Looking south from Livingston, MT where we are staying at Osen's RV near Daryl & Vicki's home is the beautiful Absaroka Mountain Range and the "Sleeping Giant" that you can see if you use your imagination.
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| We can make out the head, can you? |
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| American Avocets on a shallow area of Yellowstone River at Sacajewea Park in Livingston |
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| Yellowstone River before the snow melt on the mountains |
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| Now it's the bank to bank flow with whole trees rushing down |
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| Fox Sparrow |
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| Mountain Bluebird |
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| Pronghorn Buck stays for a photo |
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| Slough Creek at dawn, looking over a mile on the hillside was the wolf den. |
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| One of the thousands of Bison in the valley |
We headed south into Wyoming and Yellowstone National Park the second day it was open from Montana. We drove in the dark to Sough Creek to look for Wolves. There were three dens of pups in this vast area. Over a mile across the valley we scoped the wolves, we did see 6 adults and 6 pups but too far away for photos.
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| Did you want a close up? |
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| Lamar Valley |
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| Those two dark spots on the bottom are wolves |
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| Two dark wolves and a buffalo carcass |
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| Wolf leaving buffalo carcass to the Ravens |
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| The Absaroka Mountains from the east on Bear Tooth Pass |
We explored the Lamar Valley and Barronette Peak area and headed out the northwest entrance of the Park to see Bear Tooth Pass. There were many stops along the way and waterfalls were gushing everywhere as the snow pack was melting fast.
One of those stops was a huge Grizzly Bear not too far from the road. He was a silver-tipped massive bear. He was digging up ground squirrel burrows in the mud, But something was wrong with his face. He was missing his upper lip and part of his nose. That gave him an angry look as if he was baring his teeth. We speculated that he was in a fight but other people said they had heard it was a birth defect and that there were two bears that looked like this.
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| Bear Tooth Pass named for the center rock |
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| The close up of the "Tooth" through the thin clouds on the mountain |
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| American Pasque Flowers |
We drove to the summit of the pass which is almost 12,000 feet and above tree line. All the plants are small but if you look closely there are Alpine flowers everywhere the snow has melted. A small flock of Mountain Goats were surprizingly on our side of the valley where we could get some good photos of them.
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| Black Rosy Finch Male |
There are very few birds at this altitude but we were able to find this very special bird, the Black Rosy Finch. Notice that they are the same color as the rocks in this area.
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| Black Rosy Finch female |
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| All the mountain lakes were still frozen but the blue was starting to show through, They'll be open soon |
Just arising from hibernation is the Yellow-bellied Marmot. Scurring around looking for new shoots of grass to eat.
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| Two yearling Moose were near Cooke City |
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| Hey! He's got a camera, let's get out of here!! |
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| Black-billed Magpies are very common |
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| White-tailed Buck looking good in his Spring coat |
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| American Goldfinch singing loudly |
One of the things Ty wanted to do this year was trout fishing with Daryl on the Yellowstone River and the many feeder creeks. He has caught three trout so far. With the snow melt and rising water, they may have to wait for the rushing water to recede before going again.
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Ty on Mission Creek
Greetings from Montana
Love & Prayers,
Ty & Ida Baumann |
