Take an Epic Journey With the Elk of Yellowstone | Short Film Showcase

[Music] The tools of my trade are satellite collars. [Music] Here she goes, start getting locations and find out where she migrates. [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] It's like sending yourself a Christmas present in the mail. I put this collar on, and we do it in March. By July, it'll be fun to open up the box and see where that thing went. Ever since Yellowstone was created, people have known about the elk migration, but it's been difficult to see it in its entirety. In the case of the Cody herd, they spend half their year out on this patchwork of private ranches and state lands. In the spring, they all start migrating towards the forest boundary. Pretty soon they're getting to the Yellowstone National Park boundary. Once they cross into the park, they're arriving at their summer ranges where they spend the other half of their year. The GPS collars I put on elk let me see incredible detail, but that's still a far cry from going there myself and seeing the migration firsthand. So that's what I'm going to do this summer.

Joe's bringing his camera traps to set along the trails. James is bringing his paintbrush and an artist's eye. In the end, we also want to be able to share this with other people. I've been photographing migrations for a long time, and this is the first time I've focused on elk. The only way to see and show migration is with camera traps. [Music]

Perfect bear nap place. If I was a bear, I would nap in there. We are on the east side of Yellowstone National Park. [Music] We're in the winter range now. [Music] The first elk I saw were while trout fishing in the west. [Music] We need beautiful things. The planet would be a pale and uninspiring place without things like trout, for me anyway. [Music] It's fun working with James. I mean, I find myself bringing, you know, "Hey James, paint this," you know, "Why don't you add this? What about this ladybug, wildflowers, rocks, fish?" He notices things that we don't notice and, you know, pulls us back out into the broader view. [Music]

You know, if I'm painting a trout, I'm also kind of painting an elk because they've walked through this territory. As we come to learn more about the movements of animals, you realize that everything is connected with everything else around the planet. So if Yellowstone's come to mean a box with stuff in it, then maybe we have to work to make that word mean something else. [Music]

All right, how you doing? Good morning! Jesus, that's a nice cow there. [Music] Actually, all ranchers will tell you we don't raise cattle; we raise trash. The herds are on these ranches for half their lives. This is where they get food and shelter during the harsh winter. The total amount of land that you guys are managing is 255,000 acres in Wyoming. Actually, I think it broadens an appreciation to know that, okay, this is a part of something a lot bigger than just our activities on the ranch. We're on the edge of the Yellowstone ecosystem, you know, we're really part of it. That's the wild, wild place, just living around the wilderness areas just right above us. All around us, we're surrounded by public land too, and it borders, and the elk move through it. And this fall we had over a hundred animals grazing. You kind of have to try to plan for that, you know, the fencing—we had to redo all of our fencing so that they don't get caught up in it, make it easy for them to move through. Being out there, seeing all this, being, you know, kind of sharing their habitat, listening to bull elk bugling out your backyard—it’s good. [Music]

Now we're leaving the ranch lands and we're going to start making our way up into the mountains. [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] We're pretty far away from Yellowstone right here; we gotta migrate. [Music] [Music] The Absaroka Mountains are rugged, they're steep, they're dry, they're scrabbly, and so the only way we can do it with our gear and efficiently is on mules and horses. [Music]

Looking for Joe's cameras—he had five cameras up here. The last one has gone missing. Seems like some elk or a bear came through and knocked a lot of these cameras around, and we found the other ones. Can't find this one. [Music]

Is that a lens sticking up down there in the mud? Yeah, that's not good. Way to go, Joe! I didn't think I was gonna find this one. It's probably the first bump; it eliminates the front lens element. But I mean, it's either we put it on the cliff and take the risk of getting amazing elk migration footage, or we don't do it. Yeah, and we decided to do it. We'll clean them up and see if we can get them back out. We might have to just do without that—just do without that. This... yeah, that front. All right, we better get moving so we can get over the needle, which is not even in sight at this point. Look at that pile! Elk coming over the top! May 30th, wow, coming over the top! Yeah, that's definitely our best footage yet. It's beautiful. [Music]

We're gonna get as far as we can get with the horses and pack mule, and then Scott's gonna drop us with our bags, and we're gonna keep going on foot over the mountain top. [Music] Now Arthur, I have to admit, I would like to see it with all these outfails that I've run so far this spring. That was going to be a fun one to see too. All right, good luck guys. [Music]

Yeah, there's one place where we have to cross an open steep face that still has some snow on it. A lot of elk cross there; we really don't want to cross there. [Music] A lot of people think elk are just elk and then they all could do that, so maybe a wildlife battle just can't do it. Those hoof prints, this out tracks all pounded through here—this is a hell of a trail, hunter. [Music]

Elk has taken all these routes, and it's just amazing to me that they just go without knowing what's around the corner. [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] Just make sure to take your time on each foot. [Music]

I mean, I'm just totally amazed. When you're standing on top of a needle mountain, looking at those other points along their trail, all you can feel is awe at the physical capabilities of these animals. [Music]

