Guarding

• Photographer
  Elizabeth Yicheng Shen

Was the bobcat involved in chasing the deer off the cliff or was she just lucky to be in right place at the right time? No one knows for sure how the mule deer fell off the top of the West Yellowstone lava flow and ended up just 20 feet above the Firehole River. What we do know was….for the next 10 days or so, the cat sat on the carcass guarding, eating and sleeping, rarely left. It seemed to be a perfect location to hide the carcass. The snowfall also helped the cat bury her meal. Her only enemies were from the sky: the ravens to which the cat never gave the opportunity to steal even a bite.