Woodland Tracers

Smarterer

2012-02-02T10:09:00.003-07:00

So for the past several years I've been a member of a Word of Mouth organization called BzzAgent. I've loved every minute of taking part in their surveys and product campaigns because I've gotten to try out things I wouldn't normally do. Today was no different. After checking my email for typical drivel I decided to log into my BzzAgent account and see if there were any new campaigns for me to join. Luckily there was and it was the Smarterer campaign. Now while I don't recommend going to this site if you actually have things to do in your day it is an excellent site for wasting time and de-stressing. This site is a platform for people to test their knowledge base about everything digital in this wonderful world we live in. It has quizzes about facebook use, twitter use, blogging, computer games, etc etc etc. I've only taken the quiz specifically designed for BzzAgents so far but I'm sure in the next day or two I'll go back and try my hand at a few other digital formats I use in my day to day life and see how I stack up to others. But as I said... be forewarned... I can see this as being rather addictive and time can slip away pretty quickly while you are trying to prove your skill set to the rest of the world. So get your work done first THEN check out this site. Oh and by the way... I got a 764 out of 800 for my BzzAgent quiz. Guess I'm Smarterer after all!

Opportunities

2011-10-21T08:48:00.003-06:00

I keep trying to have an optimistic attitude when it comes to finding a job in this current market. But at the same time I also have to be realistic and not get my hopes up too high even when I'm getting positive feedback from interview and hiring panels. But right now I'm feeling that there are some great opportunities out there that I'd be well suited for.

Right now I am one of two finalists that are being considered by hiring committees in Ephrata, WA and Mountain Home, ID.a I'm excited by these prospects since they both jobs with the NRCS (Natural Resource Conservation Service) and Pheasants Forever under the Sage Grouse Initiative. I would be working with ranchers, farmers, and private land owners along with federal and state agencies to improve sage grouse habitat that exists on these lands. In all honesty its exactly the kind of work I've been wanting to get involved in since graduating from UM but was happy to just have a job with the Forest Service right out of college.

In a lot of ways my desire to work on this kind of collaborative project stems from my Dad. Over the years I'd watched him try to get various organizations and industries to work together to reach a common goal. This was not always the easiest of ventures for him and he came across plenty of roadblocks in his career but his work really influenced my opinion on multi use management of the landscape. These jobs would allow me to put my principals into practice and work with a diverse group of people. I know there would be plenty of challenges and I'm sure there would be times that I'll want to pull my hair out at the roots, but I think the rewards could surpass any frustration there might be. I truly believe I'm the right kind of person for this kind of work.

So my hope, in closing, is that I get one of these jobs and can make a difference, just as my dad did for all those years.

Rainy Day Blues Washed Away!

2011-10-14T11:47:00.004-06:00

Though I've never really had a poor initial interview for any of the outfits I've submitted applications to, today I possibly had the best initial interview ever. I work today to rain, fog, gloominess and a foreboding of the day going downhill, but to my surprise my phone interview was so exhilarating that my whole attitude has changed.

This morning I had a 30 minute initial screening interview with a 4 person panel for a position with the NRCS and Pheasants Forever in Belle Fouche, South Dakota. The folks on the panel consisted of the Western Director of the Sage Grouse Initiative, the private lands supervisor for the S.D Game and Fish, and the two contacts I would have as direct supervisors if I were to get this position. Three out of four of these people work out of the same office and obviously have a good thing going. They were young, vibrant, and excited about the work there were doing. Its only been in the last year that the Sage Grouse Initiative has been a part of South Dakota's land and wildlife management strategy so really I would be coming in on the ground floor of a project that I have really wanted to be involved in. The panel was so enthusiastic about where they project could take them and how much it could improve the landscape that I was able to feed off their excitement and really able to communicate about the projects I've been involved with, why I'm so interested in collaborative work between state, federal, and private land owners, and what assets I could bring to the project as a whole. I wish that I could capture that feeling every time I interview for something because it really took it to a whole new level. I should know by mid-week next week if they want to do either an in person interview or one done via video conference since I live so far away. I really hope they do because frankly this is one of the few outfits that I felt like I could really fit in with and also do something amazing with.

So now that I'm super charged I need to use my energy for good. Step 1... write in my blog... check. Step 2... go through clothes and decide which ones are keepers and which ones need to go to Goodwill. Step 3... clean out my file cabinet of junk paperwork I don't need anymore (something I've been procrastinating on for waaaaaaayy to long). Step 4...not a clue at the moment but I'm sure I'll come up with something fantastic and goal oriented.

Have a good weekend everyone!

Hello World

2011-10-10T09:47:00.003-06:00

Arg I have done it again. It has almost been an entire year since I've written anything in this blog after multiple promises to myself that I would get back to it way before now. I guess that's what happens when you are living life and staying busy but its pretty ridiculous I know. I really am going to try and be better... no promises this time... but I will try.

This past year really has been a whirlwind of activities and it seems like I am perpetually in motion. After Mace finished his college degrees we had a good long talk about what we wanted to try and do with our lives and came to the conclusion that we need to go somewhere other than Trout Creek. The reasons for this are varied but it boils down to the fact that for him to find a job in his field he needs to be in a bigger town and for me to gain more experience in my field I need to shift into another location as well. So while Mace started the lengthy and somewhat nerve wracking task of pulling his first time resume together I updated mine and started the great job search. I honestly don't know how many applications I've put out into the world in the last 6 months but its got to be pushing 100 if its not more than that. While this might sound rather dire it really isn't. I've had some great interest from some amazing organizations during that time as well and have interviewed both in person and over the phone for quite a few jobs making the cuts down to between 2 and 4 remaining candidates. But in the end the results have been the same and I haven't been selected either because they would prefer me to have a Masters in a wildlife program or because I don't have enough contract or grant experience. And while I do understand where they are coming from I also know myself and if given a chance I could blow them away. How am I supposed to get grant or contract experience when in my current job that isn't part of my duties? But until that chance comes around I'll continue to think positively. There have been several jobs that I've interviewed for that I got my hopes up too high either because of what the job was or where it was located and of course getting that call or letter saying "We're sorry but we chose someone else" hurt a bit more in those cases. I do have to keep telling myself that times are tough, jobs are in short supply, and I should feel pretty good about myself for making it so far through so many interview processes, but it still kind of sucks to be told thanks but no thanks in the end.

I do have to say its been a lot easier for me than it has been for Mace. If you want to know how tough the job market really is, then try and get one right out of college. I know he gets frustrated and feels a little rejected right now especially when the calls keep coming in for me to start and interview process and he hasn't gotten a bite yet. But I have to keep reminding him that I'm in different place in my career than he is in his. He is just starting out and trying to find a place for himself in the world and I was lucky enough to get a job out of college and continually add to my skill set over these last 5 years. I know that at some point a break through will happen for him and he'll be able to let himself shine. I just hope its sooner rather than later so he doesn't give up hope and feel like all that time and money he put into schooling wasn't a waste.

