Yellowstone National Park

Its Natural Wonders:
 Yellowstone National park’s greatest natural wonder is a fumarole named Old Faithful. Old Faithful is the largest fumarole in Yellowstone. A fumarole is small hole in the ground that shoots hot gases and steam into the air. Yellowstone also has geyshers. They are fountains that shoot hot water high into the air. There are cliffs, hot springs and waterfalls. Artist’s paint pots are boiling water and mud that are different bright colors. They’re very colorful sights!  Mud pots in Yellowstone are pools of mud that bubble.  They are not colorful.  They can become Artists paint pots.  Yellowstone also has a lake named Yellowstone Lake.

History:
 Indians used to live in Yellowstone. Here are some of the tribes: Blackfeet, Crow, Flathead, and Bannock. Yellowstone was the first national park. Ulysses S. Grant preserved 3,472 square miles or 2,219,823 acres in 1872. That sure is a lot of land! Grant wanted to protect this land because he said it was one of the most beautiful pieces of land in the world. 
Once there was a fire in Yellowstone in 1988.  It was in June, July and August.  There was very little rain so it was very dry. The fire started by lightning and human carelessness.  In that fire 990,000 acres were burned. Sometimes control burning is good but this fire was so hot it destroyed the seeds and the roots under the ground.  It snowed in September and it slowly put out the fires. 

Geology
Yellowstone National park has magma close to the surface of the land.  This hot rock easily heats up the snow or rain that falls.  Then, when the water soaks into the ground and gets heated it comes to the surface and forms the natural wonders like fumeroles and geyshers.  It is different from other parts of the earth because the land changes in an instant. 

Animals that live there:
There are elk, moose, bison(buffalo), otters, bears, deer, pronghorns,cutthroat trout(they are rare), coyotes, wolves, marmots, squirrels, chipmunks and bighorn sheep. Birds that live there are Clark’s Nutcracker, Gray Jay, Magpie, Raven, Osprey, Bald Eagles, Canada Goose, Mountain Blue Bird, Mallard Ducks, and Swans

Plants That You Can Find There: 
There are pine trees,  Aspens, Lodgepole Pines, Englemann Spruce, and Douglas-Firs. Wildflowers in the park are balsam root, Yellow Monkey flower, Fire weed, Painbrush, Lupine, Rabbitbrush, Fringed Gentian, and Sagebrush. Algae also grows there.

Yellowstone Park Rangers
Who takes care of Yellowstone National Park lands and welcomes people to some of America’s beautiful lands?  A park ranger that is who.
When you enter a park, a park ranger will tell you rules about how you can care about Yellowstone’s natural wonders.  Then, he or she would give you a map so you know where to go in Yellowstone.  A park rangers job is to protect the area.  Here are some of the jobs: rescue people, patrol land, make sure animals stay safe and wild, and protect the land from being “civilized.”  They are trained for rescue missions, patrolling land and best of all protecting land and animals.  Whenever you need help, there is always a park ranger.  They are always ready to answer questions.  They are always dependable.  If you want to become a park ranger, you must know about the park and it’s history.  Rangers tell stories about the park and they sometimes dress in old time clothes to show what it was like long ago.  Most of the stories they tell are about the history.  Sometimes they give hikes and show plants and animals.  Park rangers use special vehicles to patrol land.  Here are some of the vehicles: planes, air boats, rafts, water boats, and over-snow vehicles.  Park rangers control careless fires made by people and fires made by lightning.  Sometimes they do what they call “controlled burning.”  That means they burn a part of the park on purpose to help the environment.  For example, there is a special pine tree called the Jack Pine whose pine cones only open to let out its seeds when they have been exposed to the heat of a fire.  When the fire goes out, the seeds will grow into trees.  So, controlled burning is important to Jack Pine trees.