The Independent-Record from Helena, Montana • 7

The Independent Record, Helena, Sunday, September 18, 1988 7A DfeelHF ifroim) YeHmiffitaia Ilae -Y ELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK (AP) During the three months Yellowstone National Park ha burned, firefighters have struggled heroically, Tourism might actually be enhanced politicians have pointed fingers and the park has quietly gone about healing itself. Just eight weeks after flames roared past Grant Village on Lake Yellowstone, wildflowers already have sprouted from the blackened soil. By tne time a blue-ribbon panel of experts convenes in mid-October to review the devastation and recommend a rehabilitation plan, the seeds for recovery will have been sown in some cases, by the very flames that have destroyed nearly half the parks 2.2 million acres. ThT meadows, I would anticipate by next July you would not even be able to tell that there was a fire there," says John Varley, the parks chief researcher. They respond that fast.

The areas of the forest that had a ground fire, but not a crown fire, it will be difficult to tell that they were burned. The areas that were totally consumed by fire will come back and essentially be 100 percent plant cover in three to five years. Also returning to the landscape will be lodgepole pines, which already are reseeding. The fies melted a protective resin covering the pine cones, allow-' ing seeds to fall to the earth. Fires have changed the face of Yellowstone this summer, but much has not changed, said Ed Lewis, Greater Yellowstone Coalition head.

Elk, bison, bears and other wildlife species still roajii curiosity, said Dan Dowdyrwho runs a campground and motel in Gardiner. Those visitors, as they make their way around the Grand Loop that links Old Faithful, Madison Junction, Norris, Mammoth Hot Springs, Tower, Canyon and Lake together, will be able to pull over and watch the park mend itself, said Varley. We have in progress the development of an interpretive plan that will tell the visitor next year the story of the Summer of 88. I think it will be a fascinating story, he said. The tourists also can expect to find elk, moose, bears and bison in many of the areas where they were before, he said.

The information that comes to us from the firefighters and all the other people that are out in the field right now suggests that the animals are surprisingly nonchalant about the fires, said Varley. We have numerous observations of elk bedded down in meadows right next to where these great conflagrations are going on. And we also have a lot of evidence that they move into these blackened areas soon after the fire passes, he added. The reasons that people visit the park are still there and will still be there next year, Lewis said. The message is is that Yellowstone has changed but has not disappeared or died.

rally ignited fires. Wyoming Sens. Malcolm Wallop and Alan Simpson have called for Park Service director William Penn Motts resignation. But many observers say noth-ing in Yellowstone really was de- ir stroyed. They say the alterations The are simply the parks latest growing pains.

No species have been driven from the park or tossed into extinction by the fiijes, Varley said. Strictly ecologically speaking, there is really no downside to this story, he said. Where the downside comes in is when you talk about human values, values to life and property. This area has been putting up with fires like this for the last 10,000 to 12,000 years, and it has adapted to be able to deal with it, he said. Many businessmen in the cities and towns surrounding Yellowstone, while suffering through a dismal tourist season this year, actually expect the fires to spur a boom of sorts next year.

I think the park will have a lot of people out of thp nark and the surrounding millions of acres of wildlands. Yellowstones world-famous geysers still gush, whistle and roar, and Yellowstones spectacular rivers and waterfalls still flow. Gone from Yellowstone will be many of the insect-killed trees thdt fueled the fires. They (the trees) are being attacked by insects, right now, right this very moment, that love freshly killed trees, Varley said, adding that they include termites, ants, beetles and other species. They are not, let me make this distinction, the same kinds of insects that attack live trees, so we are not serving as some kind of pestilence for the remaining live trees, he said.

That will in turn bring in a host of bird species that feed on those kinds of things. The bears spend a lot of time with ants and termites in these freshly dead and decaying trees, so there is a very interesting component coming in there in the insect W'orld that will feed a lot of animals, birds and so forth. The fires have spawned controversy over the National Park Services let it burn policy on natu Yellowstone Park still a treasure v.v v' klMtt IP'1 rk is YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK (AP) The park is just' a howling wilderness of one turnout, five tidy picnic tables Colleen White, MSW Counselor Educator Specializing in issues of Human Sexuality Mary Burns Massage Therapy Swedish, Esalen and Reflexology 44 N. Last Chance Gulch, LaLonde Building, 449-3787 The sun comes up like a faraway fireball, heralding another day of waning summer in Yellowstone National Park. After three nerve-wracking months and a blessed few inches of early snow, the walls of flame are gone.

The 60 mph winds that danced embers from treetop to treetop have died away. The small tourist towns that hug the boundaries of the worlds first national park are no longer threatened with annihilation. On the horizon there is only a hint of smoke and haze. But Yellowstone is a casualty of what historians describe as its worst summer of drought and flames in 300 years. Famous around the world as a pristine symbol of wilderness, this vast park is now a mosaic of green and black.