As for other life altering events there really haven't been too many. For the past 4 years I've gone over to the local school several times a semester and presented wildlife and outdoorsy information to the kids and had developed a nice "working" relationship with the principal there. So I guess I shouldn't have been to surprised when she called me up in August and asked if I wanted to work with another teacher and help out with an evening preschool class she was organizing. Apparently a lot more little kids have moved into the area and they didn't have enough room in the morning and afternoon programs to include them all. With my garden stuff wrapping up for the fall/winter I figured doing something in the evening would be a good idea and agreed. So for 2 days a week for a couple hours in the evening after work I am Miss Tracy the Great and am teaching 12 little 3-5 year olds about manners, friendship, counting, and site words. Its actually been really fun for me and I love kids so I've had a blast seeing them play and learn in their own unique ways. I know I'm not supposed to have favorites in my class but I do... shhhh don't tell anyone. I have one little boy in my class that reminds me so much of my brother Brian its kind of scary. Not so much in looks but in attitude and the way his mind works. He is so polite and goes out of his way to treat everyone nicely and include them in activities. He also has a little crush on me which just makes it all the cuter. He picked me a dandelion bouquet after the first week and got all shy and blushy when he gave it to me. Then I have a little girl that thinks she is a little puppy dog 24/7 and asks me to take her for walks around the play room with a make shift leash she's made out of construction paper and string. Gotta love the imagination going wild there. I've already started to think about a Halloween costume for myself for the preschool party. Haven't come up with anything concrete yet but I need to get my rear in gear soon since its just around the corner and I don't want to disappoint the kidlings.

In sad news I have no pumpkin this year. I KNOW its heartbreaking!!! The summer just didn't cooperate. We had snow on the ground clear into the first part of June and didn't even get tomatoes and other garden stuff planted until the first week of July. So there just wasn't enough summer left to try and grow a giant pumpkin. Its been so wet and cold anyway that I doubt we would have gotten anything over 30 lbs if we were lucky. But I have to say that its been kind of a bummer of a summer not taking care of a giant gourde. Mace and I had kind of gotten used to the work and the resulting pleasure we'd get from watching something grow day after day. Don't get me wrong we love our other garden veggies, but its just not the same. But this also means that I don't have a pumpkin to carve for Halloween, which is something I have not experienced. I know I could go buy a pumpkin from the store (and I'll probably end up doing that at the last minute because I can't stand the idea of not having a carved pumpkin for the trick or treaters to gaze at) but its not going to have the wow factor that my previous pumpkins have had. Heck the biggest pumpkin the sell over here can't be more than 20lb... and it seems so small. Mace calls them toddler pumpkins and kind of turns his nose up at them. I can't say as I blame him. But maybe I'll get him a pumpkin too and he can turn on his creative juices a bit and we'll have a carving party on Halloween together.

Okay... I've written enough for now. I'm spent... on to baking massive amounts of goodies since I have the day off.

23 Days!

2010-11-28T11:06:00.003-07:00

As some of you know I've been doing a countdown to my vacation home since about mid September. Now we're down to 23 days and I'm just so excited. I know I haven't written a blog in so long and its not because I've been super busy really, I've just not felt like writing. Poor excuse I know but sometimes you are in the mood to spill your guts and other times you just aren't. Even now I'm sort of blase about writing anything but I feel like I should since its been so long.

Work has shifted gears from fall to winter and I've already had to break out the snow shoes. My calves hated me for the first week of using them but them seem to be getting used to them again. You really have no idea what kind of a work out it is to have snow shoes on your feet until you have them on for 8-10 hours at a time. You'd think my butt would get smaller over the winter because of them but alas no such luck.

I'm trying to think of all the things in Cheyenne I want Mace to see. How do you show your fiance everything from you childhood in a measly two weeks back home? I guess there really is no way. I know he wants to see a few of the museums, the base, my neighborhoods and see the places that are special to me but there just isn't enough time and I know we both want to take the time to enjoy Christmas with my mom. Mom is trying to find her groove with holidays without dad and I know its really hard. I think she is really looking forward to Mace coming down with me because at least that means there will be a guy in the house and some of our traditions will be more normal. It just seems so weird going home to a place where dad is not there to greet us and be a part of the festivities. Seems so empty. Mom and I did our best last year to keep things light and fun but I have to admit it was hard for both of us. At least with Mace there to add his two cents to the conversations and keep football on the tv it will seem a bit more normal.

Well I really can't think of much more to say at the moment. So I'll leave you with my countdown and hope that tomorrow or the next day I'll have something more interesting to talk about.

Tribute to Mom

2010-05-09T11:57:00.003-06:00

I may not always say the right things to tell you how much I love you, so I thought this poem captured my own thoughts nicely. Happy Mothers Day!

Mom, I look at you
and see a walking miracle.

Your unfailing love without limit,

your ability to soothe my every hurt,

the way you are on duty, unselfishly,

every hour, every day,

makes me so grateful

that I am yours, and you are mine.

With open arms and open heart,

with enduring patience and inner strength,

you gave so much for me,

sometimes at your expense.

You are my teacher,

my comforter, my encourager,

appreciating all, forgiving all.

Sometimes I took you for granted, Mom,

but I don’t now, and I never will again.

I know that everything I am today

relates to you and your loving care.

I gaze in wonder

as I watch you being you—

my miracle, my mother.

By Joanna Fuchs

Hard Month for Friends Back Home

2010-04-17T08:46:00.002-06:00

Though my thoughts have mostly been turned to work and the nice weather I've had recently, this month has been full of grieving and sadness for some of my friends back home in Cheyenne. It seems as though all bad things come in sets of three. First my friend Mario's father died suddenly and without warning one afternoon, then this past week Bennett Grant a family friend and fellow St. Mary's parishioner passed away, and today I received word that one of my best friend's uncle passed away and she and her family are traveling back to New York for his funeral this weekend.

My heart certainly breaks for the pain and sadness these people are going through and I just wanted to leave a little note that if you guys have a spare moment to send some prayers to these folks and their families I know it would be appreciated.

Cocoa and Coffee

2010-04-09T10:17:00.004-06:00

Brrr I'm still trying to warm up from a long early morning out in the woods. It started snowing about 3 this morning, just about the time I pull out of the office parking lot in my FS green rig and began my day. Luckily I only had an 8 hour day this morning and was able to come home to a fire crackling in the fireplace and a pot of coffee already made. This is the first decent amount of snow we've had since about mid January and what I mean by decent this year is more than 2 inches. Such a stark contrast to the 10-12 feet we got during the course of just a couple storms last year.

