[Geysers] Geyser Report: Young Hopeful/Gray Bulger

Stephen Eide stepheneide at cableone.net
Fri Sep 18 10:04:22 PDT 2015


Hi Steve, 
All I can say is I was using T. Scott Bryan's book to identify the feature and Young Hopeful seemed to be the best fit.  I was not entirely sure I was correct.  
Stephen 

----- Original Message -----

From: sgryc at comcast.net 
To: "Geyser Observation Reports" <geysers at lists.wallawalla.edu> 
Sent: Friday, September 18, 2015 8:38:34 AM 
Subject: [Geysers] Geyser Report: Young Hopeful/Gray Bulger 



     I was in the park all last week.  Following up on July posts concerning Young Hopeful geyser from Stephen Eide and Dan Schaffer, I spent some time at Firehole Lake.  Dan had seen what I will call “major eruptions" of Young Hopeful (or Gray Bulger) to a height of 6 to 8 feet.  Stephen had witnessed later ones of up to 10 feet.  The jetting eruptions I witnessed were between 10 and 15 feet. The intervals I timed were all longer than Eide’s, ranging from 12 minutes 42 seconds to 41 minutes 54 seconds.  I saw twelve eruptions on Tuesday, September 8.  I went back on Thursday, September 10 to take more data and saw two eruptions for a closed interval of 14 minutes 15 seconds.  I waited another 2 hours and 35 minutes and saw nothing but the usual continuous bursting from four vents and sporadic small bursts from two others.  Thinking that the geyser might be erupting in series, I returned the next morning.  I waited over an hour and a half and saw no major eruption.  Now I’m wondering if Young Hopeful (or Gray Bulger) has stopped the major eruptions altogether.  Has anyone seen this geyser jetting at all since 16:25, September 10? 

     The major eruptions were really cool with the five other vents shutting down in a specific order as jetting began from a slot-like vent.  As the jetting declined in height, the other vents would turn back on, again in a specific order.  I will write an article about this for the Sput.  I have photos as well as video of the jetting eruptions.  I would appreciate any data. 

     There is a big question in my mind as to the name of the geyser that Eide, Schaffer, and I saw.  I always assumed that Young Hopeful was the collection of vents (many of them) perforating a sinter shield west of the current activity.  I saw just one vent in that shield spitting a little water last week.  I have a slide from 1999 that shows three distinct erupting features: vents erupting together from the shield, a single vent erupting from where the recent jetting occurred, and an eruption over the small rise to the east.  In 1999 I thought identification was simple.  Moving from west to east, the geysers were: Young Hopeful, Gray Bulger, and Artesia.  But people have been telling me I’m wrong about this.  Allen and Day don’t mention these geysers, and Marler doesn’t describe them either.  There is no sign at all for Gray Bulger Geyser, but the sign for Young Hopeful Geyser is west of the sinter shield and a good distance away from the currently active vents.  I would say that the collection of vents now active (and there are six of them) is Gray Bulger.  The situation probably won’t get any clearer as this complex of vents seems to be quite changeable.  I would welcome any clarification, if, indeed, any clarification is possible. 




Steve Gryc 

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