Theodore Roosevelt National Park Bingo

Brown and shaggy, grazing right up to the road on the South Unit loop. They have the right of way. Stay in the car.

A bison can run about 35 miles an hour and jump a fence about 5 feet high, which is surprising for an animal the size of a car.

Bare dirt mounds and short-cropped grass along the loop. Listen for a high squeaky bark passing from mound to mound.

Black-tailed prairie dog colonies sit right along the South Unit Scenic Loop, where they are visible from the car.

Ground squirrel, not a dog. Watch one stand straight up on its hind legs to bark at you.

Prairie dogs do not just bark, they bark specifics. Different threats get different call patterns, and researchers studying their calls believe the animals can encode the kind of predator approaching, not only that something is coming.

Free overlook right off I-94. Layered badlands as far as you can see, no entrance fee to look.

The badlands view most travelers see, reached from the Painted Canyon Visitor Center at I-94 Exit 32, east of Medora.

Not truly wild, NPS says so plainly: these are descendants of ranch horses. Look for a band on a ridge above the road.

A stallion marks his band's ground by dropping manure in the same spot again and again. NPS calls these stud piles, and they sit right along the scenic drive, so you can sometimes find horses by finding their mailbox.

Roosevelt's own 1883 ranch cabin, beside the South Unit Visitor Center. Short, indoor, self-guided.

Roosevelt's 1883 ranch cabin, the first of his two Dakota ranches, moved several times before settling beside the South Unit Visitor Center in Medora in 1959 pe…

Pick up the booklet at any visitor center, even the Painted Canyon stop, and finish it for a ranger swear-in.

Wide circles over the buttes on a slow-flapping glide. The reddish tail is the field mark, if it turns for you.

The hawk scream in almost every movie set in the American West is a red-tailed hawk, even when the bird on screen is a bald eagle. The National Park Service says filmmakers reach for its hoarse kee-eeeee-arr cry for nearly any bird of prey.

A short flat walk that drops you at a rim over the Little Missouri. The shortest hike in the park to a real view.

The shortest hike in the park that reaches a real view: a 0.4-mile loop with about 50 feet of gain per the base dossier, ending at a wind-cut overlook of a Litt…

A herd standing on the pavement, cars stopped and waiting. Photograph the whole scene, not just the animals.

Low evening light on the badlands from a South Unit pullout. Animals move more at this hour too.

The 36-mile South Unit Scenic Loop per the base dossier strings together bison range, prairie-dog towns, and the Wind Canyon overlook, with numbered pullouts al…

Nests in canyon-wall hollows above Wind Canyon. Ask a ranger where the family was last seen.

The "horns" on its head are not ears and not horns. They are just tufts of feathers. Its real ears are hidden holes on the sides of its head, and they sit a little crooked, one higher than the other, which helps the owl find prey in the dark by sound.

The river that cut every badlands wall in the park. Find where it runs closest to the road.

The river that cut the badlands and the spine of all three park units, South, North, and the Elkhorn Ranch unit between them.

A stallion marks his band's ground by dropping manure in the same spot again and again. Find one, then look uphill for horses.

The North Unit's big hike, climbing out of a dry wash onto a ridge with long canyon views.

The classic North Unit day hike, a 4.3-mile loop with about 700 feet of gain per the base dossier, climbing out of a coulee onto a ridge with long canyon views.

Get close enough to a butte to photograph its stripes: gray clay, red clinker, gray clay again.

The turnaround at the end of the North Unit Scenic Drive, looking down on a wide bend of the river.

The turnaround at the end of the North Unit Scenic Drive, about 14 miles out-and-back per the base dossier, looking down on a wide bend of the Little Missouri.

The third-largest concentration of petrified wood in the country, on the South Unit's west boundary.

On the west boundary of the South Unit, the third-highest concentration of petrified wood in the United States, after Petrified Forest National Park and Yellows…

Ask a ranger or read a sign: the red cap on a butte is clinker, baked hard by a coal seam that burned underground.

The South Unit's developed campground, under cottonwoods on the river bottom near Medora.

The South Unit's developed campground, on the Little Missouri river bottom under cottonwoods a few miles from the Medora entrance.

Frame as many mounds as you can in one shot, with at least one prairie dog standing up in it.

The 1883 town at the South Unit gate. Find the Rough Riders Hotel and the Burning Hills Amphitheatre.

The 1883 town at the South Unit gate, the only walkable cluster of hotels, restaurants, and services at either unit.

The South and North units are about 70 miles apart. Time the drive between visitor centers.

One flat-topped butte, photographed close enough to lose the horizon. Just rock and sky.