Delaware vs. Yellowstone: A Tale of the Tape

http://www.hotelcasperwyoming.com/yellowstone_national_park.html

Why do I want to experience Yellowstone National Park and all it has to offer?  Let's compare Delaware to Yellowstone...

Area of land: Delaware covers 2,491 square miles; Yellowstone 3,468 square miles (YNP is 1.4 times the size of the entire state of Delaware

Highest Point

Delaware, Ebright Azimuth 448 feet

http://www.hmdb.org/marker.asp?marker=2893

Yellowstone, Eagle Peak 11,358 feet

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Eagle_Peak_Yellowstone_National_Park.jpg

Geothermal Features

Delaware

Yellowstone over 10,000

http://exogenerian.tumblr.com/post/12824713955/onceuponawildflower-yellowstone-thermal-pool

Geysers

Delaware

Yellowstone over 300

http://flickrhivemind.net/Tags/geyser/Interesting

Animals

Delaware

http://www.urbanitebaltimore.com/StaffReport/archives/2011/12/26/chicken-poop-power

Yellowstone

http://www.yellowstoneparknet.com/wildlife/moose.php

http://www.imagesbyslwalker.com/portfolio.html

http://www.nps.gov/features/yell/slidefile/mammals/mountaingoat/Page.htm

http://www.examiner.com/article/yellowstone-s-grizzly-bears-and-other-wildlife-at-risk-from-climate-change

http://www.yellowstoneparknet.com/wildlife/mountain_lions.php

Scenic Vistas

Delaware 

http://www.worleyparsons.com/Projects/Pages/DelawareCityRefineryRepoweringProject.aspx

Yellowstone

http://www.yellowstoneparknet.com/blogs/?pubcontentid=4819&reporttype=full

Trout

Delaware

http://www.ag.auburn.edu/fish/image_gallery/details.php?image_id=719

Yellowstone

http://www.nps.gov/yell/naturescience/wsc.htm

In summary, why is it important to keep Yellowstone's fish and wildlife populations intact and healthy?  Because people have a tendency to screw up everything we touch, it's in our nature.  Yellowstone is one of the last nearly untouched and intact ecosystems left on the Earth.  It's a  wonderland with over half of the world's geothermal features located within its boundaries.  The three hundred geysers found in the park?  Yeah, they account for over 2/3 of all the geysers on Earth!  Where else are you going to go to see grizzly bears, elk, moose, mountain goats, pronghorns, mountain lions, big horn sheep, and on and on?  Where can you go and fish for the native arctic grayling, westslope cutthroat trout, Yellowstone cutthroat trout, and the non-native brook trout, rainbow trout, brown trout, lake trout?  Certainly not in Delaware.

Humans try to make things better.  We can't help it.  Nature has it figured out pretty well though.  

I've dreamed of visiting this hallowed ground and fishing in one of the last, nearly intact, natural ecosystems on the Earth.  I want to experience animals living as closely as they can to being unaltered by humans and their impacts.  I would love to see and hear elk off bugling in the distance, grizzly bears foraging for food (from a safe distance), bison traveling across the grasslands in a huge herd.  I look forward to hearing coyotes howl at the moon after a long day hiking through the park and fishing streams we cross.  Most importantly, I really, really want to fish in the park.  I want to catch cut throats, I want to catch rainbows, I want to catch browns.  I want to stand in the middle of a giant blanket hatch on the Madison river while trout rise all around me and I search frantically in my fly box for the one fly I haven't tried yet since all the others have been refused.  I want to splash big foam hoppers close to the bank as non-discriminating cutties rise with reckless abandon to completely hoover my offering.  I want to embark on a hike at daylight to reach some distant lake that few anglers see each year.  I want to take in all the beauty that is Yellowstone National Park.  And I want to photograph and maintain notes so that when I return I can share it all with you.

Disclaimer:  “This is my submission for the Trout Unlimited, Simms, the Yellowstone Park Foundation and the Outdoor Blogger Network – Blogger Tour 2012 contest.”