Travel
Yellowstone National Park Sets Visitor Record. Also Gets On Endangered Ecosystem List
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| Bisons at Yellowstone by Aaron Villescas |
Yellowstone National Park set visitor record in 2010 with 3.6 million tourists. This is the highest number of annual visitors America's first national park, established back in 1872 got in its 138 years of existance. Even President Obama and his family visited Yellowstone in 2010!
This shouldn't come as a surprise as the seven-day pass for the whole family costs only $25. Not to mention that you can bring in your own tent and barbecue and forget about fancy restaurants and expensive hotels. It's relaxing, it's nature at it's best and it's genuine.
Yellowstone stretches across Wyoming, Montana and Idaho. The park is known for its hot springs, extraordinary geysers and a wide variety of wildlife, including grizzly bears, wolves, bisons, and elk. Unfortunately, not everybody is happy at Yellowstone as the mountain pine beetle that lately increased in numbers due to global warming is damaging the magestic and ancient whitebark pine forests, the most prominent plant in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. The whitebark pine is a source of food for birds and bears and part of a breathtaking landscapes but due to the mountain pine beetle might become functionally extinct in the next seven years. Yellowstone National Park made it to Endagered Species Coalition's top 10 endangered ecosystems list and they are now urging the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to list the tree as an endangered species.
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| Gray Wolf (endangered) at Yellowstone National Park by USFWS Endangered Species |
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| Morning Glory Pool at Yellowstone National Park by David Fulmer |
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| Great Fountain Geyser at Yellowstone by Alan Vernon |
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| Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone by Alan Vernon |
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| Autumn grasses in the Orange spring area, Yellowstone by Alan Vernon |
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| Yellowstone National Park by John Carver |
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| Striped Skunk at Yellowstone by Dan Dzurisin |
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| Grizzly bear at Yellowston National Park by Aaron Villescas |
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| Grand Prismatic Spring by Alan Vernon |
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| Autumn color at Yellowstone by Alan Vernon |
Photos: Flickr Commons
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