Yellowstone National Park and Bio-Diversity

There are, unfortunately, many influential people who don’t understand the value of keeping the GYE exactly as it is today. Let’s examine exactly what the concept of a Greater Yellowstone really is, and what it means to people in general.

Right now, anyone can drive, walk or bike into Yellowstone, or any National Park, and see the wonders of it, because we all own it. We all own this wonderful, natural treasure, a comparative rarity in the lower 48 states, a large, intact eco-system. When you enter Yellowstone, in fact, for the most part as soon as you enter the Greater Yellowstone Eco-system, you are in a wilderness area. I don’t think most people understand this fact, let alone appreciate it. Yellowstone is a wilderness, people! Yes, you can drive a car into it, stop at Old Faithful, or other places in the park, eat lunch, even stay the night in a comfortable hotel room; you are still within a wilderness. You can go right outside and see wild animals, including bear, cougar, wolf, moose, elk, deer, bison, etc., most times from within your car. This is not a zoo; these are wild, dangerous animals, which can and will kill or injure you if provoked. This is a good thing. Why, you ask?

Because it means you are in a place that isn’t completely controlled and ruined by the hand of man.

Mankind has put his hand to most of this planet, especially in the last 150 years or so, and tamed most of it. The majority of it has been changed substantially by mankind, to the point where it is unrecognizable compared to what it once was. Wilderness is increasingly rare as are places that have intact eco-systems essentially the same as they were before man entered the picture. Yellowstone is one of these rare places. The value of such a thing as a place where we can go to get in touch with the primitive sides of our soul is valuable in and of itself, let alone its value in a biological sense as a control against our uncontrolled development in other places.

The fact is, bio-diversity is a valuable thing, something we are just beginning to recognize and appreciate. The bio-diversity of the thermal areas alone has already proven to be of incredible value, as research done on the bacteria from some of the thermal features led to modern DNA identification