Well, this is awkward… I’m not really sure how to go about asking this, so I’ll do my best so feel free to ask me for clarifications if what I’m asking is difficult
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I live in Montana, which is sort of a reference I guess. Lol. Anyway...
He would probably be a wildlife researcher, biologist, scientist, anthropologist or something like that if he's actually studying them as well as photographing. If he's just a photographer, he'd just be a wildlife photographer or photojournalist.
Yellowstone has lodges where people can stay. You can rent rooms at a lodge like a hotel, or you can stay in a cabin, usually in clusters of other cabins. Unless they've built new ones since I was last there, they aren't huge, they really are cabins, not like rental houses. I don't know how other parks like Glacier and such are though. He could probably rent one of those and if he had a grant to do his research, like a lot of things like that have, he could afford it. With research things like that though, the researchers usually go pretty far away from other people and groups of people to better immerse themselves in the natural habitat of the animals they're studying, which is why they usually camp out. Especially with wolves, they're skittish animals and they would avoid him if they aren't used to seeing him and being around him. A good book to check out on the subject is "Never Cry Wolf" by Farley Mowat. He lived among wolves for a while while doing research. This was in 1963 or 64 though, so there are probably more recent studies that are similar.
To carry a gun, he would just have to have a concealed weapons permit, sometimes called a carrying license. They're not that hard to get. He would have to check it at the entrance to the park and show his permit, say why he was there, what he was planning to do in the park, that kind of basic thing. Same for a rifle and he would probably need to have a permit to have that within the boundaries of a national park. That would be more difficult because you're not supposed to hunt there and that's what rifles are usually used for more than protection. There are non-lethal alternatives to guns, but if it's wolves he's working with, because they're in a pack and because of the range, pepper spray wouldn't be that effective. They tend to be shy of getting that close to humans though, so unless they were starving and ganged up on him, he could yell and throw sticks, rocks, pretty much anything at them to scare them off. Or fire a gun in the air or something. Even blanks make a lot of noise and would work for that. For grizzly bears, they make special pepper spray like I've already mentioned and it's pretty effective. The guy would still have to run like hell while it was distracted by the pain of that, but it would stop it from killing him. But also, yes he should have a hand gun for lethal protection because things happen and that's not always going to be enough.
I would suggest looking up people who have studied and lived with wolves, what provisions they took with them, what problems they encountered, that sort of thing. Maybe also look up bear attacks and stuff like that, depending on what kind of dangerous animals you're intending to put your character up against. Look up state and federal laws about carrying handguns, or guns in general, into a federal state park, what regulations there are, etc.
No prob. And now that I look, I'm not even sure a law enforcement officer would have been allowed to (as I stated in a comment above). Maybe I'll ask my sister (she's with USF&W).
I've talked to my sister. Fish and Wildlife people were allowed to bring firearms onto national parks if they were working, even before the law changed this year. However, she said it was far more likely that a Park Ranger would be taking care of issues in a national park. So making him a ranger (as others have suggested) would be better.
To clarify: It was not legal to carry firearms in National Parks (or wildlife refuges). It was legal to carry on other federal land (subject to applicable state laws & etc.). Not relevant to the OP, since s/he's looking specifically at Parks, but it might matter to somebody else.
I actually knew it wasn't the exactly correct term, I was lazy enough I didn't want to look it up. That's right off the top of my head what I know ^^ I figure the OP can find out specifics if they need to.
He would probably be a wildlife researcher, biologist, scientist, anthropologist or something like that if he's actually studying them as well as photographing. If he's just a photographer, he'd just be a wildlife photographer or photojournalist.
Yellowstone has lodges where people can stay. You can rent rooms at a lodge like a hotel, or you can stay in a cabin, usually in clusters of other cabins. Unless they've built new ones since I was last there, they aren't huge, they really are cabins, not like rental houses. I don't know how other parks like Glacier and such are though. He could probably rent one of those and if he had a grant to do his research, like a lot of things like that have, he could afford it. With research things like that though, the researchers usually go pretty far away from other people and groups of people to better immerse themselves in the natural habitat of the animals they're studying, which is why they usually camp out. Especially with wolves, they're skittish animals and they would avoid him if they aren't used to seeing him and being around him. A good book to check out on the subject is "Never Cry Wolf" by Farley Mowat. He lived among wolves for a while while doing research. This was in 1963 or 64 though, so there are probably more recent studies that are similar.
To carry a gun, he would just have to have a concealed weapons permit, sometimes called a carrying license. They're not that hard to get. He would have to check it at the entrance to the park and show his permit, say why he was there, what he was planning to do in the park, that kind of basic thing. Same for a rifle and he would probably need to have a permit to have that within the boundaries of a national park. That would be more difficult because you're not supposed to hunt there and that's what rifles are usually used for more than protection. There are non-lethal alternatives to guns, but if it's wolves he's working with, because they're in a pack and because of the range, pepper spray wouldn't be that effective. They tend to be shy of getting that close to humans though, so unless they were starving and ganged up on him, he could yell and throw sticks, rocks, pretty much anything at them to scare them off. Or fire a gun in the air or something. Even blanks make a lot of noise and would work for that. For grizzly bears, they make special pepper spray like I've already mentioned and it's pretty effective. The guy would still have to run like hell while it was distracted by the pain of that, but it would stop it from killing him. But also, yes he should have a hand gun for lethal protection because things happen and that's not always going to be enough.
I would suggest looking up people who have studied and lived with wolves, what provisions they took with them, what problems they encountered, that sort of thing. Maybe also look up bear attacks and stuff like that, depending on what kind of dangerous animals you're intending to put your character up against. Look up state and federal laws about carrying handguns, or guns in general, into a federal state park, what regulations there are, etc.
Hope this was somewhat helpful.
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I've talked to my sister. Fish and Wildlife people were allowed to bring firearms onto national parks if they were working, even before the law changed this year. However, she said it was far more likely that a Park Ranger would be taking care of issues in a national park. So making him a ranger (as others have suggested) would be better.
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(also not relevant to OP's question- but people often forget about us as being part of anthropology)
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