at the carcasses, claiming them as theirs and protecting the food from others.  This year we have had carcasses go untouched for long periods, or only fed on at night with the bears long gone by daylight.  So, I guess we were lucky that this one came out at all.

A long day commenced, during which I took a nap for quite some time.  It felt wonderful to sit there with the window open and to have the breeze flowing in about me.  I covered my face with my jacket hood and slept soundly.

But, before going to sleep, I got into trouble.  A family, upper middle class it would appear, parked their car in the wrong land, blocking 3/4 of the lane to oncoming traffic, in a blind curve, and came walking down the other lane.  Melba mentioned to them that they needed to move but they just kept wandering down.  I saw a car coming and knew disaster could strike and so I also told her she needed to move the car.  She said she would and proceeded doing what she was doing.  I told her she probably needed to move it right away because it was dangerous.  Her daughter walked up and she complained about me to her and I though, oh geez, one of those type of so called adults.  Without a word I walked away and was standing around talking to everyone.  Suddenly the woman pulls up and yells, “Hey Lady.”

We all turn.

She screams, “Fuck you!”

Everyone begins laughing, wondering what happened and of course they were looking at me.  We told them about the parking job and they understood.

Well, just as I was getting ready to nap a ranger was coming along but I closed my eyes to doze off.  Melba went up to see what was going on and he said there had been some complaints about some yelling.  She showed him a photo and asked if it was them, with the car parked in the wrong lane.  Apparently he understood and some other guy said that I had been a bit bewildered and just standing there when it all went down.  So, the ranger left and I slept.

After my nap I decided to take a hike up the hill and wander all about.  I came to the edge of a hill overlooking Soda Butte Valley at a place I have seen Lamar Canyons looking down on us and it was quite beautiful up there.  And so I took the cell phone out and did some panos of the area.  The iPhone 6 plus takes amazing images!

On the way down I saw the bear coming.  Apparently Melba had been trying to wave me down but I forgot binoculars and so could not see much but did notice a dark spot way off in the distance.  I got down just in time to see the bear come into the carcass.

The bear did not stay all that long and ended up running with a big chunk of meat, which he dropped along the way.  He headed back to the forest and I left for home.  Only my battery was dead again…

We shall see what tomorrow brings.