beaver jam

My weekend started at 1:30 p.m. on Wednesday afternoon, and for once the sun was shining. We set out for the Little America section of the park (just past the Yellowstone Picnic area en route to the Lamar Valley), and hiked a short ways from the road to an old wolf den.

The hike starts in open sagebrush and ends at the abandoned wolf den, just inside the treeline. As we hiked I told Steve that we should make a lot of noise, as there's normally a lot of bear activity in the area. Ten minutes into the hike, as I was glassing the treeline with binoculars, I spotted a movement. Bear!


It was a decent-sized cinnamon black bear, and apparently our frequent shouting of "Hey There!" had reached him, as he was moving up the mountainside and away from us when I noticed him. After waiting a while to make sure he had vacated the area, we continued on, and spotted the den in the trees.


It was much smaller than I expected it to be, and I made Steve pose next to it for comparison.


Though this den is long-abandoned, we did find fresh wolf tracks in the mud as we hiked.


We hiked back to the car, took a short drive, and then headed back towards Tower Junction. As we drove past where we had just been hiking we noticed that the cinnamon bear was back in site, grazing along the treeline. And not far from him were two other black bears--that made three separate bears grazing not far from where we'd been hiking. Just goes to show that it pays to make a lot of noise when hiking!

Right after we drove over the Yellowstone River bridge we ran into a familiar friend--the fox from winter. I had just enough time to snap one photo of him before he disappeared over the ridge.


Near Obsidian Cliff I noticed something along the edge of the road, and a quick U Turn revealed it was a beaver. I felt a little bad because after we stopped several cars stopped, and the poor guy had about 10 cars full of people watching him go about his business. But he didn't seem to mind too much.




Right before we got home, at Swan Lake Flats, the grizzly with four cubs was out again, and we watched the cubs wrestle for about an hour before we called it a day. Everyone here has their fingers crossed that she'll be able to keep all four of the little ones.