Intro –
Yellowstone National Park is a national park in the United States. It was the world’s first national park. United States President Ulysses S. Grant signed a law to create it in 1872.
The name comes from the Yellowstone River, which flows through the park. Yellowstone became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1978.
Yellowstone National Park is famous for its geysers and hot springs. About half the world’s geysers are in the park, including the world’s most famous geyser, the Old Faithful Geyser. Large animals such as grizzly bears, wolves, bison and elk live in Yellowstone. Many tourists visit the park each year to see the geysers and animals.
The park is the main part of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. This is the largest, almost complete ecosystem in the Earth’s northern temperate zone. It has many regions; the subalpine forest covers the largest area.
Yellowstone
Animals of Yellowstone
The Greater Yellowstone Coalition is committed to ensuring the ecosystem’s exemplary wildlife have access to high-quality habitat and the freedom to move across the landscape. While human activities are at the core of what puts Yellowstone’s wildlife at risk, protecting the region’s iconic wildlife cannot happen without the people who live and work on the landscape. From engaging with planning processes that impact wildlife, to building partnerships with folks on the frontlines of conflict, to implementing on-the-ground projects that benefit people and animals alike, protecting the ecosystem’s iconic species is one of the pillars of our work.
Bison
It is hard to overstate the importance of Yellowstone bison. Their unparalleled genetics, cultural significance, and ecological impact are among the many hallmarks of this remarkable species.
Yellowstone National Park is the only place in the world where wild American plains bison can be witnessed in large, free-roaming herds. But the fact that these bison exist at all is miraculous. Yellowstone bison are also inextricably tied to the Native people and cultures that shared the landscape with them for millennia. The roughly 5,000 bison living in Yellowstone today are descendants of just two dozen individuals that found refuge in the park’s rugged interior while European settlers and the American military systematically killed millions of bison through market hunting and with the intention of eliminating Tribes that depended on the species.
Grizzly Bear
Greater Yellowstone’s grizzly bears are the icon of the ecosystem and represent the wild, rugged beauty of this remarkable region. They inspire awe and reverence in millions of people across the globe.
As a wide-ranging omnivore, grizzly bears play a vital role in maintaining the health of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. Once on the brink of extinction, bears in this region have made a remarkable recovery. It took years of persistent work—and millions of dollars—from many organizations, agencies, and wildlife advocates to restore this important species in Greater Yellowstone. With the species no longer in imminent threat of collapse, it’s now time to pivot toward longevity and stability.
Yellowstone Wolves
For many people, seeing a wolf in Greater Yellowstone is the pinnacle of wildlife-watching. With intense eyes and hues of fur ranging from smokey grey to inky black, these canids have captured hearts, inspired conservationists, and jumpstarted a local tourism economy.
After loss of prey and aggressive predator control eliminated wolves from the landscape in the early 20th century, the Yellowstone National Park and Central Idaho wolf reintroductions brought this keystone species back to the Northern Rockies in the mid 1990s. Today, wolves provide a significant economic benefit to Greater Yellowstone’s economy through wildlife-watching and tourism, generating an estimated $82 million annually.
Anti-wildlife bills focused on wolves also make their way into the Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming state legislatures. Legislators frequently put forth legislation with substantial implications for wolves, undermining the role of state wildlife agencies in making management decisions, and exacerbating alarmist anti-carnivore rhetoric that persists throughout the region.
Wolves are highly social animals and live in packs. Worldwide, pack size will depend on the size and abundance of prey. In Yellowstone, average pack size is 11.8 individuals. The pack is a complex social family, with older members (often the alpha male and alpha female) and subordinates, each having individual personality traits and roles within the pack. Packs defend their territory from other, invading packs by howling and scent-marking with urine. Research in Yellowstone since reintroduction has highlighted the adaptive value of social living in wolves – from cooperative care of offspring, group hunting of large prey, defense of territory and prey carcasses, and even survival benefits to infirmed individuals.
Wolves consume a wide variety of prey, large and small. They efficiently hunt large prey that other predators cannot usually kill. In Yellowstone, 90% of their winter prey is elk; 10–15% of their summer prey is deer. They also kill bison.
Many other animals benefit from wolf kills. For example, when wolves kill an elk, ravens and magpies arrive almost immediately. Coyotes arrive soon after, waiting nearby until the wolves are sated. Bears will attempt to chase the wolves away, and are usually successful. Many other animals—from eagles to invertebrates—consume the remains
Landmarks
Old Faithful Geyser
Old Faithful is one of the most famous parts of Yellowstone. This geyser erupts every 40 to 100 minutes, each lasting between 2 to 5 minutes in length. The spray ranges in height between 100 and 200 feet, with steam that rises even higher. Other popular geysers include Economic Geyser, Grotto Spring, and Riverside Geyser.
Mammoth Hot Springs
Mammoth Hot Springs is a large complex of hot springs on a hill of travertine in Yellowstone National Park adjacent to Fort Yellowstone and the Mammoth Hot Springs Historic District. It was created over thousands of years as hot water from the spring cooled and deposited calcium carbonate (over two tons flow into Mammoth each day in a solution). Because of the huge amount of geothermal vents, travertine flourishes. Although these springs lie outside the caldera boundary, their energy has been attributed to the same magmatic system that fuels other Yellowstone geothermal areas.
Grand Prismatic Spring
The Grand Prismatic Spring in Yellowstone National Park is the largest hot spring in the United States, and the third largest in the world, after Frying Pan Lake in New Zealand and Boiling Lake in Dominica. It is located in the Midway Geyser Basin.
Grand Prismatic Spring was noted by geologists working in the Hayden Geological Survey of 1871, and named by them for its striking coloration. Its colors match most of those seen in the rainbow dispersion of white light by an optical prism: red, orange, yellow, green, and blue.