Because the flames were fickle, huge patches of sweet-smelling pines abut miles of charred forest. There are fragrant meadows hard by singed marsh. Delicate ferns, turning gold with the equinox, grow next to creekbeds seared of every blade of grass. 3.000 square miles, full of all imaginable freaks of a fiery nature, wrote Rudyard Kipling of Yellowstone in 1889. And so it is today.

Visitors to Yellowstone after the fires will still see the same breathtaking vista from Artist Point that inspired painters Thomas Moran and Albert Bierstadt in the 1800s. The 700-foot sheer drop and roaring waterfalls of the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone are the same as when the parks first superintendent, Nathaniel P. Langford, was moved to write: I realized my own littleness, my helplessness, my dread exposure to destruction, my inability to cope with or even comprehend the mighty architecture of nature. Along Virginia Cascade drive there are many unspoiled spots where falling pine needles have created a soft carpet. But farther down the slope there is graphic evidence of the ominous spiral of fire which swept through that place with particular fury.

Above the falls are still little puffs of smoke and an occasional lick of distant flames. In stand ready for the next batch of campers. In the pastoral Hayden Valley, herds of bison graze in the untouched meadows. Bull elk are everywhere. Just as President Theodore Roosevelt wrote during his visit in 1903, we saw an occasional pine squirrel, snowshoe rabbit or marten; and in the open meadows around the hot waters there were Canada geese and ducks of several species, and now and then a coyote.

The geysers erupt as they did for naturalist John Muir in 1885: The wildest geysers in the world, in bright, triumphant bands, are dancing and singing in it amid thousands of boiling springs, mud volcanoes, mush and broth caldrons whose contents are of every color and consistency, splash and heave and roar in bewildering abundance. "Americans have a national treasure in Yellowstone Park, and they should guard it jealously, wrote artist Frederic Remington in 1893. Nature has made her wildest patterns here Let us respect her S0' Community Education Series Sponsored by St. Peters Community Hospital and Park Place Fitness Center FOOD, GLORIOUS FOOD A series of 4 classes on nutrition for you and your family. October 4, 11, 18 25 p.m.

150 includes all materials, recipes, sample snacks, cholesterol test for one child, and cooking materials, etc. Topics: Parenting With Food (Leslie Pierson, RD) Is Cholesterol a Family Matter? (Erin Keefe, MD, Pediatrician) Take the Drag Out of the Bag (lunch) (Les Jones, RD) Making Family Changes Work (Cindy Brown) Make Good Nutrition a Family Affair CHOLESTEROL EDUCATION SERIES November 1, 8 15 p.m. $50 includes cholesterol screen, classes and materials. A Physician and Registered Dietitian will discuss the meaning of cholesterol results, other health risks, the use of medication, and modifying eating habits to reduce cholesterol All classes will be held at Park Place Fitness Center, 50 South Park REGISTER FOR ALL EDUCATION CLASSES: -Call 444-2130 Illusions PERM SALE naa $9695 PERM AiV Aad ph with Pectin Reg $55 50 The most noturol perm you've ever hod with added strength and bounce to your hairl Includes haircut. Long and color treated hotr slightly hiqher.

Some tourists like fire YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK (AP) When Steve Falacy saw open flames near the Virginia Cascade in fire-ravaged Yellowstone National Park this week, he stopped his truck, ran into the blackened woods with a shovel and attacked the hot spots. Im from Montana and I wont let it burn any more, said Falacy, who grew up in Missoula and lives in Albuquerque, N.M. Falacys reaction was typical of people from the Yellowstone neighborhood the states of Montana, Idaho and Wyoming. But tourists from distant parts of the United States and overseas are less emotional about the damage and said they expected to see far worse. When it all grows back it will be twice as pretty, said Jack Quig-gle, of Huntington Beach, Calif.

He said television coverage of the fires had led him to believe that all Id see was burned trees. They made it sound like the whole park was scorched to the ground. An Australian tour group marveled at undamaged parts of the park. We thought it might be worse, said Val Ellerington, of Cokedale, New South Wales. But its a beautiful place.

Weve been able to see the falls and Old Faithful and what we wanted to see, and were so glad we could see Yellowstone at all. Milton and Marie Wright, of Nashville, said they, too, expected more damage. Marie Wright said she hated to see the burned trees visible from some roads, but wasnt disappointed with the park. Theres a lot left, she said. Hair Designs Illusions 1732 Prospect 449-7388 Hours' M-F 9-9, Sat 9-6, Sun.

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