Tag: yellowstone national park

Rocky Mountain Elk

Elk Calf, Yellowstone National Park

newborn elk calf

Newborn Elk Calf along the Madison River

I apologize to those who have followed my blog for not having posted anything for many months.  I’m back and one thing I did during the interim was build a new website (and get rid of two former websites).   Hopefully, I’ve done what it takes for everyone to find this site.   Another thing I did in the interim was go through old images, like this photo of an elk calf, which I photographed in 2014.  When I look at old photos I don’t remember much about some, but others I remember very well.  That’s true with the images of this elk calf.

It was mid-June in Yellowstone and I was driving along the Madison River looking for animals to photograph, especially baby animals.  I don’t regularly drive along the Madison because I don’t have much luck there.  That’s partly because the elk herd in the Firehole/Madison area numbers less than 100 animals.  It’s the only elk herd that stays in the park in the winter and that takes its toll.  The animals are also affected by high fluoride and silica levels in the plants and water which wear their teeth out prematurely.  They live about five years less than elk in the rest of the park, according the the Park Service.

Anyway, it was getting late when I spotted a cow elk with this very small calf.  Another photographer was already there and he told me he saw the mother give birth that morning.  He added that a pair of coyotes had made an attempt to get the calf, but the mother had held them off.  I stayed until I couldn’t see and took this photo well after sunset.  By that time I had developed some connection to the calf and its mother and I decided that even though it was far from where I was staying I would get there by first light the next morning to see if the little one made it through the night.  I got there by first light, but there was no sign of the calf or its mother.  I hope it made it.

Badger

Badger Cubs, Yellowstone National Park

Two badger cubs play-fight.
“I’m toughest. No you’re not.”

I spent  lot of time photographing these badger cubs and their mom in the spring of 2014.  I kept waiting for all three of them to show their faces to the camera and do something interesting.  This photo is the best I got.

I think these little guys were enjoying their little fight.  It’s more than just fun though. When their mom sends them into that big world away from her and the den site they’ll need to be able to defend themselves.   When I’ve observed a mother predator with only one offspring, the mother always take the place of a sibling and play-fights with the little one to teach it that life-saving skill of defending itself.

Other Bird

Raven Nest, Yellowstone National Park

Young ravens scream for more food.
“Feed me”!

I was driving through the Golden Gate area of Yellowstone on May 24, 2015, scanning the cliffs for mountain goats as I drove.  I didn’t see any goats (as is usually the case), but did see this nest of ravens.  The babies were small (and with few feathers), but I made a mental note to check on them every time I drove through there for the rest of my stay in Yellowstone.   The last time I saw them was June 14, a few days before I headed home.  This photo was taken June 3.  Believe it or not, there are six of these little ravens in the nest.  These three just happened to be the most hungry when I shot this photo.  Note the blue eyes common to young animals.

I don’t enter photo contests very often because it is hard to win when there are thousands of entries, at least in the most prestigious ones, and judging is, understandably, very subjective.  However, I decided to enter the 2015 Yellowstone Forever Photo Contest put on by Nature’s Best Photography Magazine and the Yellowstone Park Foundation because Yellowstone is my favorite place and I have lots of images from there.  There were 11,000 entries from 31 countries.  This raven nest photo was awarded an Honorable Mention as was the black bear spring cub below.

Black Bear Spring Cub, Yellowstone
“Hey, I’m pretty big when I stand up”!

Two friends, Max Waugh and Daniel Dietrich, were also awarded honorable mentions.  In fact, Max won seven honorable mentions!  Click here for a list of all the winners and honorable mentions.

There are several reasons I tend to not enter many nature photo contests.  The first reason is that entering takes a lot of time and the odds of winning are very low because there are thousands of entries.  The odds are also low because of the subjective nature of judging. Art can’t be judged objectively.

Another reason is that some (but not the Nature’s Best contest) are designed to be rights grabs.  By that I mean they charge you to enter and they provide in the fine print that they can use your photos for any purpose with no compensation to you.  Think about that.  Instead of you getting paid by for the commercial  use of your photo, you in effect pay them to use it when you enter the contest!   What a great way for a magazine to get many years’ worth of photos without having to pay for them!  Read the fine print before you enter a contest!

