Finally Some Peace

I am back after a long needed mental break. I still miss my Tidy and Kitty but I find great comfort knowing that they are together and were never apart for very long. Actually I am surprisingly calmed by this fact. Now in addition to the newest cat Alice, I have a guinea pig that I picked up from the city animal shelter. This guinea looks just like a raisin with legs, hence it new name Raisin. Change is sometimes hard but that doesn't mean it's not positive.

On a sad note, there are 500 deer living in Helena. Montana. They are proposing to kill 350 of them to keep the population down. I know this is a lot of deer to be running around a city but when we are in their natural habitat what do we expect? I feel bad for these deer. They are just trying to co-exist with us. I guess a few more mountain homes can be decorated with dead animal heads this fall. Guaranteed mine will not be one of them!


I spent a couple days camping in Yellowstone last week to see what was happening at the Hayden Pack's den. I never saw the white wolf or the pups this time. One evening another wolf came out (gray colored). The herd of buffalo in the picture is standing directly in front of the den area. The huge male had a pretty much useless right hind leg but he was still the obvious leader of the herd. That buffalo had the loudest snorting I've ever heard-even clear across the river from him. He had a hard time getting back out of the river but on land not much trouble. The herd quickly ran up the hill behind the den. What happened to the big buffalo - did a wolf or bite its hamstring to bring it down? Did a grizzly get sick of it following too close and decide to tell it to back off (I have watched buffalo several times closely following bears)? Did it trip on a rock and hurt the leg? I'll never know but does make me think about the possiblities of nature. Heck, it could have tangled it's leg up on a camp chair put out roadside by crazy tourists.

I got to watch a wolf pup one afternoon in the Dunraven area. Just frolicking by a tiny stream and pouncing at voles and gophers. Another evening, I watched a black wolf and a gray wolf doing the same thing in the same area. Wolves doing wolf business on a late summer's day-how cool! Several coyotes were doing the same thing throughout the Park. A mom and cub black bear made there way down a hill close to the road. A grizzly made its way across the road as I was driving by. It was grazing. Another grizzly was camped out in a treed patch on Mt. Washburn. The buffalo calves are not orange any more. Saw 3 moose this time-one pair was a mom and baby. A pair of deer wandered the campsite as I set up the tent. Only saw one elk herd. No shortage of wildlife for sure.

So where are the pictures of all these great animals? My luck-the batteries in the camera ran out. Oh, I did take 2 sets of rechargeable back-ups but they did not work in my camera for some odd reason - they are exactly the same as the old batteries. Also my memory card was full since I forgot to take my last pictures off of the camera. The wolves were too far away anyway for pictures. I had the trusty spotting scope out for those guys. At least I still have a picture perfect memory (for this type of thing anyway).


Yellowstone Lake: The largest alpine lake in North America. The waves are as big as the oceans' at times.

Now I have one more day hike tomorrow in the Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness before settling into the daily grind.