Photographers and filmmakers can be the only connection some people have with nature. The way we see and document wildlife, on social media or otherwise, has at least some effect on how potential viewers will portray them. Bears are often seen as cute and cuddly, but can this make them seem less dangerous than they really are? There is no denying bears are playful, just like any animal can be. There’s nothing wrong with seeing them as they are, but you’ve got to have the common sense to realize and respect their power.
Many people visiting Yellowstone seem to have zero fear of bears. Do they have any idea what would happen if a grizzly bear, or even a black bear, decided to charge them? That would be quite the shot to get on your iPad, but ultimately it would not end well. There has already been one instance this season of a man following a grizzly bear into the woods with his iPad. By some miracle, he wasn’t mauled, but he was ticketed by a ranger.
I watched several photographers scurry down a hill to get a closer shot of a mother grizzly bear with three cubs in May. If you’re nearing the retirement age, I don’t think you and your twenty pounds of camera gear are going to make it back up that hill when mama bear decides to charge. In fact, I watched someone slip and fall just trying to make it back up the hill, after the bears were gone.
It’s nearly impossible to make a bear cub look like anything but the cutest thing in the world. A one month old cub probably couldn’t maul anybody, but its mother certainly can.
I think common sense should ensure people have the ability to see something as cute, yet still know it can be dangerous as well. That’s a healthy appreciation and respect of the animal. Common sense is lacking in today’s world, so what can you do? These animals aren’t domesticated. They are wild, dangerous, and struggling to survive. If you get in their way, they can quickly render you no longer a threat.
Making a bear appear scary and threatening isn’t hard. They’re huge animals, and when they’re next to something you can relate to, you can see just how big they really are. The bear below is the same mother of the three cubs above, but it’s not so “cute” anymore huh?
What do you think? How would you prefer to see bears portrayed? Leave a comment below or on Facebook!
A little more than a year ago, I packed my stuff and headed out from Georgia to Wyoming and Grand Teton National Park. Since then, I’ve been to Big Sky, Montana, and now settled in West Yellowstone, Montana. To the surprise of most, I survived the seemingly overhyped winter of the west. Sure it snowed nearly every single day, and often 8-10″ over night, but it was nothing dreadful. Many mornings I would wake up to fresh snow and ski my way to work instead of driving. The winter cold of nearly 40 below some days took a little toll on my car, but nothing major.
Now it’s spring, and yesterday was 75 degrees. Even though it’s been raining daily (we need it), the fishing and weather has been great for the most part. In the first couple of weeks of the opening season of fishing in Yellowstone National Park, I’ve caught several fish on the world famous streams, including the Firehole and Madison Rivers, as well as Nez Perce Creek. The crowds are here, and are starting to pushing me in to exploring the more secluded locations for some backcountry fishing.
Madison River in Yellowstone National Park
Although the weather has been nice for the most part, we had a couple of snow storms earlier in May that brought cold temperatures and a few inches of snow for a day or so.
Lodging inside Yellowstone, and outside of the park in West Yellowstone is pretty much sold out for June, July, and much of August and September. People are planning their trips out here a year in advance in some cases. It’s been pretty busy where I work at The Faithful Street Inn.
Over a year, I’ve learned quite a few things about Montana and the west in general. I’ve compiled a list of several of these below.
McDonald’s and Chick-Fil-A are virtually the only places that offer real sweet tea. McDonald’s is decent, but Chick-Fil-A is better, even though it’s 2 hours away.
When you live an hour and a half away from the nearest Wal-Mart, you know you’re in the middle of nowhere.
The western states get their fair share of severe weather, minus the tornadoes. We get pea size hail with almost every big storm, and small hail even with a passing shower. The wind yesterday knocked out power in much of Grand Teton National Park, closed several roads, and caused wrecks here in Yellowstone.
It’s extremely dry out here. Even on a cloudy, rainy day, the humidity may be only 50%. It’s never muggy. During the summer, a lot of rain never even reaches the ground.
For the most part, people leave you alone here, and want to be left alone. They are still very friendly!
People vacationing seem to leave their common sense at home (if they had any in the first place). You may have seen a couple of these instances on the news lately.
If you live here, you better know how to drive. People like to get where they need to be as fast as possible. Another reason is the weather changes constantly. A quick hail storm can turn the road completely white in a minute. Snow can make the road very dangerous very quickly. I still have my snow tires on in June.