Yet another reason I pass on most nature photography contests is because they strictly follow photojournalism standards.  In other words, the photo has to be a faithful representation of the original scene, except dust spotting, cropping, exposure changes and color balance are usually allowed because they were practiced in the film/darkroom days.  I have had to pass on entering many photos I like because a little twig is in the way of a clear facial shot.  I wish the dust spot exception were expanded a little to allow the removal of the twig that crosses an animal’s face.  Another solution would be to have an “artistic” category in contests where some manipulation is allowed.  After all, we are way past film and darkrooms.  Photoshop rules and I think nature photography contests need to recognize that.  If an artist were painting the same scene, you can be sure that little twig would never make it onto the canvas.

There are other concerns I have about nature photography contests, such as use of captive subjects and baiting, but I’ll save those topics for another day.

Grizzly Bear

Grizzly Bear, Yellowstone National Park

A mother grizzly bear walks through the south end of Swan Lake Flat.
A mother grizzly walks through sage.

A well-known place in Yellowstone to look for grizzlies is a large open area called Swan Lake Flat.  It is especially good for seeing grizzly sows with cubs.  I have often seen grizzlies there, but they have always been too far away for good photos.

In May 2015 I got lucky.  I was approaching the flat from the south when I saw a flash of brown out of the corner of my eye.  I stopped and saw a mother grizzly with two two year old cubs walking parallel to the road about 75 yards away.   Unfortunately, they were heading in the opposite direction.  By the time I got the car turned around they had disappeared into some trees.  I drove to a spot that looked like it would be a good place to wait for them and got ready.

As luck would have it, after a minute or two I noticed that there was a very young elk calf between me and where I hoped the bears would pass.  It was standing in a little clump of trees.  Hmm.  Bears love elk calves.  In fact, grizzlies and black bears kill about 50% of the calf crop each year.  What if they see/smell the calf and charge toward it (and me)?  That’s as far as I got in my thinking when the bears came into view.  They didn’t detect the calf and kept going.  The calf got to live another day and I got my photo.

 

Wolf

Famous Yellowstone National Park Wolf Shot and Left to Die

The alpha female of the Canyon Pack

I was saddened to hear a month ago that the alpha female of the Canyon Pack had died.  She was a very popular wolf and one of only a few with white coats.  In the photo above, she was only three years old.  The little bit of dark fur you see in this photo was replaced by white fur as she matured.

It was reported that she had lived twelve years.  That’s a long life for a wolf.  The average life span for a wolf in the park is six years.  I assumed then that she had died of old age/natural causes.

I first got to know her in October of 2008.  She and her three pack mates had killed a bull elk at the north end of North Twin Lake the day before I happened on the scene.  When I arrived there was a large male grizzly protecting the carcass from the wolves.  I was told he took the carcass from them shortly after they had killed it.  That is very common.  Some grizzlies in Yellowstone have learned to follow wolf packs for days until the wolves make a kill and then they take over.

I learned yesterday that she had not died of natural causes.  She had been shot and was found by some hikers.  She was alive, but in bad shape.  The hikers contacted the National Park Service which examined her and determined that she could not be saved.  She was euthanized.  I went from being sad to being angry.

NPS has posted a reward for $5,000 leading to the arrest and conviction of the person responsible.  That amount was matched by a conservation organization, Wolves of the Rockies.  I was told by a friend that the reward has since climbed to $20,000.  You can read more about the story here.

In spite of many suits by conservation organizations to keep wolves protected under the Endangered Species Act, I believe they are no longer under its protection.  However, the wolf was found inside the boundaries of Yellowstone National Park.  NPS has regulations against discharging firearms and killing wildlife in the national parks.  Hopefully, the culprit will be found and successfully prosecuted.

Bobcat

Bobcats; Comparing Point Reyes National Seashore and Yellowstone National Park

Bobcat, Point Reyes National Seashore
A bobcat moves through grass hunting for gophers at Point Reyes National Seashore.

