YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK
Stay on the boardwalks; don’t pet the buffalo; don’t drive off road and into any of the thermal features — there are just too many rules to remember these days. Outsideonline.com reported that “five visitors to Yellowstone National Park found themselves in hot water — literally — when their SUV ended up in a geyser” — the Semi-Centennial Geyser, which is within spitting distance, or, in this case, plunging distance, of the popular Grand Loop Road. Fortunately, all five escaped the 105-degree thermal pool without life-threatening injuries, though their vehicle was not as lucky. The next day, workers closed the road, and recovery specialists hauled the SUV out of 9 feet of very hot water. “Semi-Centennial” got its name in honor of the one and only time it’s known to have erupted, shooting water 300 feet into the air. That day — Aug. 14, 1922 — happened to coincide with Yellowstone National Park’s 50th, or semi-centennial, anniversary. If a Yellowstone geyser is only going to blow once, that’s pretty good timing. Unlike Old Faithful, it’s been quiet ever since.
However, there’s been plenty of other hydrothermal “activity” at Yellowstone this summer — which isn’t surprising, considering the park sprawls atop a giant volcano. Dailymontanan.com reported that on the morning of July 23, Black Diamond Pool in Biscuit Basin, located about 2.1 miles northwest of Old Faithful, exploded, resulting in flying debris and a damaged boardwalk. Luckily, no one was hurt. Some of the video footage from the aftermath shows park visitors lingering after the blast, apparently in no hurry to vacate the freshly blown-up area. Perhaps we’re getting a little too used to living on the edge, just waiting for the next epic disaster to blow up in our face.
WASHINGTON
What’s a nice exotic animal like you doing in a place like this? Koin.com reported that a kinkajou, native to South American tropical rainforests, was spotted at the Selah Creek rest stop in Yakima, Washington, which is about as un-tropical a place as you’re likely to find. The kinkajou is a funny-looking critter that’s related to raccoons, though it actually resembles Nosferatu the Vampire, which is slightly unsettling. But what’s it doing in the middle of Washington state? Well, the Fish and Wildlife Department people who rescued it said they weren’t sure whether it escaped from somewhere else or was abandoned there. For the time being, it’s being looked after by Tacoma’s Point Defiance Zoo and Aquarium. The zoo said that “despite their cuteness,” kinkajous don’t make good pets. Everyone said that about Nosferatu, too.
ARIZONA
If you’re traveling to the Grand Canyon this summer and looking for a rest stop not populated by kinkajous, you might enjoy Poozeum, an unusual roadside attraction in Williams, Arizona, that is a museum dedicated to doo-doo — or, more specifically, to coprolites, i.e., fossilized feces, particularly ancient dinosaur poop. Poozeum’s founder and driving force, George Frandsen, told Azcentral.com that when he was 18, he saw a coprolite for the first time in a rock shop in Moab, Utah, and it “sparked his curiosity.” Frandsen thought the “peculiar time capsules” offered an incredible way to study the diets, behavior and environment of prehistoric creatures. The Poozeum and Frandsen hold two Guinness World Records, one for the world’s largest coprolite collection and the second for the largest sample from a carnivore. A review posted on the Poozeum’s Facebook page by a 9-year-old visitor named William summed it up: “This combines my two favorite things — dinosaurs and inappropriate jokes.”
UTAH/CALIFORNIA
If fossilized dino dung doesn’t float your boat, and we rather hope you don’t have to find out if it does, then maybe a green-boned dinosaur named “Gnatalie” is more your thing. ABC7.com reported that a new species of sauropod similar to Diplodocus, was excavated in the Utah Badlands in 2007. It’s older than Tyrannosaurus rex, but what really got paleontologists excited was that Gnatalie’s bones are green. What’s Gnatalie — named for the gnats that swarmed throughout the excavation — got to be green about, anyway? The skeleton acquired its olive green color from the mineral celadonite during the fossilization process. Most celadonite forms in the kind of volatile conditions, such as volcanic or hydrothermal environments, that tend to destroy bones. In Gnatalie’s case, the celadonite entered her remains when conditions were optimal, and now she reigns at the Natural History Museum in Los Angeles in all her green and glamorous glory.
We welcome reader letters. Email High Country News at editor@hcn.org or submit a letter to the editor. See our letters to the editor policy.
This article appeared in the September 2024 print edition of the magazine with the headline “Heard around the West.”
Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.
