Report from Yellowstone

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Report from Yellowstone

Sandra Nykerk • Apr 25, 2016

The Top Ten Signs It Is Spring in Yellowstone

#10 My dwarf iris are blooming in Gardiner. And the Gardiner hills are flushed with green. Green, what a lovely color!

#9 The rivers are up. In the past 3 days, they’ve gone from a crystal clear trickle to the consistency of chocolate milk.

#8 Some of the roads into the interior of YNP are open. And the Upper Terrace Drive. Go Orange Mound!

#7 Potholes. Frost heaves. In the road.

#6 Two nights ago, it was 65° at 8:00 pm. Today, it’s 46° and raining. Yes, RAIN!

#5 Robins. Bluebirds. Ruddy ducks! Ospreys. Cranes. But still waiting on the warblers.

#4 Buttercups. Shooting stars. Teeny weeny ones. Phlox. And the pasque flower leaves are up.

#3 The wolf watchers are on maternity watch. Pups should be happening any day.

#2 Bears. Black ones. Grizzly ones. Bison calves. Lots of them. Already.

And the #1 sign it’s spring in Yellowstone,

#1 FROGS! My beloved frogs. They are only as big as your thumb but so loud it literally hurts your ears. I sat for more than 30 minutes hunkered down on the very edge of the water between substantial piles of bison poop, looking with and without binoculars, and still never found one. NOT EVEN. I think they were literally at my feet and I still couldn’t see them. But I forgive them. And I will be back. You can have a listen here. Be sure to turn up your volume.

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Twenty Years of Wolves

By Sandra Nykerk • 12 Jan, 2015

This. Twenty years ago this morning the wolf was returned to Yellowstone National Park. I was in the right place at the right time, and thanks to an early morning phone call from Tom McNamee alerting me to a change in schedule, I was standing there when the convoy carrying the wolves (still in their […]

Report from the Park

By Sandra Nykerk • 10 Jul, 2014

It is summer in Yellowstone. Finally. Not just a cool and rainy late spring slowly giving way to warmer days, but instant overnight firecracker hot summer. The prickly pear are blooming on the dry hills outside of Gardiner, and a cloud of young grasshoppers scatters at every step. It’s so bright, it is difficult to […]

Fifty Years is Half a Century

By Sandra Nykerk • 23 Nov, 2013

50 Years is Half a Century I am old enough to remember where I was. In an American history class. How ironic. The school secretary pushed a button that caused the incomprehensible news coming across the radio to be broadcast on the school’s public address system. The first sentence I remember hearing was, “the President […]

Satisfaction - old west looking building

Road Trip to the Past

By Sandra Nykerk • 26 Mar, 2013

Dry roads, a bright sunny day coinciding with the Spring Equinox, and a willing and patient companion provided the impetus for the first official road trip of 2013. Launched from Livingston and into the beautiful sweeping prairies of central Montana. I love these grand Montana views and the remnants of the ragged little towns still […]

Postcard from Yellowstone: Autumn Falls

By sandra3 • 07 Nov, 2012

Sunday was the last day of the season that the roads in the interior of Yellowstone were open, so I made a ritual drive down to Old Faithful and out through West Yellowstone. It seemed like at least half of Gardiner was also doing the same. It’s a wonderful thing to be able to drive […]

The Summer of Endless Smoke

By sandra3 • 18 Sep, 2012

This time of year, the question that always seems to be the first uttered with friends over a cup of coffee or stopping to chat on the street, is the annual lament, “Where did the summer go?” Immediately answered by “I don’t know where the summer went.” But, this year, I do know. I know […]