Tag: yellowstone national park

Badger, Red Fox

The Last Week in May of 2013, Yellowstone National Park

Photo of red fox kits playing at den site.
Red Fox Kits at Play

I arrived in Yellowstone on Sunday afternoon, May 26.  The red fox den near the Yellowstone Picnic Area was the talk of the park.  Hundreds of people came to see the foxes.  The den was only 60 yards from the nearest picnic table.  The Park Service put up signs and cones to keep people 50 yards from the den.  Seeing the parents all day long was great, but the best times were when they let the kits out to play.

I had gotten some good fox kit photos last year so I wasn’t as inclined as some to watch and photograph the foxes all day long as many people were.  I would stop by once or twice a day to see what was happening.  As it turned out, I learned that on  Thursday that just before I arrived a badger and the vixen started fighting some distance up the road and the fight continued to the den.  Many people photographed the fight at the den entrance.  At this time the kits were in the den.  I learned that when the badger got in the hole one kit ran out of the den entrance and the other got out an escape hole.  The foxes had another den about 50 yards away and the the parents rounded up the kits and put them there.  The badger never came out that day.  It is likely that the vixen had stored food in the den and the badger presumably ate it.  One of the parents was usually at the den entrance waiting for the badger to come out.

Photo of a badger moving from the main den to the second den where the fox kits are hidden.
Badger moves from the main den to the other new den.

Everyone came back at the crack of dawn Friday morning.  On Friday afternoon at about 5:00 p.m. the badger emerged from the den.  Neither fox was around, which was very unusual.  The badger went immediately to the other den and entered.  I don’t know if it had been to the other den before or it followed a scent trail.  When the mother returned she went to the new den site.  The badger had back-filled it and the vixen dug and dug, but the badger was able to fill it much faster than the vixen could dig.  The vixen bided her time outside the new den site.  I learned that the badger came out for a short time Saturday and there was another fight, but it was much shorter than the first fight and the badger went back into the new den.

There doesn’t seem to be any doubt but that the badger killed and ate the kits.

Another photographer told me that he talked to the NPS Ranger that had been there the day before and the Ranger told him that this pair of foxes has yet to successfully raise its kits.  I do remember hearing reports of foxes on the other side of  the picnic area last year, but I never saw them.  I think the photographer said that he was told the badger got the kits last year as well.

As I mentioned, I wasn’t there for the first fight.  (I missed the later one as well.)  Some people were there for the first fight though and they got good photos of it.  To see one person’s photos click here.

Another sad note is that the vixen that I photographed with her kits last May just outside the northeast entrance was hit by a car and killed.  Click here for my blog about her last year.  She left four kits.  One of them died, but someone is feeding the other kits.  But they have no one to teach them the secrets to living a long life as a fox.  Hopefully, it’s mostly in the genes.

Pronghorn

Pronghorn Doe and Fawn, Yellowstone National Park

Photo of pronghorn mom and her young fawn.
New Life in Yellowstone

It’s that time.  If you like to photograph wildlife you should be in Yellowstone or on your way.  Bison calves are running all over the place.  Elk, pronghorn and bighorn sheep are giving birth or will be soon.  The bears are also out and about, some with cubs.  It is the time to see and photograph baby animals.

This pronghorn fawn was born last May.  The doe kept it and its sibling between the Roosevelt Arch and the north entrance station for the first week after birth.   That’s when I left the park.  The area is bounded by three roads and a high steel fence.   It was crowded and noisy and wouldn’t seem to be a place for a wild animal to want to have babies.    It’s also about the last place around Yellowstone that I would want to be stationed for a week hoping to photograph some predators.  I don’t know if it was just happenstance or that mother pronghorn knew this was a good place to have her babies while they got stronger and were able to run fast enough to escape from a predator.

Coyote, Grizzly Bear, Other Bird, Pronghorn

My 10 Favorite Wildlife Photos of 2012

About a year ago I posted a blog with my 10 favorite wildlife photos from 2011.  Here are my 10 favorites for 2012.  Most of this year’s photos are from Yellowstone.

Photo of a female red fox with her kits.
Mom and the Kids

Finding and photographing this red fox vixen and her two kits was the best part of my trip to Yellowstone last spring.

Photo of red fox kits at play.
Fox Kits at Play

Baby animals are usually photogenic and these two certainly were.

Photo of pringhorn doe nursing her fawn.
Feeding Time

While on the subject of baby animals, this doe pronghorn kept her two fawns right around the Roosevelt Arch for a week or more.  They stopped a lot of cars.

Photo of a young grizzly bear.
A Grizzly Daydreams

This grizzly bear spent several days in May on the slopes above Yellowstone’s Soda Butte Creek feeding on grass, roots and whatever other vegetative material grizzlies feed on in the spring.

Photo of a grizzly bear.
Sad Looking Young Grizzly

I spent a fair amount of time photographing this bear.  It often looked sad to me.  I think it was a young bear and perhaps it was its first spring without its mother.

Photo of a mountain bluebird on a sage plant.
Mountain Bluebird on Sage

I always see mountain bluebirds in Yellowstone in the spring, but until this past May I’ve never really had any good opportunities to photograph them.  They seem to be constantly on the move.  This May was different.  They hung around.

