Lone Elk Park, 240813
August 26, 2013
…And here’s the Lone Elk!
After spending a day at the
a paid event to which we went (the pictures are
I asked if we could drive through
(click on the name above for the post of my first visit there)
and so we did...we were not supposed to get out of the car, but it was a very productive "car safari".
This sign kept me in the car more effectively than tigers or lions could have done!
I'm still digging tick heads out of my skin after each foray into Forest Park, so I had no wish to do more excavation.
Here are the prairie grasses....
We started with some
EASTERN BOX TURTLES
sunning themselves on rocks in the water...
We then saw a
WHITE-TAILED DEER
doe:
Then we saw herd of
ELK :
Some of them had been ear-tagged (for safety and tracking, one assumes)
You can see the ear tag and the lovely liquid eye:
Others sat around in the grass, not bothered about the passing cars, in much the way our mammals do in Bandipur...
In fact, some of them did not even raise their heads!
They were clearly telling us not to come back :)
Such beautiful animals!
We then entered the Bison area, with repeated warnings not to get out of the car:
A group of
WILD TURKEYS
delighted me.
We were lucky to come upon a herd of
AMERICAN BISON :
During the summer, with food plentifully available, they don't always come up near the road, so we were lucky! (Yes, I 've gone through the ride sometimes without sighting a single animal.)
I find it hilarious that the scientific name of the American Bison is Bison bison, and that of the the Plains Bison is...Bison bison bison!
Apart from the massive adults, there was a little calf, too:
The
Lone Elk Park website
says this little bull calf was born on Jan 3, 2013!
Why do young ones always look so adorable?
"Come along, come along!" the mother said....
They continued grazing.
The sheer size of these animals is awesome.
Here's a short video of the American Bison:
He wandered across the road:
On he went, slowly:
He stopped to have a good scratching session....
We left Lone Elk Park, very happy with what we’d seen in the short time we’d been there, particularly since I’d not expected to see anything at all in the lush foliage!