Yellowstone National Park is an amazing place to discover because when you do, you start to understand why we have national parks at all. There are three spheres of interaction in the park and they are: nature-and-nature, human-and-nature, and human-and-human. The spheres that stand out are the human-and-nature and nature-and-nature. Tourist-and-wolves interact within the human-and-nature sphere, and the effects of their interaction are a complicated and long relationship within the history of the Yellowstone National Park. Tourist are defined as citizens who come to visit in the seasons of spring and summer, and their visits are the reason the economy of the park and the surrounding concessioners maintains a profitable output year to year.
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Of course this was meant to allow the park to build roads and other infrastructures but that was not all it was used for. In the early 1920’s tourism was sought after and attempts to bring more visitors were made. The park knew that the main attraction of the park was the ability for tourist to feel as if they are in the wilderness. One thing that makes people feel like they are in the wilderness is seeing animals roam free within it, so making it easier to see the animals was one of the attempts made by the national park. Elk and bison were seen as the easiest and safest animal to artificially increase the population of. While introducing the wildlife policies and priorities professor Parr mentions, “the most important pro-elk policy was to eliminate the bad animals that eat elk” (II-C-1.4). This was the hunting and eliminating process of mountain lions, coyotes, and wolves, but the only animal they succeeded in eliminating was the wolf. Of course, the elk population blew up because the wolf was gone. This policy was never mentioned publicly, …show more content…
The tourism industry is seen as a very important part for the Yellowstone National Park because it allows for it and surrounding businesses to thrive year to year. Tourists come to see the wilderness and animal viewings within the park are necessary for an enjoyable experience in many cases. Elk provide for many of the tourist viewings and the tourist, for this reason, admire the elk. Tourist are considered so important that the Organic Act of 1916 included a clause that allowed for the park to destroy animals, plants and other resources just to allow for further enjoyment of the other resources, but when the park decided to do something under this clause they decided to keep it under the radar just long enough to successfully eradicate the entire Yellowstone wolf population (II-C-1.4). After it became public the tourist and other environmentalist were furious about the eradication but none of them, including the Park Rangers, knew that the massive elk population would harm the whole willow population. These two spheres of interaction collided with each other and have created one of the Yellowstone National Park’s worst trophic cascades. Tourist have been the focus of the National Parks for decades, but if Yellowstone had only avoided causing a trophic cascade the park may be a completely different place
Of course this was meant to allow the park to build roads and other infrastructures but that was not all it was used for. In the early 1920’s tourism was sought after and attempts to bring more visitors were made. The park knew that the main attraction of the park was the ability for tourist to feel as if they are in the wilderness. One thing that makes people feel like they are in the wilderness is seeing animals roam free within it, so making it easier to see the animals was one of the attempts made by the national park. Elk and bison were seen as the easiest and safest animal to artificially increase the population of. While introducing the wildlife policies and priorities professor Parr mentions, “the most important pro-elk policy was to eliminate the bad animals that eat elk” (II-C-1.4). This was the hunting and eliminating process of mountain lions, coyotes, and wolves, but the only animal they succeeded in eliminating was the wolf. Of course, the elk population blew up because the wolf was gone. This policy was never mentioned publicly, …show more content…
The tourism industry is seen as a very important part for the Yellowstone National Park because it allows for it and surrounding businesses to thrive year to year. Tourists come to see the wilderness and animal viewings within the park are necessary for an enjoyable experience in many cases. Elk provide for many of the tourist viewings and the tourist, for this reason, admire the elk. Tourist are considered so important that the Organic Act of 1916 included a clause that allowed for the park to destroy animals, plants and other resources just to allow for further enjoyment of the other resources, but when the park decided to do something under this clause they decided to keep it under the radar just long enough to successfully eradicate the entire Yellowstone wolf population (II-C-1.4). After it became public the tourist and other environmentalist were furious about the eradication but none of them, including the Park Rangers, knew that the massive elk population would harm the whole willow population. These two spheres of interaction collided with each other and have created one of the Yellowstone National Park’s worst trophic cascades. Tourist have been the focus of the National Parks for decades, but if Yellowstone had only avoided causing a trophic cascade the park may be a completely different place