Yellowstone 2013 – The Grand Tetons

Emma Matilda Lake

In previous years, we have started class in Grand Teton National Park.  We often have students who choose to fly, so we pick them up at the Jackson airport. Being further south than Yellowstone, GTNP is also a little bit closer to Illinois, and we can cover the 1350 miles in two days.

 

Dependable moose

Seeing the Tetons first can shape students’ views of Yellowstone in negative ways.  For many students, Yellowstone can be a bit of a disappointment, as they decide that they like the spectacular scenery of the Tetons more. Jackson Hole also has a more visible elk population, which shapes students’ perceptions of the landscape.  Wildlife such as moose is more dependably visible on Teton trails.

The Tetons are hard to beat

Interestingly, seeing Yellowstone first in 2013 produced the same result – the Tetons show better.  The reasons varied a little. Students preferred the scenery in the Tetons to that in Yellowstone. Students preferred the feel of Teton trails over the boardwalks and greater development of Yellowstone’s trails, even in the backcountry.

Making bad choices?

Students also though that the Tetons attracted “higher quality” hikers, even on the very popular trail to Inspiration Point. It’s been interesting to me that “lower quality” hikers (unprepared in clothing, supplies and demeanor) make my students view a trail as more like developed frontcountry.

This year’s wildlife viewing was not noticeably better in either park. We did not see pronghorns in either park, though we saw many outside the parks. We did not see moose, wolves or bighorn. We did see some smaller species for the first time in my classes, notably badger and pika. Yet even without wildlife sightings, students preferred the Tetons.

 

Tetons at Dawn

Is there something wrong with Yellowstone? You can’t do much about the scenery.  The Tetons are one of the world’s great mountain ranges in scenic terms. Yellowstone has the Absaroka, Beartooth, Gallatin, Red, and Washburn ranges — all beautiful but they do not match the Tetons. Spectacular as Yellowstone Lake is, Jackson Lake has the better setting.

Far from the madding crowd

More important than the scenery, the visitor experience in Yellowstone clearly impacts the students’ own visitor experiences in undesirable ways.  Visitors are more likely to seem ill-prepared in Yellowstone, are more likely to stick to the parking lots, and seem to crowd the wildlife more. That makes Yellowstone seem less natural, even less “wild.”

Better without people?

Sadly, in the world’s first national park, visitors can be a problem for other visitors.

 

Yellowstone 2013: Geology

Two Cones

Yellowstone is famous for its geology.  The park holds more than half of the world’s thermal features.  Its surface appearance reflects the activity of a huge caldera that last erupted about 650,000 years ago.  The Yellowstone River carves a spectacular canyon, the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, that holds two beautiful waterfalls, 308 and 109 feet high.  There are petrified forests atop Specimen Ridge inside the park and in the northern Gallatin range just outside it. Mountains such as the Gallatin, Beartooth, and Absaroka ranges ring the park, and the Red Mountains lie entirely within it.

Terrace at Mammoth Hot Springs

Despite those riches, geology is an awkward subject for a class on the “Politics of Yellowstone.” The federal government does not have a policy on place tectonics or volcanism. With rare exceptions, we do not have a geyser policy. At the same time, it would be stupid for the course to ignore these wonders. The students rightly want to see this famous geology while they’re in the park.

Old Faithful

What to do?  We use the scenic geology to start talking about tourism. By visiting tourist-heavy destinations like Old Faithful or the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, we examine the impact of tourism development on the environment. Finding a geyser along the trail in an isolated area is very different than viewing Old Faithful from a boardwalk surrounded by hotels, restaurants, gift shops and parking lots.

Our first examination of these issues in 2013 came along a trail I call the “Yellowstone Sampler.” We see some unfenced thermal features in the backcountry and usually walk fairly close to some bachelor bison groups at the north end of the Hayden Valley.  After lunch at a scenic spot, we emerge from a moderately-low use trail to the crowds and parking lots of Artist Point.  The transition is pretty sudden, which makes it a good place to talk about developed tourism and personal experiences of nature.

Stumped!

The hike encourages students to think about “wilderness” – the Wilderness Act of 1964, students’ personal definitions of nature and of wilderness, and the views of other people. Does wilderness matter to people? Is it important for well-functioning ecosystems? Does the preservation of the world, as Thoreau wrote, lie in wildness?

Specimen Ridge


In 2013, I added a new hike to our second full day in the park.  As part of our driving tour of the Lamar Valley’s wildlife, we climbed the lower reaches of Specimen Ridge to reach a petrified forest.  This was a remarkably steep trail, posing a definite physical challenge – but one that rewarded us with great views from high above the Lamar. We remained in sight of the park road, but the physical challenge contributed to the wilderness feel of the experience for many students.

Though some guidebooks describe it, Petrified Forest is an unofficial trail, not found on park maps. The Park Service does not maintain it, so people find their own track.  This results in many social trails and greater impact on the landscape.

In some parks, there might be a road going up to a site like this.  Instead, Yellowstone has decided to keep these petrified trees unpublicized, accessible only by a difficult and unmaintained trail.

Boardwalk at Grand Prismatic

Is that democratic?  Most visitors – about 97% – want to experience Yellowstone from their automobile or a high-density, paved path. Why do we keep them away from the petrified forest?  Automobile sightseers are restricted to a single petrified tree just off the park road, and that tree is surrounded by a fence.  Even that lonely tree is inaccessible to recreational vehicles. Is that fair? Or should the park keep some destinations away from the vehicles, recognizing that hikers have some “right” to physical challenge?

Parks are for people


When you ask those questions you realize that Yellowstone’s geology starts to open up all sorts of questions about political values.  What are national parks for? Who are they for?

