Monthly Archives: May 2013

Bites My Face

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What we have here is not a failure to communicate but instead a reaffirming of a mother’s love. Apparently the young marmot had asked why she couldn’t go down the rock slide with the other young marmots and the mother’s reply was “Because I said so.” and the discussion was on. In marmot speak it is perfectly acceptable to punctuate (pun not intended) the youngster’s muzzle with a firm bite to make certain the youngster recognizes the importance of the message being delivered. Failure to comply will often be handled by the application of yet a firmer bite, or as is known in family discussions as an escalation to a higher level. If the message is still not understood by the application of several firm bites to the muzzle the situation ratchets up to what is known in marmotological terms as DefCon 5. That is a very bad thing. Everyone hopes the situation never reaches DefCon 5. Fortunately in this situation the young yellow-bellied marmot accepted her Mother’s advice and did not go down the rock slide with the other young marmots and a highly charged situation was defused. Whew! That’s a relief. It’s another great day in the animal kingdom.

Fishing Wolves

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This is a fishing wolf. Actually it is a captive gray wolf that lives at the Grizzly and Wolf Discovery Center in West Yellowstone, Montana. The pack members were born in captivity and can not be released back into the wild. Every effort is made to provide them with natural surroundings and as close to wild conditions as possible. To keep them engaged mentally they are provided with the ability to hunt their own food, but in a very special way.

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The staff brings in a barrel full of live trout and releases them into the stream that runs through the wolves enclosure. The trout range in size from 6-7″ up to 12″ or so. They immediately spread throughout the stream and it becomes very difficult to find them.

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As soon as the staff leaves the area the wolves begin the hunt. They start by walking along the bank and poking into the areas next to rocks and along the shore hoping to feel one with their paws. The fish are difficult to see and the wolves have to rely on touch. Their sense of smell doesn’t help them either and the hunt becomes a definite challenge for them.

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When the light is right and the fish are moving the wolves can sometimes see where the fish are. They spend quite a while standing very still and watching until they get a line on where they think the fish is.

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Then they do something I’ve never seen a wolf do in the wild. They plunge their heads completely under water hoping to catch the fish. I don’t know if they keep their eyes open while their heads are submerged or if they simply rely on luck to make contact. This happens over and over and they never seem to tire of it. Some of the wolves are better at this than others, keeping their heads under longer and sweeping it back and forth.

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The downside of this method is you sometimes get water in your ears.

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But you shake it off and go back to the hunt.

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Then just when it looks like they will never catch one, they do. Success at last. Keeping a good grip on the thrashing fish this wolf makes his way out of the stream.

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Catching one of the wily trout calls for a victory lap which also doubles as an opportunity to look for a place to eat his prize in peace.

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Having found his favorite place in the sun he settles down to enjoy his hard won meal. Surprisingly or maybe not, as wolves tend to be polite to each other, there is very little poaching by the other wolves. If they catch it, it’s theirs and they are left to finish it in peace.

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The others in the pack redouble their efforts now that they have seen how it’s done. This process will fill up the better part of a day until all or most of the wolves have caught their limit.

Late For Dinner

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Sometimes things happen with the very best of intentions. You’re on your way home, you run into a couple of buddies, you stop off at the buggatorium for a couple and suddenly you have done the unforgivable. You’ve missed dinner. That ‘s the one sin you do not want to commit. Never miss dinner. Explain all you want, make all the excuses, beg, plead, flap your wings, it’s too late. You are out on the branch tonight. In fact you might be out on the branch for quite a few nights. To make sure you make it through the nesting season this is a lesson best learned early. I don’t care what it takes, get home for dinner. This rule tends to work across all the species. Remember, even if you have to tattoo this across your beak so you don’t forget, to keep things running smoothly in the nest, don’t miss dinner.