My giant pumpkin plant is doing terrifically in the green house. Its up to about 8 leaves and I had to move it up into a bigger pot so the root system didn't run out of room to grow. Mace is still diddling around with his version of "blue prints" for the hoop house he wants to build out the garden. I have an excellent idea on how to do it so we can reuse the structure year after year but apparently this is a "guys" job. Talk about a dumb thing to be egotistical about. Never mind that I've had 3 years of calc, 2 years of advanced trig, and have put that knowledge to good use building reusable seedling cages for aspen up here. Oh well... sometimes it just better to leave things alone. I think there are times that I forget that I'm used to just getting things done and don't really think about that it might not be the girly thing to do. My parents didn't raise a 20 lb weakling that has to be pampered. But maybe there are things like this out there that make guys feel more primal or something... who knows???

But the point is the garden stuff is doing great and thriving despite the cold. I'm always so thankful that Polly has such a nice big green house to start all our seeds in. It really gives us a jump on the growing season which is way to short anyway.

Hmmm other news. I drove into Missoula with Mace Monday evening. He had a doctor's appointment with the neurologist to see if he couldn't get something done about the nerves in his face, jaw, and neck that have been giving him such grief for the past couple years. The doctor basically said that he thought after looking at the CT scans and Mace's neck MRI from a year or so ago that the problem was a chemical imbalance in his nervous system. Basically his neurons are firing inconstantly which is causing overactivity, hypersensitivity, and then of course major major pain. So now Mace is starting up a regiment of different meds that should even out that body chemistry and help. He's supposed to go back in 6 weeks and see where his is from there. If he is still experiencing the same level of pain the doctor is going to order either a PET scan or a full cranial MRI to see if there is something physiologically wrong that the other scans may have missed. We're hopeful that the meds just do the trick and we are able to move on from there. I really feel bad for Mace though, because these are some serious medications they are messing with his body pretty bad though all that should even out as well. I've never seen him so hyper though. Whenever I see him its like hes about ready to jump out of his own skin. So if you all have a minute or two keep him in your prayers and hope that he gets to feeling better soon.

Thats about it from my end of the world. Here are some pictures of Mace's niece and nephew doing some egg searching from Easter. I thought they were cute so why not share. Love you all.

We Eloped!!!

2010-04-01T13:11:00.003-06:00

Ha ha ... made you read! Happy April Fools Day! Anyone that actually would believe that Mace and I would have eloped doesn't know us very well. Though we've been engaged a really long time there is no way in hell we'd just go and get married without our family and friends... so no worries. And if any of my family is reading this I swear we really didn't do it.

It has been a long and miserable morning for me. I was out in the woods by 3 am and got got home just a few minutes ago. While the time frame itself wasn't a bad thing the weather certainly was. I'm not prone to getting cold even when in 8 feet of snow but when its down pouring the entire time you are out in the woods the cold just seeps into your bones. I usually enjoy my mornings out and about. But there is something about seeing the sky get light but not actually seeing a sunrise because of the rain and fog that is a bit depressing. I tell you GPS is an amazing technology. I was in one of my study sites in literally the middle of nowhere and the fog was so thick that I couldn't even see the trees 10 feet in front of my, but my GPS knew exactly where I was and in what direction I needed to travel to get to my next study plot. I think most people would get really nervous in that position but I had faith in my tools and got home safe and sound.

So here I sit at 1:30 in the afternoon on a very wet, very dreary, and very foggy day and I haven't a clue what to do with myself. I need the bookmobile to show up so I can get some new reading material. On days like this I've found that I spend entirely too much time playing Mafia Wars on Facebook. Who ever knew I'd get a kick out of "boosting loot from a rival mafia boss"? Its way too addicting. But anyway... think I need to go do something productive. Happy 1ST of April everyone!!!

Last Day of March Already???

2010-03-31T13:13:00.002-06:00

It seems as though time is flying by entirely too fast these days. While I feel like every individual day creeps along I can see by the date on the calender that the year is speeding by. The other observation that I am continuing to make is that I'm tired. Granted I'm not one that sleeps a bunch and my work schedule is such that I flip flop between working days and working nights which can't be good for my sleep in general but still I don't think I should be as tired as I feel. By the time I come home, be it in the morning or in the evening, both my body and mind are exhausted and I'm not sure why. I'm still forcing myself to do other stuff in the course of my day because it seems like the right thing to do but really I think I need about a 36 hour nap.

Aside from that there isn't a whole lot going on with me right now. I've started all my vegetable plants for my garden and am hoping to be able to take them out of the greenhouse and plant them by mid April (if the weather keeps cooperating). My pumpkin plant is already 2 feet long and sprouting new leaves like crazy. I had to put it in a big 5 gallon pot so that the roots didn't get sick from lack of space. I'm still hoping that I'll end up with a 700 lb gourd this year. Mace and I are going to build a hoop house for it out in his garden so that even if we have some cold nights the plant wont freeze. While I'm glad we started it earlier there are some tricks to it that we have to take into consideration since we still can't plant it for another couple weeks.

As for work... well its been hectic. The changing seasons are always really busy because I'm trying to finish up the last of my winter work in the form of proposals, write ups, and survey summations as well as outlining what needs to be done for my spring field season. I was informed a few weeks ago that our office doesn't have the budget for me to hire a seasonal field worker this summer which really sucks. I had such a great kid out here last summer and got so much done that I had been looking forward to a similar experience. Plus I think its good to get some supervisory work under my belt for job experience. So with those plans foiled I've really had to concentrate and focus my work and be even more efficient in the field which isn't easy when everything is a muddy mess right now. Over the past several weeks we've gotten a ton of rain, which is great but puts a damper on some of my plans. Unfortunately the lack of snow this winter has everyone worried. We did fire prep exercises Monday and Tuesday this week and even had bucket choppers and c-130's in the area doing exercises for the upcoming summer fire season. This year marks the centennial anniversary of the 1910 fire which literally burned everything in this area. It makes me worry that we might not be celebrating the occasion but reliving it with the dry conditions that are being predicted.

On a side note? Does anyone have a really good recipe for shortbread cookies? I tried one that I found the other day online and I just wasn't that happy with it. I want something super buttery like I've had in English Shortbreads over the years. I know they aren't good for me but I think it would be something kind of fun to do as an Easter cookie. So if anyone knows of one feel free to let me know.

With that I think I best be getting off of here and take a shower. I still smell like moss and tree sap from work but figured I'd post something on here before getting too comfy and possibly falling asleep. Love you all and wish you a happy last day of March 2010.