Some might argue that Yellowstone should serve the vast majority of Americans who want to go sightseeing only a short distance from their automobiles.  Others might emphasize the wilderness experience that can be found only in the larger national parks. Still others might move away from human needs and argue that only large wilderness areas can protect intact, well-functioning ecosystems.

Those are the big topics of the national parks. Geology may not be a politically-salient topic, but it turns out that you can find political themes if you use the geology to play tourist.

Lamar Valley from Specimen Ridge

If you’re interested in geology, and to some degree even if you’re not, I recommend Geology Underfoot in Yellowstone by Marc Hendrix.

For a fascinating view of the human footprint on the geologic record, see Jan Zalasiewicz’s The Earth After Us: What Legacy Will Humans Leave in the Rocks?

Photos from the 2013 Yellowstone course are on Flickr.

Yellowstone 2013 – The Waters of Yellowstone

Absarokas across Yellowstone Lake

In past years, the first day in Yellowstone involved driving up from the Tetons, with stops at the West Thumb geyser basin before hitting the iconic site of Old Faithful.  This year, our introduction to the park began with Yellowstone Lake.

 

 

Geyser cone in Yellowstone Lake

We entered Yellowstone through the East Entrance, which brought us to the Lake Overlook. This was the site for my first mini-lectures, on wilderness, Native traditions of the region, and the Lake ecosystem.

Historically, cutthroat trout have provided a key part of the ecosystem here. When they spawn in the creeks around Yellowstone Lake, they provide a spring food source for grizzly bears. They also feed otters, ospreys, eagles, pelicans, and many smaller predators.

 

 

 

Deep water

It looks pristine — but not all is well. Cutthroat trout populations are suffering at the hands of non-native Lake trout in Yellowstone Lake. Those trout live in deep water and spawn in the lake’s depths, making them unavailable as a food source for predators. They also eat the native cutthroats.

Other waters face their own challenges. Fly fishers say the hatches of nymphs and flies are not what they used to be. Acid rain from industrial areas to the west is changing the pH of these waters, leaching trace minerals that are key nutrients for bighorn sheep.

 

 

Yellowstone Blues

Changes in wetlands, lakes and rivers have also harmed Yellowstone’s amphibians.  Though they are not as abundant as they used to be, we found some Tiger salamanders later in the week, at Lake Isa, on our annual salamander hunt.

In addition to these human-caused threats to the ecosystem, the Greater Yellowstone Area is in a period of extended drought. These periods have happened regularly in the park’s history, so we need not assume that global climate change is responsible. Drought has important political implications throughout the West.  Industry, consumers, and especially agriculture rely on water, and water authorities must work to find new sources in a drought.

 

Double pool at West Thumb

Historically the need for water has led to pressures to build dams and other projects in western national parks. In Grand Teton National Park, a dam raises the level of Jackson Lake by nine feet, water that supplies the potato farmers of Idaho’s Snake River Valley. Farmers have also cast covetous eyes at Yellowstone Lake, the Yellowstone River, the Snake River inside Yellowstone, and the many rivers of the Bechler region in the southwest of the park. Unlike other iconic parks – Yosemite, Glacier, Rocky Mountain – there are no dams here. But there’s always the potential for new demands.

 

Storm Point

After visiting the Lake Overview, we drove to a trailhead where we saw our first bison. We hiked to Storm Point, where we were treated to wind, high waves, and a light squall. We  saw the local marmot colony before returning to the van. A quick stop at the Fishing Bridge visitor center and then the West Thumb geysers completed the day.

 

For further reading on the health of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, check out Jack Turner’s Travels in the Greater Yellowstone.

Photos from the 2013 Yellowstone course are on Flickr.

Yellowstone 2013 – Getting there

Reading material on the road

In a regular classroom, it’s relatively easy to arrange topics in the order you want. You have to work around constraints like Thanksgiving break, and obviously the number of topics has to fit the number of class sessions in one way or another.  But that’s about it.

A field course also has constraints of the calendar. The biggest challenge is somewhat different: making geography fit both a chronological sequence and an analytical one.  We don’t have transporters that get us from place to place in whatever sequence we like. Instead, the geography must tell a story.

Windmill blade in Iowa

In past years, I’ve been constrained by the airport at Jackson Hole – some students have chosen to ride the van with me while others have flown. I’ve used that to tell a story of tourism, starting with a superficial engagement of the Grand Teton range. We see the Tetons as a tourist sees it while driving through, and then engage the landscape more deeply with hikes and an introduction to wildlife and ecosystems. Then we engage wildlife more deeply in Yellowstone, and loop back to Jackson Hole and the airport.

 

 

Back to the mythic West!

This year I had the freedom to do something different, a great crescent through the parks. We began at Cody, Wyoming, with an overview of the mythic West. My impressions over the years is that “the West” often helps recruit students to the class, but students vary considerably in terms of how detailed this vision is. They do know what a rodeo is, however.

Rooting for the calf

After a long drive on the second day, students had the option of attending the nightly rodeo in Cody, Wyoming. Questions of animal welfare sparked some reactions, especially when they saw calf roping and bull riding.

 

 

Rodeo clown and bull riding

Another cultural surprise came as the announcer and rodeo clown engaged in some banter that consisted mostly of bad jokes. A few of those jokes used stereotypes that would be socially unacceptable back in Illinois. That introduction to Western ways had most of us rooting for the bull against the rodeo clown.

Peregrine falcon and handler

We formally began class at the Buffalo Bill Historic Center the next morning. We visited the Draper Museum of Natural History, providing an introduction to the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem from low-elevation sagebrush flats to high-elevation tundra. Students explored the other four museums according to interest (Plains Indians, Art, Firearms and Buffalo Bill). We finished with a live raptor show.

Then . . . off to Yellowstone !

The entire set of 2013 Yellowstone photos is on my Flickr page here.