I Don’t Get Ulcers… I Give’em

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Many,many strange things happen out in the wild. Some make sense, others take awhile to figure out. Normally these cow elk are placid, shy, introverted animals. They don’t look like drill sergeants or the Mayor of Chicago. But this young cow appears to break the mold. ( whenever I see the phrase “Young Cow” it reminds me of that old joke, “How do you say Calf in Chinese? answer – Young Cow.” but enough about humor. This is serious business.) That greenish thing she has in her mouth is a bone. She held it in her mouth like an old stogie and appeared to be chewing on it but not trying to break it up, just rearranging it for maximum taste. There are lots of places in Rocky Mountain National Park, where this event took place, that are wetlands, not quite swamps but very damp areas with some standing water and dense stands of Aspen and in this area were the remains of a dead elk. The bones were algae green and scattered about and she nosed through the pile before finding the one she liked best. Elk aren’t normally cannibalistic, at least in this dimension, yet this is very puzzling behavior. To get to the bottom of this mystery we consulted with our staff Mammologist, Dr. Frieda Houf, here at the World Headquarters of our Media Empire and asked her “Hey, What’s up with all this elk eating bones and stuff?” It turns out that this phenomenon isn’t as strange as we first thought. Herbivores, ungulates and other creatures who eat mainly grass lack a lot of the essential minerals and vitamins that we get from our diet of cramming whatever will fit into our mouths, and consequently they have to get those things wherever they can. Bones being made up mainly of really hard milk, and you know what’s in milk don’t you? Right, Calcium. Funny as it sounds calcium is needed to make strong healthy bones. This is why you should drink at least three gallons of milk a day. So you see, the circle comes around and there it is. Bone sucking by cow elk makes for strong healthy bones. Not so strange now is it? It is insight like this that makes the members of our staff here at the World Headquarters of our Media Empire so valuable. Unfortunately we can’t pay them anything at the moment, which is causing some dark murmuring down in the PHD dorm but hey, we don’t control the economy. The fact that they can come up to the big house I mean the headquarters occasionally to get warm should count for something. So there it is, another fact about the natural environment that surrounds us. Pass it on.

Multi-Tasking

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There is not a lot of time for a leisurely sit down meal when you have three chicks to feed and the nearest lake is miles away. The kids are in that eat-your-own-weight-in-fish mode and  their demands keep you in a frenzy of activity. Fly to the lake, catch a fish, bring it home, watch kids devour it without even chewing, fly back to lake, etc. It ‘s a never-ending cycle. The thought of them fledging and being able to feed themselves is so far down the road you can’t even think about it. Like all good parents the ability to multi-task comes in handy and allows for a quick meal on the fly, so to speak. The thought of night time and the chance of finally getting a little rest is enough to keep their spirits up as they hurry through their day and there may even be a glimmer of anticipation of the upcoming winter trip to Florida or maybe even the Caribbean. Meanwhile, back to the lake.

Bones of the Past

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When you record your journey through life with the lens of a camera you tend to see things a little differently than those who do not. Your perspective narrows or widens, zooms in for detail that others pass over, and sees the patina that the passage of time imposes on our surroundings. The moment becomes a scene frozen and captured along the path we travel. For many of us who photograph, this process is not a deliberate act where we reason it all out beforehand but a reaction to what passes before us. The light and dark of sun and shadow literally slip by us in a blur of motion that is the continuous movie playing constantly in our lives. For those of us that document this passage there is a need to stop it, to record it because the image you are seeing at that moment is too beautiful to allow it to disappear and there is too much to see for our memories to hold it forever. Unless we find a way to preserve the special moments we see there is a loss and that loss is unacceptable to me.

This was never made more real for me than while riding the Narrow Gauge train between Durango and Silverton, Colorado where we slowly passed a spur siding where old, out of use railroad cars were parked. It seemed as if they were waiting for time to complete their transformation from needed to not. As that thought was forming it became apparent to me that image, that feeling, was already receding from my view as the train moved us forward and would soon be gone forever and I quickly, reflexively, grabbed the shot. The entire episode, the viewing, the recognition, the reaction, all happening at the speed of a slowly moving train would have been out of my mind as soon as the next interesting thing entered my view. But because I feel the need to save those moments and was able to record that view I am transported back to that time whenever I look at this image. There is also the added benefit that when others see the picture they get to share in the experience as well. All in all it makes this job I do worthwhile.