And God Said... "LET THERE BE KITCHENAIDS"

2010-03-26T12:43:00.005-06:00

So for the last couple years I've been playing around with some serious baking. I've always loved doing it and I find it quite relaxing after a hectic work week. It makes me think of my mom, sister and grandma. And Mace has been very encouraging of this passion of mine. Of course he is the one that usually benifits from the goodies I make so I think he has a dual purpose. So for this reason we decided to go in 50/50 and buy some nifty kitchen gadgets that we'll both use for the rest of our lives. I'm talking some serious toys here.

I had an older Kitchenaid plain and simple stand mixer for the last couple years and while it did anything I asked of it I could tell it was starting to lose its will to survive especially when I made Divinity. Figuring I would be baking for the rest of my life in some capacity we decided to upgrade to a fancy schmancy 575 watt 6 quart professional series Kitchenaid stand mixer. All I can say is OMG!!! I've been playing with it for the past week and love it! I've made pasta, chiffon cake w/ super fluffy orange frosting, a couple batches of Divinity right after another, and pizza dough to die for. And I'm planning on using it this evening to make dinner rolls and cinamon rolls to feed 40 people for tomorrow's family bbq. I tell you its fabulous and I'm not quite sure how I lived so long without it. Mine looks just like this one --->

Before buying the monster of stand mixers, we also decided to try a Kitchenaid professional series food processor. Again OMG!!! We've been shredding potatoes for hash browns, carrots for salads, and producing fresh salsa for when we had tacos the other night. This think has everything but the kitchen sink! Two weeks ago I made a pie crust that literally melted in your mouth with this sucker and I'm never going to use a bowl and fork again to make crust. Mace has also been using this like crazy and is really finding an interest in cooking and baking as well. Its kind of fund having something to do together in the evenings. I'll have to start taking pictures of my goodies and posting them on here.

With these two gadgets I seriously think I could open up a local bakery and do well but that will be later on in life. The good news though is that these two babies will last a lifetime and hopefully I'll be able to pass them on to my daughters if I'm so blessed if/when I have kids. As if I needed extra encouragement to spend time in the kitchen. I'm like a little kid in a candy shop now and keep scouring the Food Network website for new and interesting recipes to try out. So if any of you have any suggestions let me know... I'm giddy and totally ready for some baking challenges!

Forsaken Blog

2010-03-23T10:44:00.004-06:00

My Blog my blog... why have I forsaken you? Well to put it bluntly I've had a lot of other shitake to do. But because the weather is getting nicer, I'm spending more and more time out in the field, and I actually get some form of relaxation out of writing on here I do believe I'll be a bit more vigilant about writing once again.

Those reading this blog might recall I live in a land where in most winters I get 10+ feet of snow. Not so much this year. I don't think I've had more than 2 feet total and not a single flake since about mid January. El Nino has really put a damper on my winter snow fun activities. On the positive side however, the lack of massive amounts of snow meant a much easier winter field season for me. I was able to track and tag 4 lynx this year which beats my all time best of 2 in a season the first year I worked up here. All the little kitties are happy and healthy except for the fact that they are inbreeding just a bit too much. It doesnt just happen in the South anymore.... sorry couldn't resist that dig.

Another positive side to the lack of snow is that my garden has been thawed out for a month and I've already started my seeds for this season's Giant Pumpkin. I'm getting about a 2 month jump on the sucker and am hoping that with this much time in the ground I'll be able to have a 700 lb pumpkin to take to the Portland weigh off in the Fall. I know I'm a dork but I can't help it. Growing these giants is a ton of work but they are so much fun too. So don't knock it til you have the guts to try it. This picture was taken a couple days ago when it first sprouted. Now it already has three other leaves and I need to get a hoop house built out in the garden and get it planted before it completely outgrows its pot.

Well I think this is a good start so far. It's probably best if I leave it at that for now so that I'm encouraged to write more later. Hope everyone is well and enjoying spring.

I Am Lord of the Gourd

2009-08-23T16:14:00.003-06:00

Again I've gone through a major slump where I haven't written in either of my blogs for a long time. I knew that summer was going to busy but I figured I'd still have time to put in my two cents on here every once in a while. Apparently its been over a month since my last posting and I apologize to everyone out there that might be even the least interested in my little life.

Work as always has been keeping me on my toes. Eli's (my intern) last day was Friday and we all said our goodbyes at the office picnic out at the Bull River Pavilion. I meant to take my camera along and get pictures of everybody leaving but forgot. Good thing some other folks remembered theirs and I'll be able to get copies of them. I have to say I miss the days of my Dad's old BLM picnics. While we had a nice time, there just isn't the same sense of camaraderie out here that there should be in such a small office. Heck, most of the full time people didn't even show up. There is a lack of caring for one another that really annoys me. You would think that in a small town it would be easier to get people together but that doesn't seem to be the case.

I've also been slaving away in the garden in my spare time. My pumpkin is growing a little more everyday. Its been set on the vine for about 17 days now is weighs over 50 lbs. Its about 2.5 ft in diameter and about 2 ft from stem to butt end so far. I'd like to beat my 272 lb pumpkin from last year but I'm not sure the weather is going to cooperate. The nights are getting colder and the days are starting to feel like fall. I have a sinking suspicion that we are going to have an early freeze and the plants will be done for. I'm keeping my fingers crossed though. This is my first year of growing corn and I have to say I'm pretty damn excited about it all. Every stalk is standing well over 8 ft and has multiple ears to it. I'm not sure how Mace and I are going to eat it all. I wish you all lived closer and I could share it. It just makes me glad that both Mace's niece and nephew love corn on the cob and should put a big dent in our harvest. I'm even already getting beautiful ripe tomatoes and peppers. Hopefully within the next week or so I'll have some time over the weekends to start canning salsa and beets. I'll need to ship off a few cans of beets to my mom down in Cheyenne. She's just crazy for them.

Polly has gotten jealous of my bread maker and so Mace and I decided to buy her one as a belated birthday present. Not exactly sure why she needed it right away except for the fact that if we both have one we can make more cinnamon rolls, raisin bread, and french bread in one sitting. When we all get together for dinner there just isn't quite enough with the one machine. Hopefully it will arrive some time this week and I'll be able to sneak about and rap it without her knowing.

So thats about it on my home front. I'll try harder to update all this a bit more often. Love you all.

Mmmmm Pie!