I go to Point Reyes National Seashore (PRNS) often.  It’s rare that I go and not see at least one bobcat.  I also spend a month or so almost every year in Yellowstone National Park (YNP).   Yet, I’ve never seen a bobcat there in spite of the fact that they do exist.  I’ve often wondered why.

According to my most recent copy (2013) of the annual “Yellowstone Resources and Issues Handbook,”  bobcat numbers in Yellowstone are “unknown, but generally widespread.”  It says their habitat is in rocky areas and conifer forests.  It goes on to say that they are rarely seen, with most reported sightings being in rocky areas and near rivers.  I’ve seen a few online photos of them along the Madison River in winter.  Given the lack of stated population numbers, I assume they haven’t been studied much in Yellowstone, if at all.  I’m not aware of any bobcat study in PRNS either.  I assume PRNS doesn’t know how many bobcats there are in PRNS, let alone what their habitat preferences are.

In any event, why do I see bobcats regularly in PRNS and never in YNP?  I can only speculate.  My best guess is that it has to do with where the bobcat finds itself in the predator pecking order in each place.  In YNP the bobcat has to worry about grizzly bears, black bears, wolves, coyotes and mountain lions.  In PRNS it’s just coyotes and a very, very few mountain lions.  This may cause them to stick to the forests and other good cover in YNP without the same pressure to do so in PRNS.  If so, this reminds me of what I found last spring photographing pumas (aka mountain lions) in Patagonia’s Torres del Paine National Park (TDPNP) and adjacent private land. There are no bears or wolves in TDPNP.  There is a coyote-like predator there called the culpeo, but coyote-sized animals are no threat to a mountain lion.  While mountain lions in YNP stay in good cover, in TDPNP they feel no need to hide.  I saw 18 pumas in a week in TDPNP and all of them were in open areas – like the bobcats in PRNS.

Other Mammal

Mountain Goat, Yellowstone National Park

Photo of mountain goat.
Billy Goat, Golden Gate Area

I haven’t been blogging much in the past year.  There have been two reasons.  The first reason was the constant theft of my images. The second reason was that I was growing a bit tired of feeling pressured to post something on a regular basis.  So, I let things slide.  I did go back and put a big copyright symbol on the photos that I had previously posted, but that didn’t leave me feeling all that satisfied about the theft problem because the big copyright symbol made the photos look pretty bad.  I’ve changed that to what you see here.  Maybe I’ll be more happy with this copyright style as time goes by.  I say “as time goes by” because I’m feeling a little more enthused about getting back to blogging.

One reason I’m enthused is that I just spent a month in Yellowstone.  Spring is my favorite time there because of all the baby animals.  I think this was the most successful spring trip I’ve had there.  One of the high points was seeing mountain goats in an area where I had never seen them before, and, more important, at distances that made photographing them feasible.  The area I’m speaking of is the Golden Gate.  It’s called the Golden Gate because of the color of the rocks.  If you aren’t familiar with where the Golden Gate is, it’s the canyon area you drive through just before you reach Swan Lake Flat (when driving from Mammoth).

I saw and photographed a nice looking (full winter coat) nanny and her kid on two different days and then this billy at a later time.  Telling mountain goat males from females is not all that easy.  The horns are a way to identify male from females, but with goats it’s not real easy because there’s not a big difference in size between the horns of a billy and a nanny.  The horns of billy goats are much thicker at the base and more curved than are the horns of nannies and, in frontal views, the horns look like they are spaced very close together with the males.

Photo of a billy (male) mountain goat.
Billy or Nanny?

The males also have a shoulder hump.  Based on the thickness of the horns at the base, the curve of the horns and the shoulder hump, I think this is a billy.  He is also in the early stages of molting.  He will soon have a much shorter summer coat.  One of the things I like about mountain goats is that they often assume stances as though they’ve been posed by the photographer.

The Park Service says mountain goats are not native to Yellowstone, but the result of the introduction of mountain goats by the State of Montana in the 1940s and 1950s which became established in the northern portions of the park in the 1990s.  The Park Service also says they may be having a negative effect on bighorn sheep.  The Park Service is doing research now with other agencies on mountain goat ecology and to determine the effect of the goats on bighorn sheep.