I have much feeling in common with an old Scotch friend of mine, a lover of nature and a frequenter of forest and mountain, who spent a fortnight in the Park with the express purpose of reproducing upon his bagpipe those remarkable notes, the whistling of the elk, but with only partial success. The story is told that the elk left that part of the country, and he was unable to keep up with them.
That there are several thousand elk in the Park and adjoining country is quite certain, but from the nature of the case it is a difficult matter to estimate them. Their number may vary from year to year, depending upon the severity of the winter and other causes. Exceptionally severe seasons would naturally cause an increased death-rate. At all events, they exist in numbers sufficient to put at rest all fear of extermination if they shall only be protected and allowed to wander undisturbed. Several favorable seasons might cause them to reach the limit of a winter's food supply, but overcrowding must tend to a high death-rate, and the struggle for existence would keep their number down. The migratory habits of the elk would lead them to seek new haunts beyond the protected region, offering every year opportunities for healthy, manly sport to the ambitious hunter during the shooting-season.
Moose have been observed in this region only to a limited degree, but probably they occur in somewhat larger numbers than is generally supposed. While they are migratory in habit, their requirements restrict their favorite haunts to limited and inaccessible areas, and they prefer swampy and boggy regions in the lowlands to the meadows and grassy parks of the uplands. They roam mainly in the southwest corner of the Park, in the Falls River Basin, a level country fed by innumerable streams and springs coming out from beneath the lavas of the plateau. As this basin lies partly in Idaho, beyond the borders of the Park, and the moose wander in and out of the reservation, their protection is a matter of great difficulty; yet it is important, not only on account of their scarcity, but because it is near the southern limit of their range. They do not travel in large bands, and a country tramped up by moose is unknown in the Park. In many instances they have probably been mistaken for elk. I have detected their footprints in the broad valley of the Snake, below the mouth of Lewis River, and also in the Lower Geyser Basin, on Sentinel Creek, a small area, but one admirably fitted for their needs. They have been seen on the borders of the Lake of the Woods, and on the head of Stinking Water River east of Yellowstone Lake.
Two varieties of deer inhabit the Park, commonly known as the black-tail and white-tail deer, the former being much the more abundant of the two. Being fleet of foot, they roam over the entire area in passing from one pasturage ground to another. They show a decided preference for gently sloping foot-hills carrying a scattered growth of mingled pine and maple and other deciduous trees, their natural habitat being the border-land between dense forest and open valley. Such favorite spots affording food, shelter, and shade abound, and present one of the most characteristic features of an ideal park country. Deer haunt the valleys of the Gallatin Range and the lava slopes around the head of Black Tail Deer Creek, which flows into the Yellowstone; but more than any other animal they seem to delight in changing their habitat. The ideal country for deer is that paradise for big game, the valleys of the numerous streams forming the sources of the Snake. While by no means as numerous as elk, deer are found in sufficient numbers to allay all anxiety as to their permanence under the new conditions now surrounding the Park.
Antelope, graceful and swift-footed creatures, restrict their range to the open country, with habits nearly identical to those developed on the plain. They are by no means numerous, and were so much shot at before protection was afforded that they nearly became extinct. But in the last few years they have steadily increased in numbers, and experience seems to have taught them that safety lies within the protected region, rather than in seeking in winter the lowlands outside its borders. Swan Valley and the slopes of Mount Everts apparently satisfy their requirements. In summer small bands roam over Hayden Valley, but so far as I know have not increased in size.
The advantages of this region as a game reservation are again shown in its meeting the requirements of the bighorn, or mountain sheep (Ovis canadensis), an animal of quite different habits, which lives almost wholly among the crags and cliffs of the steepest mountains. An ideal bighorn country is found in the Absaroka Range, where the bare rocky slopes are interspersed with patches of nutritious grasses. The size of their bands, the frequent well-worn trails over the barren rocks, and the occurrence of sheep "sign" everywhere, indicate conditions suitable to sheep life. The head waters of the Stinking Water and Thoroughfare Creek are among their favorite haunts. In the higher regions of the Gallatin they may occasionally be seen, and, indeed, this may be said of the summits of most of the peaks throughout the Park. They are an agile, wary, keen-scented animal, and apparently never so happy as when on the jump. Next to the elk, they are probably most sought by the horn-hunters and game-butchers; but with a little protection, and only half a show, they are abundantly capable of taking care of themselves.
That buffalo were among the animals inhabiting the Yellowstone Park was known in the early days of its history; and that indefatigable explorer and former superintendent of the Park, Colonel P. W. Norris, soon recognized the need of protection for them if their extermination was to be prevented. The Park buffalo may all be classed under the head of mountain buffalo, and even in this elevated region they live for the greater part of the year in the timber. In many ways their habits are quite different from those generally attributed to the buffalo of the plain, and it is most unusual, save in midwinter, to find them in open valley or on the treeless mountain slope. They haunt the most inaccessible and out-of-the-way places, and what would seem to be the least attractive spots, living in open glades and pastures, the oases of the dense forest, often only to be reached by climbing over a tangle of fallen timber. Localities least visited by man and avoided by other animals are by preference selected by buffalo. During long wanderings over the timber plateau I have never ceased to be amazed at the resorts selected by them, and by the rapidity of their disappearance on being alarmed. I have frequently come upon ground tramped up by buffalo, showing every evidence of recent occupation, but the animals were gone. It is surprising how few buffalo have been seen in midsummer, even by those most familiar with their haunts and habits. They wander about in small bands in such unfrequented country as the southern end of the Madison plateau, the Mirror plateau, and the head of Pelican Creek, and on the borders of that elevated table-land known as Elephant Back. In winter, leaving the forest, they feed over the slopes of Specimen Ridge, and in the open Hayden Valley.
It is not likely that there ever were many buffalo in the Park, or that those there ever suffered seriously from the hand of man other than the Indian. Up to within recent years the plains buffalo offered a more attractive field for the hunter nearer home. Their abodes in the Park were inaccessible and far away from any base of supplies. Only since their extermination from the plains and the advance of settlements to the Park border have inroads upon their numbers taken place. If they ever roamed over this country in large herds, evidence of the fact should be apparent by well-trodden buffalo trails, which nowhere form a feature of the Park plateau. Whether the natural increase in their numbers has been kept down by the severity of the climate and an uncongenial environment, or whether the young calves have been attacked by predatory animals, has never been satisfactorily determined. Dangers which would scarcely befall them in an open country might in a timbered region tend to keep down their numbers. They occasionally wander beyond the Park borders into Idaho and Montana with the first fall of snow, returning to their mountain homes with the approach of spring. In 1884 I estimated the buffalo in the Park at 200; since that time they have gradually increased, and have probably doubled in number. In the winter of 1891-92 the grazing-ground in Hayden Valley was visited by a snowshoe party, who counted the scattered bands and took photographs of several groups. These groups were generally small, and each contained a goodly number of calves. They numbered by actual count nearly 300, but there is no means of knowing what proportion of the Park buffalo were then gathered here.
Buffalo Cows and Calves.
Photographed from life by John Fossam. From Forest and Stream.