Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem

The western meadowlark is one of the birds featured in the Draper Natural History Museum. Wyoming was the first state to make the meadowlark its state bird in 1927.

The birds have long beaks they use to scarf up ants and beetles on the forest floor, or they drum on tree bark to find bugs.

While ice patches preserve objects intact for long periods of time, the Draper Natural History Museum Curatorial Assistant said as soon as the ice melts things decay quickly. That’s why some objects in the exhibit are replicas.

A display of grizzly bear and mountain lion skeletons took over 750 hours to reconstruct.

Topic of the Week - What are your views on the costs and benefits of wolves in Wyoming?

The comment period just opened for the proposal to keep grizzlies in the Northern Rockies classified as “threatened” — with some tweaks to how they are managed.

Those lands could include farms and ranches in Park County, buffalo habitat on the Wind River Indian Reservation, and lands in the Greater Yellowstone area that provide migration corridors and cultural resources.

Federal wildlife officials spread the world-famous bear’s ashes in Grand Teton National Park, after she was hit by a car.

Topic of the Week

A group of 16 young people from the Wind River Reservation spent a weekend in Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks at the start of September. They were with Indigenous Youth Voices, a group focused on empowering young people through experimental education and building connections to ancestral and traditional culture.