Photo of a sandhill crane standing in a patch of sage.
A sandhill crane hunts in the sage.

There are always some sandhill cranes in Yellowstone in the nesting season.  They usually tend to be far off though.  You often hear them calling before you even spot them.  I was lucky here.

Photo of a male yellow-headed blackbird singing for a mate.
Love-sick Yellow-headed Blackbird, Yellowstone National Park

I don’t recall  ever having seen a yellow-headed blackbird in Yellowstone before this spring.  This male was singing to attract a mate I assume.  I spotted him while driving the road to the Slough Creek Campground.

Photo of white-crowned sparrow.
White-crowned Sparrow, Point Reyes National Seashore

There are a lot of white-crowned sparrows in Point Reyes National Seashore in the winter.  This male saved what was otherwise an uneventful day.

Coyote, Point Reyes National Seashore

Photo of a coyote staring at the camera.
Coyote Portrait

The coyotes I see in the ranching areas of Point Reyes are pretty wild.   By that I mean they don’t stick around when they see a human.  This individual was different.  He was comfortable with my photographing him.  He may have previously lived in an area with heavy human recreation use.

Point Reyes is my local Yellowstone.  It has a wide variety of wildlife considering where it is located.  No bison or moose, but it has elk and deer.  No wolves or bears, but it has coyotes, bobcats, badgers and one or more mountain lions.  You’ll see elk as easily as in Yellowstone and deer more easily.   You’ll see coyotes as easily as in Yellowstone and bobcats much more easily.

Well, that’s it.  My 10 favorites for 2012.  If you’d like to see my 10 favorites for 2011 click here.

Black Bear

The Best Place to Find Black Bears in Yellowstone National Park

Photo of black bear feeding on grass.
The Salad Days of Early May

The best area to find black bears Yellowstone, at least in the spring, is between Tower Junction and Tower Falls.   There is a small lake along the road in that area called Rainy Lake.  Next to the lake is a large meadow which bears use for grazing.  This young bear was in the meadow a lot last May.  Pay special attention to the stretch between the lake and Calcite Springs Overlook.

Pronghorn

Pronghorn Doe and Fawn, Yellowstone National Park

Photo of pringhorn doe nursing her fawn.
Feeding Time

This pronghorn mom and her two babies made a lot of visitors happy by staying between the Roosevelt Arch and the entrance station in late May.  I spent a lot of time observing her and her two fawns.

During the time I observed her, she kept the fawns well-separated except on one occasion.  I wonder if this is to minimize a predator getting them both.  She would visit each one every couple of hours and let them feed for a few minutes and then they would lie down again in a new spot until she returned.  They usually stayed perfectly still, but I saw one of them move once.  Movement like that can get a young ungulate killed I would think.  Each morning I would check to see if they were both there.  They were still there when I left the Park on June 1.

I wondered if the mother made a good choice in keeping them where she did.  I think so.  It’s a rectangular area bordered by roads on all four sides and by buildings on two sides.  There is a lot of human activity around there all day.  Maybe not as safe at night, but “safe” is a relative term in the pronghorn world.

Pronghorn

Where to See Pronghorns in Yellowstone National Park

Photo of pronghorn.
A pronghorn buck walks along a ridge in the Slough Creek Area.

Yellowstone has 200 to 300 pronghorns.  They only exist in the Park in its northern range.  They spend winters in the Gardiner Basin and some, but not all, migrate from there to spend summers at higher elevations in the Park as far as the Lamar Valley.

One way to see them is to drive the Old Yellowstone Trail in the Gardiner Basin.  Start at the Park’s Roosevelt Arch and drive north around the west side of the Gardiner school and then continue on the gravel road until you get to the boat launch just before the bridge that crosses the Yellowstone River.  At that point you can either turn around and head back the way you came or you can cross the bridge, get on Highway 89,  and drive at highway speed back to Gardiner.  Pronghorn are here year round.  Note to photographers:  For most of this route the land looks to be in bad shape vegetation-wise, but gets better at the north end.  By the way, when you get back to the Roosevelt Arch look for pronghorn in that half mile or so between the Arch and the entrance booth.

The other option is to head for the Lamar Valley and look for them any place between Mammoth and the Lamar Valley that has open terrain.  I usually take a detour and drive the road to the Slough Creek Campground because I often see a few pronghorn there.  By the time you get to the confluence where Soda Butte Creek joins the Lamar River you will have covered about all the pronghorn habitat that can be seen from a vehicle.   The area from Mammoth to the Lamar Valley is summer range only.

Pronghorn

Another Wounded Pronghorn at Yellowstone?

Photo of a pronghorn buck with a possible wound.
Pronghorn Buck; Slough Creek, Yellowstone National Park

Here’s a pronghorn buck that I also saw and photographed last May.  It was in the Slough Creek area.  It’s also missing a chunk of hair at the top of the shoulders.  It also seems to be missing some flesh, but it’s hard to be certain because of the angle of view.  The doe in the previous posts provided a good view of her wound because she was  walking downhill.  The only point of posting this image is that it is the second pronghorn I saw in May that seems to have a wound in about the same place.  I find that interesting.  Was it a golden eagle?  I don’t know, but it’s possible.