2009-06-29T17:26:00.002-06:00

So yesterday was a pretty dull day for me. Did the normal Sunday stuff. I got up early and went to church. I keep wishing they'd make a mass time later than 8 in the morning but no such luck. After mass I came home and the house was still pretty quiet so I went for a nice jog down by the river. There is just something so peaceful about running by water. There were even swans paddling around in the ponds with their little bambinos. How many people in big cities can say they have that kind of beauty and wonder near by. After my jog I was able to talk to my friend Kati online for a while. She's still having so much fun in S. Korea and I know she's getting a little sad that her first year over there is coming to a close. Who knows though she will probably go back for round two after a few short weeks of coming home to the States. We're planning on having some old time fun in Missoula together and I seriously can't wait. I'm just hoping the weather holds this nice cool temperature so I don't end up on the fire lines while she's going to be in country. The rest of my day consisted of baking Mace a coconut cream pie (with extra cool whip), doing laundry, dishes, and cleaning up around the house. While it wasn't a super exciting day I have to say it was nice to calm down before another long week of working nights. Its back to bat surveying and my circadian rhythms are going to be all messed up from working until the wee hours and sleeping what little I can during the day. Wish me luck. I'll try and get some cool pictures of the bats I capture over the next few days. They are pretty cool critters. Have a great week. Love you all and God Bless.

Happy Fathers Day

2009-06-21T16:12:00.004-06:00

Although this holiday is particularly hard for me this year with the recent passing of my own dad in January, I did want to take a minute to wish all you fathers out there a wonderful Father's Day. You are all your kid's hero's and you don't even realize it. I certainly know that my dad was mine.

I love you Dad!

Grrr Deer!!!

2009-06-17T21:26:00.008-06:00

Last night deer ate all the buds on my roses that were just about ready to open. I knew it was going to happen but there isn't a whole lot I can do about it. But I have to say that it really is frustrating. I get so excited to see these gorgeous flowers in full bloom (Mace and I have planted some really unique and pretty ones over the years) yet I rarely get a chance to see more than a few blooms in a season. Its just such a shame. I think this fall we need to just invest the money and refence Mace's yard so that deer can't come in. As it is the fence is only about 5 ft tall with a 4 ft gate... certainly low enough for these summer hooved pests to jump for a tasty rose bud treat. I think my roses must taste better than Polly's because her's aren't fenced in at all and the deer never pester them. So not fair. But at least I have my other flowers in bloom right now to keep me happy. Like the columbine, iris, and peony below here.

In other, somewhat related news, our veggie garden in its entirety is now planted, including our giant pumpkin plant. Its really starting to take off now that its not root bound in a pot and getting plenty of love and attention. I'm trying to decide what to name it this year. Maybe George.... don't ask me why. Last year's pumpkin was terrific and really tipped the scales at 272 lbs but I want to grow an even bigger one. We have about a months head start from last year so we should have a few more weeks of growing time as long as we stop having anymore super cold nights. I'm hoping for at least 300 lbs and no cracking. The state record is just over 500 lbs so I figure within a few years we might know enough to do the same or better. Again I plan on making some fantastic design and carving it for all the little tricker treaters to see when they come to Mace's house. Polly is also growing a pumpkin this year but unfortunately she is way behind the power curve. She couldn't get a seed to germinate until this week. I'm praying that hers catches up and she can have just as much fun with this project as we all did last year.

I'm Expanding

2009-06-15T11:33:00.003-06:00

Ahhh so I decided I don't have enough to do. What does this mean exactly? Well I just came to the realization that I'm getting a lot of experience through work and love the woods so much that I might as well share some of my knowlege with others. I'm by no means expert on anything but I do have some good insights and thought that others in my field and related fields might appreciate having somewhere to share similar interests and meet others that are the same. So I created a new blog that talks about the wonderful world of working and playing ing the great outdoors. If you are interested go to http://montanawildlifebiologist.blogspot.com/ Feel free to check it out and leave comments or share my URL with friends that might be interested. Love you all lots.

Flowers Flowers Everywhere

2009-06-13T10:48:00.004-06:00

*happy sigh* Though I'm not the biggest fan in the world of summer it definitely has some good points. Like all the gorgeous flowers that are starting to bloom in my garden. Mace and I share a great garden space. One end is dedicated to massive amounts of vegetable plants for us to harvest in the fall and the other half is dedicated to flowers. Mace and his mom planted a bunch of different kinds of peonies the first summer that he an I started dating and while the intent was to grow them for Polly's nursery I have reaped the joys of caring for them all and seeing the results. I have pretty much taken over the plot and expended whats in their to include tons of iris, columbine, ground covers, bleeding heart, asters, clematis, lupin, veronica, etc. I've also take over various other parts of Mace's yard for my flower growing adventures. Mace doesn't want to admit to it but he loves the flowers as much as I do and I've caught him out there looking for new blooms and putting some water to them to make sure they thrive when he thinks I'm not around. Everyday I'm able to go out and find something just opening up and reading to be cut and put in a vase. There is just something so soothing about having flowers in and out of the house. My only problem is all the town deer that seem to love to come around at night and eat all the blooms off right before they open. Thats what keeps happening to my roses year after year and I'm about ready to tell Mace to just let loose with a pellet gun on their rumps just to detour them a bit. Just so very frustrating. My rose plants look so good and have so many buds on them that I just know that in the next week or two some stupid doe is going to jump the fence and nibble them right down the ground. Oh well... tis my cross to bear. Above is some of the pictures of my peony that bloomed last year. I should have even more this year. Hope you all are having a fabulous weekend so far.

Chain Saws 101

2009-06-01T16:17:00.003-06:00

The day I had planned today doing some field training with my "grunt" did not actually happen. Unbeknownst to me my little intern had chain saw training this morning and I had my "refresher class" this afternoon. I got my initial certification the summer I worked up here as an intern myself and I guess I just assumed that once you knew how to run a chain saw that you didn't have to go through training again, but I was wrong. Every three years you have to have a refresher just so you don't cut your own leg off. I suppose thats a good thing. Every spring there are tons of trees that blow down over the roads we use and we all need to know how to cut them properly out of the way. Dad would be so proud of me with a Stihl in my hands and the woodchips flying every which way.

So I spent the morning going over a bunch of old mining maps and discovering some possible shafts that might serve as bat monitoring stations this year. The new spots are now programed into my GPS and Eli and I will go hunt some of them down tomorrow and see if they are suitable habitats. When I first started working we had 8 registered shafts and I've been able to find 9 more that I've put on the yearly list to monitor as well. I hope to add a few more this year and find more suitible habitat for the various species of bats that we have in the area. It should be fun teaching Eli how to use the Harp Traps over the summer too. He already told me that Kerry Foresman (my old mammology prof) talked about them in one of his classes and is excited to actually see them in action. He'll have plenty of opportunity... including packing the equipment through the woods in the dark.

