Sharon Perry and I enjoyed a visit to Yellowstone National Park over
the holidays. We took a snowcoach tour from West Yellowstone into Old
Faithful. True to form, Yellowstone showed us an abundance of
wildlife. In mammals we saw bison, elk, coyotes, and an unfortunate
wood rat being plucked from under the snow by a coyote. In birds we
saw bald eagles, trumpeter swans, a night heron, ravens and ducks.
It wasn't possible to do any recording, but we took some good pictures.
We were pleased to see that access to Yellowstone in winter was
tightly controlled. Entrance was allowed on guided tours only. There
were only two ways to tour, snow coaches and snowmobiles. The
snowmobiles were required to travel in groups with a guide. We saw
one snowmobile tour group get pulled over by a ranger because a
couple of riders were being too playful.
There's a draft EIS on winter use coming out in the fall of 2006. See:
http://www.nps.gov/yell/planvisit/winteruse/
"The purpose of the Winter Use Plan and Environmental Impact
Statement (EIS) will be to ensure that park visitors have a range of
appropriate winter recreational opportunities, while ensuring that
these recreational activities are in an appropriate setting and do
not impair or irreparably harm park resources or values. The EIS will
consider a variety of different alternatives for managing snowmobile
and snowcoach use in the parks."
-Dan Dugan
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"Microphones are not ears,
Loudspeakers are not birds,
A listening room is not nature."
Klas Strandberg
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