And may I say that 8 days without any electronic connection to the outside world was kind of peaceful.
The trip was amazing. I went to help a wildlife study of scavengers on carcasses created by wolves. Who shows up first? who shows up last? who chases who? what’s that eagle waiting for? how many ravens can fit on that tiny peace of meat? when the coyotes wake up will they go back to the site? ooh – look, a young wolf, will the coyotes hold their ground?
Then on to the carcass itself. Teeth? ground down. Marrow? Healthy. Male/Female, skin pulled back? how much fur is left? how long is the metatarsal?
(ok – my part was just counting scavengers every five minutes, not working on the questions above!)
VERY VERY cool stuff. And when there was no carcass to keep tabs on? Listening to speakers, going for walks, searching for wolves.
There is a lot of interesting dynamics going on with the packs right now and I was lucky enough to see some of it in action. You don’t always get to see wildlife. It’s not guaranteed but we saw wolves every single day I was there and twice a day on 6 of those 8.
There was a grizzly still awake and gnawing on a carcass, foxes were out, and of course the elk and bison.
This trip was through the Yellowstone Association. (yes, JK, privately funded! Actually, I’ll add their site to my “give” section. They really do a great job.) I recommend all of their learning programs. This “Food for the Masses” one was especially awesome as it was 7 nights staying right in the Lamar Valley.
The dark, the cold, the wild, the education was well worth the time. They even did something a lot of animal folks don’t do. They spent time talking about the opposition to wolves in Yellowstone. It’s a real problem to ranchers around there and many are selling their big swaths of land to developers who’s buyers will probably be an even bigger problem to wildlife in the big picture than any rancher with a rifle and a wolf to kill.
Excellent job YA, excellent!!