In closing I'll leave you with a picture I took this afternoon overlooking Noxon. Everything is leafed out and its getting nice and toasty out. Woo hoooo!!!!!

"Chickn Fried"

2009-05-31T20:40:00.002-06:00

Summer has definitely arrived here in Trout Creek Montana. My lilac is blooming, my roses are getting some buds on them, my corn is starting to poke up out of the ground, and the pollen from all the lodgepole pine is wreaking havoc on my allergies. The entire valley has this yellowish haze floating in the sky from all the pollen being released. Even my skin was covered in a fine yellow powder when I finally came in for the evening from mowing the yard. At least is supposed to rain a bit tomorrow so maybe this junk will get knocked down a bit and I can put my contacts back in my eyes without tearing up from the crud in the air. I also somehow managed to fry myself to a crisp yesterday and am certainly feeling the affects of it today. SPF 35 my rear end!

Seems like my new intern for the summer is going to work out well. I got a report in my email over the weekend that said he faired fine over Guard school and is now certified as a FFT2 or your average woodland firefighter when called forth from the ranks. I'm only a step above him at FFT1 and I plan to stay that way. The money from wooland firefighting is great but I would much rather be able to go home at night and get up in the morning and get my real work with critters done. Eli (thats the grunts name) has some more field training that I have to run him through early this coming week but then we'll set out for the real work. That will be the true test. I have some tough stand exams this season in some really brushey and steep hillsides. Its not that I'm trying to put him through the screws it just happened to fall that way. I inventory all the stands in the district on a rotating schedule and Willow Creek and Rock Creek just happen to be this years areas. Its not going to be easy but it should still be fun and Eli should get the hours and experience he needs to graduate this coming school year from UM.

As for me I'm still having my ups and downs. Its really hard because everyday I go out in the woods and see things that I know Dad would get a kick out of hearing about and I have no one to share these little insights with. Not in the same way anyway. Even though we didn't spend hours on the phone together or anything like that... I'd always come home and just send him a quick email telling what I was doing or passing on a good "Forester" joke that I'd heard from the timber workshop. There is this big whole in my heart and time isn't seeming to make it go away at all. I don't know if this is normal or what but I still end up crying at least once a day. Never when anyone can see me of course... thats just not my style... but often times before I sleep. I know that time is supposed to heal all wounds but I wonder how much time it really takes.

I know I know

2009-04-10T10:28:00.004-06:00

I've been so remiss about posting things on here for the past four weeks. Seems like every evening I get home and say "I really should put something on my blog" but alas I don't feel like it in the end. So here I am on a gorgeous Friday morning (Have I mentioned that 4-10's are fabulous?) spending a few minutes to catch my faithful readers up.

Not a whole lot new has been going on with me. I've been going over applications for a summer grunt. Grunt is probably not the most politically correct term for a wildlife biology tech but when I think back to my experience as one the summer before my senior year that's exactly what the job is. I have fond memories of that summer, getting out and hiking around the woods with no paperwork or other huge responsibilities. I got to do all the fun stuff although it was a lot of physically hard work without the bureaucratic BS... sooooooo nice. So when I say grunt I really am speaking well of the position. I really wish I could somehow test the applicants on their back country expertise. People really don't realize how rugged the terrain is out here until they are strapped down with a 40lb pack and are working 10-12 hours a day in the middle of the summer heat on 60-70 degree slopes. Definitely not as easy as it looks. The kid from UM that I had last year was a great guy and finally got the hang of working up in the mountains but I think it really took its toll on his body that first month. A few of the applicants sound really great and I'm scheduling phone interviews for this coming week. Hopefully I can get someone out here the same week classes are finished for them. I have a pretty hefty field schedule this summer and I really want to make sure everything gets done. I have two area inventories due by September and that's a lot of ground to cover even with two experienced people. I had planned to be doing a lot of that this past spring but really there was too much snow and I was playing catch up on too much work from when I was down in Denver and Cheyenne in Jan and Feb. Oh well no matter what I'll get them done along with my typical goshawk, bat, pine beettle, duck, genetic improvement project, and other summer work. Should be a fun summer!The snow is finally melted off in town here. Its so nice to see grass and bare ground I really can't explain it. I went for a run this morning for the first time on bare pavement and wearing a t-shirt and shorts. Granted its still only about 40 degrees out but with the sun shining so brightly it feels a heck of a lot warmer. There is still plenty of snow up in the mountains though and we are seeing a lot of flooding in the valley bottoms and in all the creek overflows. Mace and I went antler shed hunting this past weekend and really couldn't get anywhere because the creeks that we normally can just take a few steps over in the middle of summer were running too fast and well beyond their typical banks by about 40 ft. I love seeing the water because it means an easy fire season but its pretty dangerous when I know that I'm going to have to cross a lot of those creeks some how to get into my study sites this week. And let me tell you I've slipped in a few and that water is bloody cold... gives me the shivers just sitting here thinking about it..

Mace and I are starting to get our plants sprouting and stronger for our garden. I'm always so thankful that Polly has a green house we can start all our veggies in so that we can extend our growing season a bit. I'm hoping that either this weekend or the next we'll be ready to start our giant pumpkin. I've tried to germinate a few of the seeds from the pumpkin I grew last year but unfortunately at 54 days old the ol gord wasn't mature enough to put out mature seeds. The little buggers rot and don't sprout at all. Oh well, I guess its a good thing that we have a bunch of seeds from a few pumpkin growers back east that have taken pitty on us poor short growing season Montanans. Honest to pete our garden is so much fun and it gives us something nice and relaxing to work on in the evenings after I'm done with work and he's done with his school stuff.

As for what I'm going to do with the rest of my day I don't know. The sun is shining, the birds are singing, and a warm breeze is coming our way so I'm sure I'll think of something to do. Maybe I'll take Lane and Gracie (Mace's nephew and neice) for a walk to the park our a mini-picnic hike on an easy trail. Hmmm that sounds pretty good. Maybe I can even convince Mace to break away from his schoolwork for a bit to come along with us. This evening I'll head to Thompson for Good Friday Services. I can't believe that Easter is almost hear already. Time has passed very strangely for me these past few months. Hope everyone is having a great day and I'll try to do better about posting more frequently. Love you all.

Clear Blue Sky

2009-03-06T11:15:00.003-07:00

Only working four days a week really has its advantages. I actually slept in until 7 this morning and was greeted but bright sunny skies this morning. Not even a cloud in the sky which really is a switch since it's been pretty miserable and rainy for so long. That clear blue sky is deceiving though. I decided to go for a run this morning since my ankle was feeling just fine and dandy but I just about froze my nips off. I walked out the front door in only sweatpants and a t-shirt thinking the sun and exercise would keep me warm but I was sorely mistaken. I ran about a quarter mile and found I wasn't getting any warmer really so I turned around to go get a sweatshirt only to find that the thermometer said -1. No wonder I was so cold. After retrieving my hoodie, grabbing a pair of gloves, and a sip of water I was out the door again and feeling good. Even in the cold the birds were starting to sing and the fresh snow all over the place was gorgeous.

