YELLOWSTONE'S WILD WORLD

It has been a few wild days in Yellowstone – long days of watching the wolf activity, including the collaring, but with very few real photo ops.

The temperatures have dropped some, to around the low to mid twenties during the day, and we have had a little bit of snow.  Enough snow that we can read the tracks in the morning.  And, when you get to the east side of the park, there have been a lot of wolf tracks going in every direction.  At the moment there are about 32 wolves between Slough and Lamar Valley, which means that tensions have remained high with the Prospects pushing the Junctions further and further away.  Luckily, no real aggression, just a large presence that any small pack would walk away from.

Collaring on the Northern Range took place over a three day period and two 8 Miles wolves, 3 Prospect Peak, 2 more Junction, the black female (now 970) and one Lamar pup (now 967, formerly known as Big Black) were collared.

The Junctions have had a pretty rough time over the past few weeks, being displaced from their territory, losing 2 pups, having one pup injured by 926 when she bit his rear, the male yearling injured, and 870 injured.  So, I wasn’t too happy that they collared two more of those wolves, giving them 3 GPS and 2 regular collars and leaving only 3 without.  Kind of thought that they had gone through enough but as it is the collaring process for that pack went on for 3 days because they tried to get 890 but no go, and then one of the collars was malfunctioning and so they had to locate them and then send two guys up to fix it by downloading new stuff, or something.  Maybe tomorrow will begin some peace and quiet so that they can restart their lives in a new territory – because the Prospects don’t appear to be going anywhere, even though their former territory had more elk.

So, while 967 was being collared in Soda Butte Valley, three coyotes chased a little deer all day long.  From early morning until late afternoon, when I left.

I spotted the deer and figured that something was up because they are not usually in that area as there is no place for them to hide.  Later in the day there were three coyotes at the confluence and I was having a great time watching and photographing them when one suddenly began chasing something.  I looked behind me and saw the deer go into the water.  Poor thing never stood a chance because the coyotes were not going to let up and the Lamar would soon be on the prowl.

But, I sure had fun photographing the coyotes.

Two of the coyotes were a couple and I believe that the other one was a pup, because while it was posturing the adults never seemed to be aggressive towards it at all.

The next morning the deer was dead and the Lamar Canyons were eating.

Unfortunately it was snowy and foggy until right about the time the helicopter could be heard and the pack made a hasty retreat towards the trees.  This was one of the better carcass locations we have had them on because it was fairly close and so open, but between the weather and their wise fear of the helicopter, they had to leave their meal to the three coyotes and run.  It was funny because they bedded in sight but whenever we heard the helicopter, both parents were on their feet and heading towards trees.  There was one pup that originally ran with the family but then thought better of leaving that meat behind and went back to chow down, which made everyone else pretty nervous as they waited.  Those alphas did not want to go through another day like the one before.  The pup ate quickly and then ran to keep up.  Laurie says that every pack has one pup that is on the sidelines and unfortunately the Lamars have one also, making it hard to capture everyone.  It is the pup I have been calling Slinky.  Oh, by the way, 925 weighed 105 pounds when he was collared and 926 weighed 83 lbs.

I missed it but the pack crossed the road and went north this morning so no sightings of them for me.

But, wolves were everywhere in Little America.  Dear 870 crossed the road in front of Cliff (he says that she looked pretty good) and went right past some Prospects on her way up  the mountain with the rest of the pack.

The Prospects have now crossed the road and taken what remained of the old Junction territory, so we assume they will try to stay in the Antelope Creek area – if the Prospects don’t want that also.  And, now they are very close to Lamar, which is also a concern.  They appear to be the land grabbers and have decided to take the whole northern range for themselves.

Anyway, there were reports of a black here, a grey there, etc., along with a lot of howling everywhere – in every direction.

Doug finally spotted one that was bedded and from there more wolves appeared.  We had troubles keeping up with who was who.  They had two pups stranded on the other side of the road and eventually sent a couple of adults to retrieve them, at which time all howling stopped and the world became quiet once again.

Just a few distant, far off shots.  This catches you up on the past two days of wolf world.

Three black wolf dots