Back Off Boys, This Lady's Mine!

Yellowstone National Park, Hayden Valley, buffalo and testosterone are on the docket for today. Today, which also happens to be our 13th wedding anniversary @juliabreheny and I took a drive to Hayden Valley which is located here in Yellowstone National Park just a few miles from where we are currently staying. The buffalo were out in droves, crowding the road, feeding on grass (how these big ass creatures live on grass is beyond me) and gearing up to mate aka The Rut. The male buffalos will choose a female and stay near her and try to keep other males away from her at all costs. When left alone the male will perform what I can only describe as buffalingus on his lucky lady friend. Although it becomes increasingly rare as we get deeper into rut season and all of the males are looking to mate. The male will show various displays of strength when other males begin encroaching on his relationship. This ranges from bugling, which sounds like one part grunt and 2 parts roar to rushing towards another male to get him to back off and ultimately when a willing challenger doesn't back off the inevitable butting of heads. We got to witness two males off in the distance going head to head for about 15 seconds when a clear winner emerged when the other male suddenly became interested in a particularly appetizing blade of grass about 20 feet away from the fight. I can only imagine the headache this guy must have had to give up on a date with his dream buffalo babe.

The video below shows some of this behavior in action (unfortunately I didn't get the big boys going for the belt) but I still have some time left here in Yellowstone and promise to do my best. In this video the subject male was on the other side of the road and was being harrased by several other males to pass the lady over. He made his way across the street to get away from him but they followed him over there. It was at this point I started filming from inside the bed of my truck and caught this incredible footage of him trying to sneak away with his new girlfriend. It was a little windy and shot with the same filmography techniques as the Blair Witch Project

I'll give this guy one thing, several of the other males were significantly bigger than he was but none of them were willing to take a bite so to speak.

Here's a photo I took of an incredible buffalo couple. We pulled over and watched another male following this pair around for about ten minutes. At one point the coupled male turned and briefly charged at the following male but the following male didn't budge so he just turned back to his girlfriend and kept grunting, flexing and moving away.

It's incredible to witness the various family dynamics of the herds as well. Often times you'll see large groups of females tending to their young with just a few bulls (adult males) mixed in to protect the family.

Here is a mother and her red cow (baby buffalo).

This one reminds me of @juliabreheny, @nickthetravelkid and myself being an awesome family (I'm the big badass looking one bringing up the rear).

Finally, we stopped and were just admiring a couple of herds on each side of the road (actually I was hoping for a fight) and noticed this young adolescent male behind us in the road. He stood in the road for no less than 10 minutes blocking traffic which just goes to show you that fucking teenagers are a pain in the ass no matter what species they belong to. I do admit to appreciating him doing that because I had zero cars in front of me but was able to sit and admire the herds due to his tenacity.

I have so many more incredible photos, videos and stories to share so follow along and be patient if it takes me awhile to get them posted.