Vol 3, #94

   Friday, November 5, 1999

YELLOWSTONE
WEATHER
Highs 40s, Lows 10s
Partly Sunny
 

Yellowstone Net Home Page
 

ROAD REPORT
Some road
construction
delays.
 

YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK, Wyo. (YNET) -- On the charts, she is listed as a black female wolf.  She was captured along with her daughter in Alberta late in 1994. Mother and daughter were placed in Yellowstone's Rose Creek enclosure with a big gray male from  another Alberta Pack. They mated, and she had eight pups under a pine tree on Mount Maurice near Red Lodge, Montana in April 1995.  Their births came shortly after her mate had been illegally shot dead by Chad McKittrick. All Yellowstone wolf watchers know the story.

That was years ago.  Chad McKittrick has served his prison time.  The pups were numbered 16 through 23.  Three of them are known to still be living.

All those people who follow the wolves know her, no. 9F, the alpha female of the Rose Creek Pack: mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, and great-great-grandmother of perhaps forty per cent of the wolves now living in the Yellowstone country.  Her pack has about thirty members, and her daughter from Alberta, 7F, is the alpha female of the Leopold Pack. Daughter 16F is the alpha female of the Sheep Mountain Pack. Son 21M is alpha male of the Druid Peak Pack. Son 52M is alpha of the Sunlight Basin Pack. And now, her daughter 18F appears to have become alpha female of the Rose Creek Pack.

And No. 9, her black coat turned a light bluish gray, is now alone.  In September she was observed spending more and more time away from the Rose Creek Pack.  Then she disappeared, but was finally  seen again this week, by herself, near Slough Creek.

The cause of her solitude is not known. Did her daughter displace her?  Was she driven off by her long time mate, no. 8M, who also mated with her daughter, 18F, every year except 1996?

Being a wolf is hard business, and most wolves do not grow old before they die. Do old wolves just retire, or are they driven away?

Another old wolf, no. 39F, "the white wolf," was the alpha female of the Druid Peak Pack, and a favorite of Park wolf watchers.  In her pack were her presumed daughters 40F, 41F, and 42F.  In the summer of 1996, she left her pack and traveled widely, even into the Crazy Mountains north of the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem. Almost a year later she returned, but never fully rejoined the pack.  She briefly consorted with no. 21M, no. 9's ambitious son, but he soon left her to join with no. 40F, to lead what was now her pack of Druids.

No. 39 wandered about for four more months, and was shot by a cowhand who said he thought she was a coyote. At the time, she may have been travelling with no. 52M, another of no. 9's offspring.

One more old wolf was no. 13M, or "Old Blue," the alpha male of the Soda Butte Pack. He was the oldest wolf brought down from Alberta.   In Yellowstone, he fathered three litters of pups, and died of old age before the third was born. His pack cared for him until he died. No. 9 now looks at lot like Old Blue.  What will her fate be?

One reason wolves are loved and also hated is that we project our hopes, fears and values onto them -- the solidarity of family life, birth and violent death, monogamy and polygamy, care for, or neglect of the old.

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CONTRIBUTING WRITERS AND COLUMNISTS

Ralph Maughan
Kim Steinbacher
Kevin Sanders
Steve Brashear
Clint Wilkes
Tim Gourley
Hon. Bob Gammage
Ruth Colter-Frick
Lee Whittlesey
Tom Mazzarisi
Russ Finley
David Monteith
Denise Elmer
Dr. Bob Bara

WASHINGTON, D.C. --  The following roads have already closed for the season: Dunraven Pass (Tower Fall via Dunraven Pass to Canyon), Beartooth Pass (outside the Northeast Entrance of the park) and the section of road from the East Entrance to Fishing Bridge (for construction).

Park visitors are reminded that with the closing of park roads, the fishing season in Yellowstone also closes (at 10 p.m. on Sunday, November 7) in ALL portions of the park.

At 8 a.m. on Wednesday, December 15, 1999, Yellowstone will open for the winter season to oversnow vehicles. Winter oversnow road openings are dependent on sufficient snow. Groomed roads will begin to close to oversnow vehicle use at 8 a.m. on Monday, March 6, 2000, with the closure of the Mammoth-to-Norris road. On Wednesday, March 8, Norris Junction to Madison Junction, and Norris Junction to Canyon will close. All remaining groomed roads will close to oversnow vehicle use at 8 a.m. on Monday, March 13, 2000.

When the interior park roads close to automobile traffic on November 8, non-motorized travel in the form of bicycles, roller blades and roller skis, will be allowed as long as weather permits. Specific information on these types of activities can be obtained by contacting the park.

At this time of year, roads in the park are subject to temporary closures, and chains or snow tires may be required at times due to hazardous winter driving conditions. Travelers to the park are urged to contact park headquarters at (307) 344-7381 for current road and weather conditions.

