Top wildlife encounters (in the last year) - MelyndaCoble.com
Top Wildlife Encounters: Madison River bobcat in driftwood

Top wildlife encounters (in the last year)

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I thought I’d summarize my top wildlife encounters for 2015 because I’ve had a banner year for seeing and interacting with wildlife. In the last 12 months I’ve snorkeled with beluga whales, watched 12 grizzlies dig bulbs in a field, and spotted a bobcat stalking ducks.

Top Wildlife Encounters: Madison River Bobcat
Top Wildlife Encounters: Madison River Bobcat

Even though I consider myself more a “plant person” than an “animal person,” it has been pretty exciting. I was going to do a “Top Five” list, but had trouble even getting it down to six. But for you, I did.

Here’s my top six wildlife encounters in the last year, starting with the most recent.

Top Wildlife Encounters:Bobcat

Last weekend I was in Yellowstone at the Yellowstone Expeditions Yurt Camp. For four days we skied to backcountry thermal areas, along the edge of the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, and through lodgepole pine forests. One of the highlights occurred on the ride in. We stopped next to the Madison River. Two filmmakers I know (The Greater Yellowstone is a small world) were standing in the snow, giant cameras pointed across the river.

Top Wildlife Encounters: Madison River bobcat strolls along bank
Top Wildlife Encounters: Madison River bobcat strolls along bank
Top Wildlife Encounters: Madison River bobcat waits for a meal
Top Wildlife Encounters: Madison River bobcat waits for a meal

A bobcat was crouched on a branch jutting into the river. Then it got up, walked down the shore, sat majestically among some reeds, and sauntered on to another log. There it stared at some ducks, willing them, I imagine, to get a little closer. We heard it caught a fish a few days after our siting. (More on that trip to come.)


Top Wildlife Encounters:Long-eared Owls

I already wrote a little about this, but for a story I went up to the Mission Valley and the Owl Research Institute. That night I stood on the porch of the field station listening to great horned owls hoot.

The next day I was in a willow patch catching long-eared owls in a mist net. Well, I watched someone catch them, but then I got hold an owl and stare into its unblinking, bright yellow eyes. “Face to face with wisdom,” I imagine the owl was thinking.

Top Wildlife Encounters: Checking long-eared owl with Owl Research Institute
Top Wildlife Encounters: Checking long-eared owl with Owl Research Institute

I’m writing a couple stories. One for Big Sky Journal that will come out next winter, and another for the Great Falls Tribune that will be out any day now. I’ll link it here when it does.

Top Wildlife Encounters: Amazing yellow long-eared owl eyes
Top Wildlife Encounters: Amazing yellow owl eyes

Top Wildlife Encounters: Beluga Whales

This summer, the whole family went to Churchill, Manitoba. Since Henry and I have both contracted with Polar Bears International, we’ve been there several times during bear season (October/November), but never in the summer. The kids got to see their first two polar bears in the wild and a whole slew of beluga whales.

We took turns going out on the beluga boat and seeing those white whales right next to the boat. Then I went snorkeling with them. Wow! One of the most amazing things I’ve ever done. This video says it all.

I’m so glad that Henry picked this frame to use as the title page. I’ve never looked better.


Top Wildlife Encounters:Grizzly Bears

In late September we drove down to the Tom Minor Basin in the Gallatin Mountains. It’s about an hour from our house. There we watched three grizzly bear sows with three cubs each ramble out of the aspens and dig for bulbs. And Jeff Bridges parked right next to us, so that was cool.

I wrote,

“Historically, a bear or two grazes in the area each fall, so there is a generational knowledge to go to that area when more traditionally used areas are low in food.

 

Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks Spokesperson Andrea Jones said that because of last winter’s weather: “There is a limited food source of things like berries at higher elevation drawing the bears down to this private property.”

 

“This is not unusual bear behavior, just digging for roots,” Jones said.

 

About 900 yards away from the bears, people line up most nights to watch the grizzlies. Spotting scopes are locked into their tripods and binoculars are passed around as wildlife watchers get ready for the nightly show.

 

The bears don’t disappoint. Moms and cubs wander and dig in a state of hyperphagia — a period of excessive eating and drinking to fatten for hibernation. Occasionally, a cub will stand on its hind legs, and seemingly, look right at its admirers.”

Yes, I just quoted myself. You can read the whole article here.

And Henry made a little video.


Top Wildlife Encounters:Herons

I saw a lot of herons this year. In the Puget Sound, along the Yellowstone River from our raft, in the Malibu Lagoon in California, and on the Madison River in Yellowstone National Park.

Herons are my favorite birds. They seem to know something we don’t.

Top Wildlife Encounters: Heron rests on island in San Juans
Top Wildlife Encounters: Heron rests on island in San Juans

Mary Oliver wrote a poem called Heron Rises From the Dark, Summer Pond. It starts like this:

So heavy
is the long-necked, long-bodied heron,
always it is a surprise
when her smoke-colored wings

 

open
and she turns
from the thick water,
from the black sticks

 

of the summer pond,
and slowly
rises into the air
and is gone.

Top Wildlife Encounters: Heron rests on kelp in San Juans
Top Wildlife Encounters: Heron rests on kelp in San Juans

Top Wildlife Encounters:Orcas

While camping on Lopez Island this summer we took a whale watching trip into the Puget Sound between Lopez and San Juan Island. We weren’t in the boat long before we spotted the first orcas. While there are fish-eating resident pods in the Sound, we saw a seal-eating transient pod.

We didn’t see any seal-eating, but the whales got really close to the seals. In fact, they were so close to shore they seemed to be hitting bottom. There was a lot of splashing and thrashing about.

I didn’t get any great photos, but it was very cool watching killer whales in the wild.

Top Wildlife Encounters: Orcas near shore in San Juans
Top Wildlife Encounters: Orcas near shore in San Juans
Top Wildlife Encounters: Orcas approach tour boat in San Juans
Top Wildlife Encounters: Orcas approach tour boat

That’s just a few of the animals encounters from the last 12 months, but I think these are the ones that will stick with me for awhile.

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