Yellow-bellied Marmot

You Can't See Me !

Yellow-bellied Marmot

Yellowstone Part 2

With the weekend over the weather in Yellowstone began to change. We woke up Monday morning to cloudy skies but as we headed into the park some of the clouds began to break up allowing hints of blue skies to peak through.

We were hoping to see some more grizzly bears so we decided to head over to the area around Fishing Bridge and Yellowstone Lake. After checking on the bison carcass in the Yellowstone River where we had photographed the bear the day before and stopping for a bathroom break at the fishing bridge we headed out towards the east entrance to the park.
The east entrance was closed, because of the possibility of an avalanche, so we decided to hang out at Sedge Bay and see if any of the grizzlies that had been seen in the area would show up. We did not see any grizzly but while we waited we were treated to a little show by the marmots living in the rocks. There were also waterfowl down on the lake to photograph, most of which were Barrow's goldeneye.
After a while I got bored of waiting for grizzly so we went back to Fishing Bridge to eat some lunch and then headed around the northern loop of the park. When we got to Mammoth we stopped for a bit to photograph the wildlife in town. Michelle took a few pics of the resident elk herd while I focused more on photographing the mockingbirds and the mountain bluebird, pictured above.

We spent the remainder of the day out at the Tower Junction and Lamar Valley. We did see one grizzly, from quite a ways away, but mostly we photographed ungulates like bison, and their calves, bull elk and pronghorn antelope, and then headed through the park back to West Yellowstone where we were staying.The next morning the weather was even worse. Since we knew that it would be difficult to photograph in the weather we took our time getting going and hung around the hotel for a while. When we finally headed into the park we found that the weather was making it difficult to drive. In most places it was sleeting and raining but around the lake it was even worse with fog often obscuring the road.
We did find a few things to photograph, though the lighting did not make for the best pictures. This male American kestrel was perched on the side of the road near the lake eating some type of rodent in the snow. I guess he did not mind frozen food. We, on the other hand were looking for something warm to eat so we headed over to Fishing Bridge for some lunch.

At lunch we found out that a mother grizzly and cub, which had been spotted at Pelican Creek a few days earlier, had spent most of Monday out by the Lake Lodge just a few miles away from Fishing Bridge. So we decided to head over and look for her since we would have loved to get some shots of a tiny grizzly cub. We never were able to find her, but on our way back from Lake we spotted this beautiful coyote. This was one of several coyotes that we spotted on the trip but it was one of the most attractive coyotes that I have ever seen, with the light color and clean coat.
The bad weather continued on through out the day. It was the only day in the whole week were we did not really see the sun at any time. So we decided to head out of the park early and catch a nice dinner. On our way out we did spot this sandhill crane doing its best to stand up straight in the snow and the biting wind.

Camera Criters: Yellow Bellied Marmot

When we travel to Yellowstone we always set aside a few hours to search the talus fields for yellow bellied marmots. The yellow bellied marmot is a member of the Rodentia (rodent) order even though they can grow to be quite large, adults typically weigh between 5 to 11 pounds.

They are related to, and closely resemble, their more famous cousin the ground hog, except that the yellow bellied marmot is usually found is the western portions of North America in elevations typically above 6500 feet in elevation. The ground hog is more wide spread across North America and prefers to live in low land habitats.

Since marmots are a type of ground squirrel most of them live in burrows that they dig in the dirt. The yellow belied marmot typically digs its burrow under rocks to help hide it from predators like bears, wolves, coyotes, and fox. Often one or more marmots will stand guard in an area where many burrows are located, sometimes sitting up on two legs like their cousin the prairie dog. If a sentry spots a predator in the area it will let out a whistle to warn others in the area about the danger. This is how they got the nickname whistle pig.

Yellowstone Yellow Bellied Marmot

Not all of the mammals that we photographed in Yellowstone were large ones. Yellow bellied marmots are a large member of the rodent family that are pretty common in Yellowstone.
Marmots live in colonies consisting of about 10 to 20 individuals. The colony usually has a series of burrows in a territory that ranges around 5 to 6 acres.

Marmots prefer rocky territory typically above 6500 feet. In Yellowstone they are most often found in talus fields, fields with a lot of broken rock. We have always been able to find them up on Blacktail Deer Plateau right around Blacktail Plateau Drive.
Marmots are omnivores. They eat grass, flowers, and other vegetation as well as bird eggs and insects.
Marmots are sometimes called whistle pigs because they will whistle as a warning call if they spot a predator. Predators include wolf, coyote, fox and bear. They do not seem to consider people as predators because I have yet to hear one whistle and I have been pretty close to them. If they do get nervous about people they usually just duck under a rock or into a burrow. Even when they do so they will often pop back out if you wait quietly for a minute or two. Usually they just go about their business and ignore us people.
I found this marmot out in the Lamar Valley, he was sunning himself. We also often see marmots over by the Tower Falls area.