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BILLINGS, Mont. (YNET) -- Like John Colter, Joseph Field was one of the "nine young men from Kentucky" chosen to travel to the Pacific Ocean with Lewis and Clark.  He, his brother Reubin and Charles Floyd  enlisted in August 1803.

Joseph was the son of Abraham Field, who had been wounded at the Battle of Point Pleasant  in 1774 in what is now West Virginia.  Abraham moved his family to what is now Jefferson County Kentucky, not far from William Clark's home. Joseph helped his brother Ezekiel make salt at the salt springs in adjoining Bullitt County.  Joseph's experience at salt-making in Kentucky was extremely valuable to the Corps of Discovery at the Pacific Ocean in 1806.  Joseph was in charge of the salt-making party near present day Seaside, Oregon.  John Colter
worked with Joseph Field and others at the salt-works.  Capt. Lewis wrote in his journal January 5, 1806 "the ocean water salt was excellent, fine, strong & white".

John Colter and Joseph Field were hunters and scouts for the party.  Both men had an encounter with a bear that could have proved fatal, but fortunately wasn't.  Joseph's gun misfired, and the bear attacked him, but was scared off by other members of the party firing their guns and chasing the bear away. Colter went into the water and escaped from a bear that chased him.

A snake bit Joseph on the side of the foot on July 4th 1804.  Fortunately John Colter did not share that experience!  The journals state that Joseph was sick, but there is no record of Colter ever being  seriously sick or wounded during the expedition.

Colter and Fields were both  disciplined during the winter of 1804 for insubordination.   They refused to obey an order from Sgt. John Ordway when stationed at Camp Dubois possibly because of their lack of understanding of military discipline.  They were civilians when they enlisted near the Falls of the Ohio.  However, they apologized for their actions and shaped-up and became soldiers of merit.

Both John Colter and Joseph Field had a battle with the Blackfeet Indians, but Colter's encounters came after the expedition with the Corps of Discovery. Joseph had gone with Capt. Lewis and others to explore the Marias River.   A small party of Blackfeet warriors met them and took their horses and Joseph's gun.  Joseph stabbed an Indian during the skirmish and Lewis shot one, but the small party escaped on the warriors' horses.  John Colter escaped by outrunning the Blackfeet near the headwaters of the Missouri River in 1808.

Capt. Meriwether Lewis described Joseph and Reubin Field as "Two of the most active and enterprising young men who accompanied us.  It was their peculiar fate to have been engaged in all the most dangerous and difficult scenes of the voyage, in which they acquitted themselves with much honor".

Joseph Field apparently died between June and October 1807 because Joseph's father deeded his right in Joseph estate to Reubin.   William Clark listed in his 1825 - 1827 journal, "P. Cruzate Killed" followed by "J. Fields, do".  So ended the life of a Pacific coast saltmaker, scout, hunter and member of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Joseph Field's remains probably rests in an unknown grave somewhere in Jefferson County Kentucky, remembered by few people, forgotten by most.

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YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK, Wyo. -- While conducting a special plant survey along lakeshores during the summers of 1998 and 1999, Yellowstone National Park staff discovered three new sites containing the very rare plant known as Yellowstone sand verbena (Abronia ammophila). Though this plant is probably noticed by very few visitors, its discovery was exciting news in Yellowstone's unusual landscape. "This is an important event in our study of Yellowstone ecology," Yellowstone Superintendent Michael Finley said. "Not all of Yellowstone's wonders are spectacular things like grizzly bears and geysers, but they all matter very much if Yellowstone is to survive with its ecological integrity intact. This small, inconspicuous plant exists nowhere else on the planet, and that makes our stewardship of it all the more important."

Yellowstone sand verbena is a multi-stemmed perennial herb that grows in low mats along sandy lakeshores. Prior to the discoveries the past two summers, only one population was known to exist. Because the known population of Yellowstone sand verbena was comprised of only a few thousand of these small plants in a very limited area, there has long been concern about the viability of the species. Management attention focused on surveying all likely areas within the park for the presence of this unique species.

Funding to conduct the survey was made available by the Canon U.S.A. "Expedition into the Parks" grant through the National Park Foundation, and an additional Native Plant Conservation Initiative matching grant from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation. This funding enabled park staff to conduct a survey targeting the most likely habitat that might harbor this species. As a result of the extensive surveys made by foot and boat, three new sites were located.

The presence of the sand verbena in a total of four known locations in Yellowstone National Park lessens the possibility that a single catastrophic event or adverse weather could cause the possible extinction of this species. Among all four sites, a total of 8325 plants were found, most of which are in the originally known population. Determination of whether large sand verbena mats were composed of one or more individuals was difficult, so this number is a minimum count for the total population. Counts from the early 1990s showed approximately 1000 individuals. This suggests that the plant is successfully maintaining its presence as a unique part of the Yellowstone ecosystem.

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