Coyote Pups Yellowstone                   click to enlarge

He ain’t heavy, He’s my brother. The refrain from that song plays in my head every time I look at this picture. Spring in Yellowstone means family. The animal world has figured out how to make sure all the creatures get their young born at the best possible time to ensure their survival as individuals, and as a species. So when spring breaks get out-of-the-way because everything that’s going to have young ones is having them.

Besides being a good survival technique its good for photographers too. If you watch what’s going on and keep a sharp eye open you’ll soon be stumbling all over animal kids. You’ll be knee deep in coyote puppies, elk calves, BIghorn sheep lambs, Osprey chicks, antelope fawns, badger babies, every single specie that has two or more members of the opposite sex present will be having offspring.

These coyote pups were born in a small cave in a rock outcropping that was literally 3-4′ from one of the main roads in Yellowstone, not far from a major tourist lookout point at Gibbon Falls. Thousands of cars went by it every day. Thousands of cars wasn’t an exaggeration as the road past Gibbon Falls is a main portion of the loop road that rings the park. If you’re coming up from Old Faithful on the West side of the park you can’t get North to Mammoth or East over to the Hayden Valley without travelling on this road and passing by this family’s home. Within several feet of it actually.

It was amazing how few people saw these guys playing in their front yard, goofing off, waiting for mom to show up with lunch. Photographers saw them though. This coyote den wasn’t too far from a pullout and every day until mom finally got tired of the traffic and noise and moved everybody to a better neighborhood, the pullout would fill up with photographers vehicles and everyone would trudge up the road to set up for the days shoot.

Of course as soon as the tripods and long glass came out the cars going by would slow, their windows rolled down and the tourist’s lament would come forth, “Hey Whatcha lookin at?” Coyotes ” Those puppies?” Yep. “They look like dogs” No answer. “What are they doing?” Sleeping. “Sleeping? Do they do anything else?” No answer. “Have you seen any Elk?” No, we’re watching coyotes. “Well they ain’t doin nothing.” No answer. “Is this all you guys do all day?” Yep. And off they’d go in a flurry of squealing tires and loud music, a look of total disbelief on their face that grown people would spend the entire day watching sleeping puppies. Occasional there would be a brake light if somebody thought they’d seen an elk but mostly it was pedal to the metal to get to the next thing to see.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with this approach to visiting the park. People experience life the way they want to. We can get all evangelistic about it and try to show them the error of their ways ( at least as we think it should be ) but when everything is said and done, if they’re happy so what. They’ll figure things out eventually. In the mean time I’m busy watching sleeping puppies.