Mace was super good to me this past Christmas and bought me a 8 gig mp3 player for when I go for walks and runs but I still have to hold on to the bloody thing. When I'm wearing gloves I feel like its going to slip out of my hand so I think I need to find one of those carrying cases for it that straps onto my arm. I'd be mad at myself if I dropped it and it ruined. Its pretty awesome though. Its a touch screen dealy that looks like the touch screen ipod (but isn't) and it has all sorts of cool functions on it. When you download a song onto it it actually downloads all the lyrics on to it too so if you feel like singing while you're listening you have the words right in front of you. I keep learning all the new gadgets and I have my complete music library on it with soooooo much room to spare so I'm downloading music like crazy... well as much as I can on a dial up connection. I'm running out of ideas for music though so if you have some cool stuff that you want to send my way feel free. Those of you that read this pretty much know my tastes and know how eclectic I am. I've actually gone through all my old cd's and riped off all that music and put on the mp3 player. So fun. Obviously I don't do anything super cool on my days off... lol.

So what am I going to do for the rest of my day? Good question. I know there is a bunch of work that needs to be done in the yard but with the new snow that fell yesterday the yard is pretty much a snow field again. I'm thinking that I'm going to search online for some yummy treat to make with the Kitchenaid for Polly and the family tonight. I already started a pot of stew for everyone but I can't eat meat on Friday's during Lent. But I thought with how cold it is outside the guys would appreciate it and it gives Polly an opportunity to just kick back tonight and relax with her family. As for me I'm trying to think of some way to zing up a can of tuna... lol. Maybe I'll just stick to a bowl of mac n cheese. Have a great day folks!

Still Sore

2009-03-05T16:47:00.003-07:00

I woke up this morning at my usual 4:30 and even in the dark of my room I could see that my ankle was huge and even more discolored than yesterday. Fortunately however it wasn't as sore as I thought it would be (though the rest of my body was) and headed off to work as usual. I ducked into my office, picked up my pack of equipment and the keys to my FS green rig, and decided that rather than run the risk of slipping again on a weak ankle up in the steep terrain I'd spend the day getting some old growth stand exams done in some river/creek bottoms and take it a bit easier. I still probably ended up hiking 10 miles or so today but I wasn't fighting the amount of snow that I would have been up several thousand feet. It was a gorgeous morning and I was working in nice cedar and hemlock stands that really didn't have much snow at all because of how thick they are, but my luck didn't last. By 1 this afternoon though I'd been dumped on by another storm that swung into the area. I'm talking those monster snow flakes that look really cool when they are falling but you can see them build up on the ground after 5 minutes of watching them. I really thought that perhaps spring was going to "sprung" but the weather gods are working against me. By the time I got back to my pickup this evening it was covered by about 18 inches of fresh snow and I had to chain up yet again to get back home. This snow is just so heavy over the roads that were muddy and slick already I wasn't going to risk sliding off anywhere. But at least now I am home, showered, and in a glorious pair of nice warm DRY pjs. There is something to be said for being dry and being able to elevate a sprained ankle in the evenings... lol. Hope everyone had as interesting of a day as I did.

Only Minor Damage

2009-03-04T15:01:00.002-07:00

I knew with the changing weather that the mountains would get me one way or another. The snow is starting to melt off and refreeze daily so conditions are not exactly ideal. When I head out in the morning everything is nice and hard and frozen, perfect to walk/snowshoe over. By about 10 though that snow has changed dramatically into a melty slushy mess. While I try to be careful no matter what because its just me out there alone, the inevitable happened and I took a misstep and ended up taking a pretty good spill down a ravine. I didn't land too terrible hard but did take a few knocks against a couple trees. Luckly I came out of it with no broken bones and only a few scrapes, bruises and a spained ankle. I was so mad at myself and am still not exactly sure how I took such a poor step so I bullied myself up and finished out the day. I do have to say though that my ankle is an interesting shade of blue right now and it took a bit of coaxing to get it out of my boot. I figure I'll take a nice hot shower and soak my ankle in a tub of epsome salts and I'll be good for go tomorrow. While I love the snow I have to say I'm ready for this sloppy stuff to be gone so I can move around more easily. Do have to say it still makes for a pretty picture in the morning.

Monday Monday

2009-03-02T15:09:00.004-07:00

Argggg! Its official I hate Mondays at the beginning of the month. Typically in the spring and summer field season I avoid coming into the office at all costs the first Monday of the month because I always get roped into some meeting or orientation or some other thing that I really don't feel like wasting hours of my time at. Unfortunately during the winter these things are mandatory for full time employees and I dread them. It had been two months since I'd had to attend these things since I was down in Denver and forgotten how much I despise being cooped up in a conference room chit chatting over budget, management tactics, shop cohesion, and overall performance evaluations. There is nothing like a government agency for over analyzing whether we're all getting along or not. Honestly I feel that most of this stuff really doesn't have much to do with me. I'm pretty much a one man band during 8 months out of the year so I keep all my stuff organized, well-planned, and ahead of the power curve. My college pseudo-procrastination days are long over and I enjoy having things done right and done early, so it really bugs me having to sit there and listen to the flailings of all the other shops. Unfortunately being the low man on the totem pole and having two supervisors that also hate these meetings I'm the one that gets sent in to them and have to come back to them and report on whats being said... again this stuff really doesn't have anything to do with them either.

Usually I can power through these things without much trouble and contribute my two cents in when needed but today chapped my hide when a manager in the trails crew suggest that the wildlife budget be cut again to buy a few more saws for the spring. First off my budget is dismal. There is a reason why I'm the only one working out in the field during the nasty parts of the year and collecting data that about 3 people should be working on. We dint have the budget in my shop to hire anyone else during the other parts of the year so we save up and hire a cheap college intern to help out when we are overloaded in the summer field season. My biggest purchase over the past two years for the shop has been some longer tapes for measuring DBH for old growth stand exam work, an extra long tree bore, and some super fine mesh wire to build over 200 cone cages (I did this by myself one very hot July day all day long) for my genetic improvement projects (which by the way actually should have been a shared cost with the forestry shop). I also spend in a year in gas what most of the guys in the trails crew spend in a month. Granted I'm not the biggest operation on the district but I work within my means so that when we need the extra funding to hire someone during the summer I have it available. The other thing that ruffled my feathers was that the trails shop doesn't take care of the saws they have so why should they get the luxury of buying fancy new ones. If they actually brought them in from the trucks when it was raining, changed out the carburetors like they were supposed to, and didn't leave them out in "hiding spots" in the woods overnight to get stolen I might show some mercy and contribute some of my funds to their plight, but since they don't I put up my dukes and fought the idea. I think the forest supervisor thought I was pretty ballsy but in the end he saw my point when he found out why they needed new saws so my budget is left intact thank God.

