Artist's Paint Pots

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Yellowstone National Park

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Artist's Paint Pots - Yellowstone National Park

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Difficulty: Moderate
Length: 1.1 miles / 1.8 km
Duration: 1 hour or less

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Overview: The Artist's Paint Pots trail is an easy hike to several geothermal features in Yellowstone National Park. From the boardwalk, you can see colorful hot springs, two large mudpots, a fumarole, and a couple of geysers.

Many of the geothermal features along this trail do not have names, and little is known about them. Montana State University maintains a database of features in this area as well as other areas of the park. They can be found at http://www.rcn.montana.edu/resources/features/features.aspx?nav=11®ion=9

Tips: Hydrothermal features are fragile rarities of nature. Yellowstone preserves the largest collection of hydrothermal features on the planet. You have an unparalleled opportunity to view hot springs, geysers, mudpots, and fumaroles in a natural setting.

Change takes place naturally in a hydrothermal area, but people can disrupt these processes and cause irreparable damage. Rocks, sticks, and other objects thrown into a hydrothermal feature may be permanently cemented in place, choking off water circulation and ending all activity.

For the sake of all who follow, never throw objects into any feature. Stay on established walkways for your safety and to protect fragile formations that have formed over thousands of years.

It is illegal to collect any natural or cultural objects or to remove, deface, or destroy any plant, animal, or mineral in Yellowstone's hydrothermal areas. Bring drinking water; take out all trash.

While viewing or photographing the area, protect your camera, glasses, and binocular lenses from hydrothermal heat and stray.

Toxic gases exist in Yellowstone. Dangerous levels of hydrogen sulfide and carbon dioxide have been measured in some hydrothermal areas. If you feel sick, leave the location immediately.

Help preserve Yellowstone for the future.

Points of Interest

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Trailhead

From the parking area, take the boardwalk path to the south as it crosses through a section of forest burned in 1988.

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Start of Loop

After about 0.3 miles, you will reach the start of the loop around the hot pools. Ahead of you (to the south) is Paintpot Hill. Turn right. The Artist's Paint Pots trail is not as developed as many of the more-traveled trails in Yellowstone, and many of the geothermal features do not have names.

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Feature GAPNN021

Montana State University maintains a database of geothermal features in Yellowstone National Park. This pool is Feature GAPNN021. The database can be found at http://www.rcn.montana.edu/resources/features/features.aspx?nav=11®ion=9.

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Milky Blue Pools

As you continue around the boardwalk, you will see several milky-blue pools. The milky blue color comes from silica that is suspensded in the water.

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Small Vents

Next are various smaller vents as the trail climbs a short distance up the hill though new growth lodgepole pine trees. Much of this area was burned in the 1988 fire.

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At the top of the hill on the right are perhaps the most unusual features in the area - Artist's Paint Pots. The mud is composed of clay minerals and fine particles of silica. In this area the rock is rhyolite, which is composed primarily of quartz and feldspar. Acids in the steam and water break down the feldspar into a clay mineral called kaolinite. As the boiling mud is squirted over the brims of the mudpot, a sort of mini-volcano of mud starts to build up.

The Artist' Paintpots themselves are a pair of mud pots located up the hillside, somewhat separated from the other hot springs. Although restricted to just two small basins, they tend to be very active and at one point in 2006 forced a temporarty colsure of the trail. At times, the gray mud is tossed as high as 20 feet. Despite their proximity to one another, the two sets of mud pots are always of different thickness, and the one to the west sometimes dries completely during the summer season.

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Feature GAPNN047

This fumarole hill next to the boardwalk has runoff areas of bright red growth within.

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Scenic Overlook

This part of the path is high enough to overlook many square miles of the surrounding area, from the hot pools below, across the Gibbon River Valley toward more distant active areas on the far side of Gibbon Meadows.

The hillside has several small pools and steam vents.

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Blood Geyser

Visible from the eastern portion of the trail is Blood Geyser. Blood Geysers plays from a shallow basin at the east end of the group. Possibly the spring named "Red Geyser" in 1878, it was described as a perpetual spouter in 1882, and, indeed, it only briefly and infrequently pauses its play. Most quiet intervals last less than 1 minute, and they apparently can be as long as several hours apart. The bursting reaches up to 6 feet high.

The water discharge of this one spring amounts to 150 gallons per minute, about half that of the entire group. The small alcove surrounding the spring is highly colored by iron oxide, and, in fact, the water contains a large amount of iron in solution. A sample, allowed to cool and sit quietly, will develop a precipitate of reddish iron oxide within a few minutes. This is what let to the name Blood Geyser. The only other Yellowstone springwater known to do this comes from the Chocolate Pots, elsewhere in the Gibbon Basin.

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Flash Spring

The imporant springs of clear water, including two geysers, are located at the base of the Paintpot Hill. Several other springs in the area appear to be geysers but actually are not. Their spouting is perpetual and largely a result of the evolution of carbon dioxide in water cooler than boiling. The best-known of these is Flash Spring, immediately next to the easternmost point of the trail at the base of the hillside.

The end of the loop section of the trail is reached in another 250 feet, after a few other equally steamy pools. Adjacent to this area are three other off-trail, backcountry thermal areas: Sylvan Springs, Gibbon Hill Geyser Basin, and Geyser Creek Thermal area. These areas are fragile, dangerous, and difficult to get to; travel without knowledgeable personnel is discouraged.