The National Park Service released their annual PSA last month and it definitely seems to have fallen on deaf ears. In an effort to protect both the animals and visitors to the country’s first National Park, each year warnings are issued to visitors to respect the local wildlife and keep their distance.
But with every visitor walking around with an incredibly powerful phone-camera combination in their hands, the perfect picture can be hard to resist. Pair that with an anxious starvation for likes on their favorite social network and you’ve got a recipe for bending the rules.
And to say that they have been bent, would be an understatement.
Over the last week, countless stories have been surfacing on the internet featuring visitors (or Tourons as they’ve since been named), blatantly disregarding any and all rules inside the park.It’s been so bad, that the Park Service has gone to the media once again with another plea to respect the rules of the park.
The Hawaiian and the Bison Calf
A visitor from Hawaii was, albeit, trying to do the right thing when he rescued a bison calf from the flowing waters of the Lamar River. Having been separated from the herd, the man, Clifford Walters, stepped up and grabbed the calf, hoping to reunite it with its family.
“I couldn’t stand to see it die,” Walters told the New York Times, calling his decision “an act of compassion.”
Unfortunately, his efforts were futile as the calf ended up wandering among the cars and humans that had watched the event unfold. The unfortunate reality of interacting with wildlife is that in many cases, those interventions do more harm than good.
“The calf was later killed by park staff because it was abandoned by the herd and causing a hazardous situation by approaching cars and people along the roadway,” authorities wrote in a news release.
Walters was ordered to pay a $500 fine, a $500 Community Service Payment to the Yellowstone Forever Wildlife Protection Fund, $30 in a special assessment, and a $10 processing fee.
Don’t Transport Baby Animals
In another incident, an elk calf was gathered into a car and transported to the police department in West Yellowstone. Details are sparse, but the assumption is that, once again, tourists couldn’t handle the thought of the calf fending for itself and decided to take matters into their own hands.
The baffled members of the police department watched helplessly as the elk got away from the would-be rescuers and escaped into the nearby woods. No word on the health or whereabouts of the calf.
Beauty and the Bull
Caught in the act and unperturbed by it, another group of tourists filmed a young lady hand in tight with a massive bull bison. With many of these animals weighing in at over 1000 lbs, the risk of sudden attack when approaching them is something that should be taken extremely seriously.
While she is undoubtedly caught up on everything going on with the Kardashian’s, it’s very apparent that she missed the memo that a bison, much like the one she was posing with, nearly trampled a group of tourists earlier in May.
Heat Warning
It might come as a surprise to some but the number one cause of death in Yellowstone has nothing to do with large mammals. Another dangerous area of the park that has strict rules (for good reason) are the thermal vents and geysers that also made this park such an attraction to tourists from all over the world.
An Australian tourist filmed a group of people leaving the unmarked trail and heading out directly to the potentially scalding hydrothermal vents. Taking photos of each of them pretending to warm their hands on the vents, the group was ignorant to the risks associated with messing around with these unique geological formations. Most tourists believe that bathing in these crevices can be a pleasant experience, but the truth is that more than 20 people have died doing just that.
Speed Kills
Another cause of death that spikes this time of year in Yellowstone is that from animal-vehicle collisions. Given the uptake in traffic going in and out of the park, the Park Service pleads with visitors to adhere to speed limits and take extra caution when driving at night.
Two black bears were hit and killed on the same day on two separate occasions along U.S. highway 191. Adding insult to injury, both of the bears were a beautiful chocolate brown in color.
Regulations require all visitors to remain at least 25 yards from all wildlife and at least 100 yards from both bears and wolves. Violation of these regulations results in fines or severe injury and even death.