A storm over the Madison River
If you’re interested in visiting, feel free to contact me! I will be presenting my photography and giving a seminar on fly fishing photography at the Ennis on the Madison Fly Fishing Festival on September 4th and 5th, put on by the Madison River Foundation.
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This past weekend was spent in the northern range of Yellowstone looking for wolves, among other wildlife. After getting up well before sunrise to get to the Lamar Valley, I came up empty. I just happened to see a few spotters along the road on the way out, and turned around to see what was there. Just a minute after talking to another photographer, a couple of coyotes came up to feed on a bison that had fallen through ice a couple of days ago.
We were up on a hill, not even 50 yards from the feeding animals. Throughout the day, several more coyotes came to share. The scavengers came and went as onlookers were spooking them. A couple of bald eagles also shared the area, feeding on a second carcass that was older.
Keep scrolling to see the photos of bison and coyotes moving through the Blacktail Pond area.
This reddish coyote stood out perfectly against the bluish ice.
I watched up to three coyotes at a time share in the feast.
This coyote decided to take a meal to go.
This bison spent time apparently “mourning” the loss of a fellow friend.
The bison herd wanted to cross here, but were hesitant after sensing another bison dead in the water.
After some grazing, the lead bison led the herd to a short crossing over the harder ice.
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Take a virtual walkthrough of the Midway Geyser Basin in Yellowstone National Park, while learning a little bit about each of the main features. Photos are all my own, and information was gathered from various sources.
Excelsior Geyser (Crater)
Although this once was an active geyser, it is now considered a crater left over from destructive eruptions. Eruptions in the late 1800s went up to 300 feet in the air. It also erupted, in a smaller fashion, for two days in 1985. The most striking thing about this feature is its size and deep blue boiling water.
Downstream from this feature, you’ll see its runoff flowing in to the Firehole River. This is what you first see walking across the footbridge. The near boiling runoff heat creates bright orange bacteria just before it hits the river.
Excelsior Geyser is able to discharge 4500 gallons of water each minute, flowing in to the Firehole River.
The boardwalk wraps around half of the crater, allowing you to see the deep blue water from many angles. You can’t help but imagine what would happen if it began erupting again!
Grand Prismatic Spring
The largest hot spring in Yellowstone, and the third largest in the world, Grand Prismatic Spring is easily among the most striking features in the park. Although it is larger than the Excelsior Geyser Crater, it discharges only 500-600 gallons per minute.
The views of Grand Prismatic from above, below, and up close are vastly different. There’s always something interesting to look at.
This view of Grand Prismatic Spring and the entire Midway Geyser Basin is accessible by an unofficial trail on the way to Fairy Falls.
Opal Pool
Although named as a pool, Opal is an unpredictable geyser. Heights of these violent eruptions can reach 30-70 feet, throwing debris around the pool, as you can see in the photo below. I believe even this past summer, Opal had a day of eruptions, and then the pool drained completely before filling back up.
Turquoise Pool
Turquoise Pool is the last feature you’ll see on the loop around the Midway Geyser Basin. It has a temperature between 140 and 160 °F and was named by members of the Hayden Expedition of 1878. Minerals in the water give Turquoise Pool an opaque, milky color.
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Here are some photos from my Yellowstone trip on May 31, 2014.
The first region I hit on this trip was the Biscuit Basin, just north of the Upper Geyser Basin and Old Faithful.
This first geyser is Jewel Geyser, which seems to be pretty active, but not huge.
Temperature: 199° F
Height: 10-30 feet
Duration: 60-90 seconds
This colorful feature is the Sapphire Pool, also in Biscuit Basin. The “layers” of different depths showed a deeper shade of blue the farther down you look. The orange surrounding the edges of the pool created a great contrast for the photo below! Sapphire pool was once quiet, but the 1959 Hebgen Earthquake caused the feature to turn in to a 150 foot geyser for about a decade, until it doubled the size of its crater, returning it to this boiling pool today.
Temperature: 200-202° F
Size: 18×30 feet
This brightly colored pool is actually named the Black Opal Pool, also in the Biscuit Basin.
There’s no mistaking this photo as the world famous Old Faithful, in the Upper Geyser Basin! The black storm clouds contrasted well with the white spray and steam of the geyser, making for an awesome black and white finished piece.
The photo below of the Firehole River in the Upper Geyser Basin area does a great job of showing not only the bright colors of the thermal features, but also the scale compared to the visitors!