So [Music] [Applause] [Music] She'll be coming round needle mountain when she comes. How does it go? Exactly right, she'll be coming around him and when she comes. Coming around needle mountain when she comes. Coming around the mountain. I feel like I have a much greater appreciation for the energy it takes for these animals to do what they're doing and the risks that they expose themselves to. You know, we're totally spent. I think I knew it was tough, but now I feel it in my bones and my muscles. It's humbling to feel what these animals experience. [Music]

Other than my camera traps, this spot is as close as I'll get to the migration. We need to show them traversing rivers, and their only time they're going to be swimming rivers is when they're migrating. You gotta wait a long time for the elk to show up at this spot. But it's good because I like hanging out and waiting. That's one of my favorite things to do, is just sit around and look around, not do much. That's when the pictures get made—when you stay in one place for a while or you work the same spot for a while. I do not want to affect the migration in any way. I just want to be an observer and document it. [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music]

Be able to capture that vulnerable moment right when they cross the river. Feel lucky, super lucky! Like in the migration, I'm like, you know, living the dream, I guess. [Music] They go over this mountain and then drop 6,000 feet to the river in less than 20 hours, and then climb up the next mountain, which is another 6,000-foot vertical gain. I mean, that's hard work. [Music]

You mention Yellowstone to a lot of people and they think of wolves, and they're around, but mainly we see grizzly bears almost every day traveling the trail, picking over an elk carcass, grazing up on the plateaus—just a whole lot of grizzly bears. And the grizzly bears have figured out that if they roll these rocks, they can eat thousands of moths. These moths make a migration in and out of Yellowstone Park. It's just interesting for Arthur and myself and Joe to think about how things outside of the park sustain the life that's in the park. As clear evidence that Yellowstone isn't contained by a box is the fact that it's in me right now. I really love that landscape, and it traveled with me back to my studio, and it informs what I do here. [Music]

Not only do the animals move from inside the box out to other places, but the wonder that we feel when we're there spreads far and wide, including this studio in Connecticut, you know, over a thousand miles away. [Music]

We were with Scott and Fevers, and now we're meeting up with Lee and Wes Livingston, two local outfitters, brothers. I could think of nothing better than go spend a month up here by yourself. You don't have a satellite—Facebook satellite link? Yeah, I forgot it! Downstreamer Wes, I thought you had it! All I do, the only reason I do this is so you believe that I know where I'm going. Our collars, there's a couple of them, and they hang over here. Yeah, there ought to be some hiding up there somewhere.

For the next 10 miles or so, all those elk are on one trail heading towards the southeast corner of Yellowstone National Park. That's why we're going to climb up there. Wes and I would be the first ones over the mountain into the thoroughfare. It was a big adventure. I love to go see the elk, you know, in the spring, and then we follow it through the summer. When we take our pack trips, we show people these beautiful herds of elk up on the high alpine meadows grazing. Then on into the fall, through the hunting season, we rely on the elk. And then in the wintertime, I go capture elk and net gun out of a helicopter, put collars on them for this research project here. So it's pretty much a year-round thing that we're interacting with these elk. Elk probably make up 85 percent of my fall income. Yeah, they're a driving factor in my life. Yeah, you think about it—they're messing with them, damn near, you're around. I hope we find him, but if we don't, it doesn't mean it's a failure; it just means that the elk aren't hanging out up on top of the plateau when there's a storm happening like we are. Imagine how Jack feels. [Music]

That's a good one, Jack! Good boy! He says that's what it's all about. [Music] So [Music] It's about to be August, and it's snowing sideways on elk summer range. July snow showers make August flowers. Probably be 75 degrees tomorrow, just another day in paradise. [Music]

We're gonna find some elk today. There are scientists who work in labs and study things that you can manipulate in petri dishes. My petri dish is the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. So the closest I'm ever gonna get to seeing through a microscope into it is getting on a horse and coming up to a place like this and just trying to get these glimpses.

There's some elk right there! There they are! That's a good group relaxing in the grass—it's nice to see. Seeing this with my own eyes up here, it's like I'm getting to see where the whole thing begins. This is where the sun and the snow and the rain make the grass that feeds these migratory herds every year. It feels like I'm in the heart of Yellowstone.

This is just one of nine different elk migrations in the Greater Yellowstone, making up a total of over 20,000 elk. These migrations sprawl over an area five times bigger than Yellowstone National Park. What that means is that Yellowstone depends on that entire area and all the land and all the people. [Music]

I've learned from Joe's footage and photographs that migration is a big part of what makes animals wild. [Music] And through James's work, that we can't think of Yellowstone as a box defined by its boundary. And personally, I've started to believe that these elk migrations are the heartbeat, the pulse of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, and I want to spend the rest of my life being a part of it. [Music] [Music] [Music] So [Music] [Music] Uh [Music] [Music] You