Yellowstone: The Task and Torment
The next day we went straight to the first snail collecting site, an hour and a half hike in on the Yellowstone-Teton boundary trail. We hiked through a stand of lodgepole pine and a burned-out section of the forest scattered with aspen before we finally reached the stream. We put on our sandals and shorts, and waded in. This "unnamed reach of Polecat creek" is heated by geothermic activity; in the entire time we were there, my feet didn't get in the least bit cold.
Now for the task of snail-collecting. We would scrape the snails from the bottom of plant roots and algae growths. Then we would put them in a container with stream water, and begin selectively draining off the plant matter that floated to the top. After a number of these cycles, the snails were isolated enough to sort the desired species from the undesired (and more numerous) one. After about four hours, one thundershower, and numerous thunderstorm near-misses, we had met our quota — something on the order of a thousand snails.
But we weren't done yet. First we had to hike back out in the midst of a massive thunderstorm that pelted us with 5mm hailstones and spattered us with heavy raindrops. After an hour and a half of this, we were soaked to the bone and freezing cold, no matter how energetically we hiked. We drove to the nearest lodge and warmed up with some hot chocolate before heading to the second snail site.
There I discovered just how miserable scientific research can be. The first site was sunny and warm and cheerful. Here the constant drizzle and overcast froze us heart and limb. Here the collecting was less of a game than an arduous process. We gathered two thousand tiny snails in about 45 minutes, but I felt no accomplishment: only a desperate need to warm up.
Fortunately, cars are well-built for that: they have heaters. We asked for nothing more as we drove down towards Jackson Lake and the Teton Range.
Perhaps this is nature's way of apologizing: just as we came down to the lakeshore the clouds drew just far enough back to see the glow of the sunset and the illuminated forms of the Tetons. We ate a dinner of wild rice and salmon, went back to the campsite, and fell asleep.
[To be contiued….]