I’ve now been living and working in Grand Teton National Park for a full month, so I thought I’d share some of my experiences so far. After this post, I’d like to post something every few days. Now that the weather is warming up, and the rivers are clearing up, I’ll be able to get out and do a lot more! Sometimes, however, words just aren’t enough, so make sure you’re following Trent Sizemore Photography on Facebook to see all my best photos.
The drive to get here from North Carolina took three full days, and was pretty uneventful. It was cool to see other parts of the country, but it just didn’t compare to arriving in Yellowstone National Park. The views are like nothing else and almost immediately upon getting over the first mountain pass, I got to see my first grizzly bear, bison, and thermal features all in the same spot.
Yellowstone Day 1 – May 13
River just outside of Yellowstone east entrance
I saw these between Cody, Wyoming and the entrance to Yellowstone. I’m thinking they may be female bighorn sheep, but they may just be mountain goats.
Mountain goats or Bighorn Sheep?
Back in May, everything was still covered in feet of snow. This was one of my first sights inside the park.
Inside Yellowstone National Park
Driving through Yellowstone was something else, because the snow was piled up higher than the car in most spots around the mountains.
Driving over the mountain pass
This huge grizzly was eating on something between the road and part of the lake. On the other side of the road was a bison munching grass on the hillside.
Grizzly in YellowstoneGrizzly in Yellowstone with frozen lake in the background
Before driving down to Grand Teton National Park, where I’m living now, I camped one night in Yellowstone. I didn’t even scrape the surface of seeing the entire park, but I was able to see quite a lot before and after the night of camping in Madison campground.
The smell of sulfur gases from this boiling mud pit below was nearly overwhelming.
The two photos below are the view of the lower falls of the Yellowstone River from Artist Point. This is an excellent spot to get a perspective of the size of the entire Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone.
The walls of the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone are covered in these bright yellowish rocks, called Rhyolite, a type of volcanic rock.
This is looking up close at a little stream that carries water from thermal feature down to the river. The colors come from bacteria that is able to grow in these extreme conditions. Different colors represent different temperatures, with blues being the hottest. This particular one was probably between 125-150 degrees Fahrenheit. It is also extremely acidic, and you definitely shouldn’t be touching it. Many tourists get serious injured because of their curiosity.
This “waterfall” of boiling water is coming out of Excelsior Geyser crater and in to the Firehole River. This once active geyser still expels 4,000-4,500 gallons of 199 degree water every minute.
This is the huge crater left by the last violent eruption of Excelsior Geyser.
Here, the still snow covered mountains reflect in the many colors of the edge of Grand Prismatic Spring.
An up close view of the outside of the hot spring called Grand Prismatic Spring.
Here’s another look at the outflow from Excelsior Geyser Crater with a dramatic sunset.
The steam, the smells, the colors, and the sounds all add together to create an out of this world experience in each of the many geyser basin areas.
This small, but very active feature is Shell Spring, which would boil up every few minutes, then all the water would sink back down in to the unknown before rising up once again.
A single geyser steaming up with a great sunset.
Last photo of the day, showing a large field of geysers all steaming up in to the cold air.
Yellowstone Day 2 -May 14
After waking up VERY early to the freezing cold, howling wolves, and elk grazing outside my tent, I went out to the see the park in a way most people will never see it, completely alone. For hours, I never saw more than one or two other visitors, even in the most popular areas.
These two bison were munching some grass with a steaming thermal feature behind them. They seek refuge from the cold in these warmer areas.
Only the Gibbon River separated me from this frost covered bison. These animals are very large, and much more dangerous than most people assume.
The early morning cold makes the steam from the hot springs much thicker and travel much farther, creating an awesome landscape. During the summer, the warm temperatures don’t allow for as much steam because the temperature is closer to that of the hot features.
Another photographer exploring the area by himself. It’s scary to walk through that steam, not being able to see what’s beyond, and the screaming geysers beside you throwing up boiling water.
A far off view of Excelsior Geyser Crater shows just how big it really is.
This deep blue pool seemed to go on forever.
Up close and personal with another bison. (No, I wasn’t too close)
After exploring Yellowstone, I drove south to Grand Teton National Park to get settled in my dorm and get orientated with the area and the lodge that I’m working at. I’ll have a separate blog post with some pictures from this park.
This reddish coyote stood out perfectly against the bluish ice.