But at least now the day is done, the meetings for the next few weeks are over with, I picked my battles and won, and tomorrow I get to go out and do some stand exam work because there if finally enough melt off I can get into the areas without hiking 17 miles from the pick up. It can only look up from here. Hope you all have a great week and I'll certainly try to do the same.

Just some thoughts

2009-03-01T10:47:00.004-07:00

I've been thinking alot about my dad lately. I guess thats not all that surprising since I spend a lot of my typical day alone in the middle of nowhere and what else would be occupying my thoughts at this point and time. I haven't exactly dealt with his loss and people keep telling me that its not healthy. They are probably right but I'm not exactly sure how to go about it. And in all honesty maybe just me thinking about him when I'm trapsing about in the woods is part of my own personal healing process and I just don't know it. Unfortunately a lot of my thoughts right now are focused on how he was doing this past year and those are hard things to deal with, but I keep trying to tell myself that there is so much more and much happier things to think about. I want to get back to thinking about so many days spent camping out in the woods with him, washing the car together, him supporting me at every soccer, volleball, basketball, choir, band, and extracurricular event that I was ever involved in, giving each big bear hugs, and just the time I was so blessed to have him as a dad.

As you all know I'm Catholic and my dad was a very devout one at that. This last year has really put my faith to the test and I'm somewhat confused. In one respect I'm angry that God could have taken away a person that I loved so dearly and looked up to so much. I've really tried to put those feelings aside because deep down I know its not right to feel that way. My faith has always taught me that God has a greater purpose and that for reason's beyond my comprehension He called my dad home to Him, but I keep asking that very human question of "why?". Why is it that a man that worked so hard his entire life, loved his family, put his faith into everything he ever did, and in my mind was a kind and giving person called so early? And at that why did he have to fight the battle he did beforehand? I know that these are questions that I wont necessarily find the answer to because its not my own time to understand them but it doesn't stop them from circling my mind. I keep hoping that this Lent will bring me to a better understanding and in the end bring a certain peace to my heart. I really am seeking that out. My dad found some comfort and peace during his fight with cancer through the praying the Rosary, which is something that I too have picked up again in the last year and find to be a time, every morning before heading off into the world, to meditate and contemplate my own feelings right now.

I know this a "deeper" post than I usually do but its whats on my mind these days and I figure maybe if I put it into words I might be able to move past these emotions. I know dad is probably looking down on my and telling me not to sweat the small stuff (thats a dadism) because he's in a better place now. So on that note I want to leave you with one of my favorite pictures of my dad when he was about 20 and working up in the woods outside of Missoula. This is a picture I look at a lot and reminds me how much I am like him. Love you all and God Bless.

Time flies

2009-02-21T09:49:00.005-07:00

My dear sweet niece, Rachel, just turned 17 on Thursday! Can you believe that folks? I sure can't. I mean I know that I'm getting older all the time, as is everyone, so it shouldn't come to me as a surprise that she's broaching full (legal) adulthood but for some reason it really does. And she really has grown into a beautiful young woman to boot, though the picture definately shows more of her "I'm related to Tracy" goofy side. She's trying to make my nephew Collin giggle by the way, Im pretty sure she was successful in that endeavor. But I think thats good. I know a lot of you have pictures of me with ummmm interesting expressions on my face, and I have copies of quite a few of them myself... >>>> case in point. So what if I'm staring dreamily at a Dairy Queen sign. Don't judge me! Those were college years and Dairy Queen ice cream was outside my monetary means. If I remember right Kati and I were driving down Higgins Ave one night and saw Erin out with Campus Crusade at the walk up Dairy Queen so we stopped to pester them. Aww memories. Doesn't seem all that long ago yet I know it was at least 5 years ago now. So that brings me back to the point I was trying to make earlier. Time really does fly! And with everything that has gone on over the past year I have a greater appreciation for life and how to really live it. There is something to be said about making each day count. Hopefully I'll get back to the point where I'm able to do that.

In other news I'm back to the grind at work. I spent the better half of last week just wading through my inbox at work. And yes I'm talking about and actual paper style inbox that was about a foot deep with gis reports, stand exam feed back, management plan research, etc etc. I don't even want to get into how full my Forest Service email account was. Talk about ridiculous. You'd think that nothing got done while I was away yet while I was in Denver I was literally still working my butt off from my laptop. I'm actually not too far behind. Didn't get any data for my lynx field work in this year though I have done the preliminary tracking this past week that I usually do in the last part of Dec. Looks like we still have them in their predicted areas so that's a good sign. It wont be much for data but it also wont be an empty hole in the previously collected info. It wont be too much longer before the snow is just too sugary to try and snowshoe into the areas I need to get to and I'll have to change gears towards "spring" work. At least its keeping me busy. I really need to be busy right now so that my thoughts don't dwell on things I'm not ready to deal with yet. But anyway, work is good, life is getting there. Hope you are all having a great weekend. Love you and God Bless.

Valentine's Day Fun for You

2009-02-14T10:42:00.003-07:00

First and foremost, I want to wish you all a very Happy Valentine's Day. I know that corporate America has turned this holiday of love into a mishmash of commercial sappiness, but I have a mission for you all that will hopefully get this occasion back to its bare roots. The mission, if you choose to accept it, is to find one person that may be spending the day alone and show that person in some way that they are cared about. Maybe its just inviting them to coffee or sending them an email that says hello, the way you do it doesn't matter just as long as its a small sign of how you feel about the person and how much they mean to you. The idea behind this is so that no person on Valentines Day feels left out. Its not a big deal and you really don't have to go out of your way to do it... but trust me it will make a difference to that one person. So have fun with this and enjoy the day. Share your love with others. Love you all and God Bless.

Day is Done

2009-02-04T16:59:00.002-07:00

My family and I laid my loving father to rest this morning in Mt. Olivet Cemetery in Cheyenne. It was definitely a bitter sweet ending to a life that most definitely touched many others. It was so nice to see the many faces of friends and family offering willing shoulders to cry on if need be and more to lift a person up when they needs a bit of light in their day. It has most definitely been a hard year and I see that my dad was the model of courage and fortitude both when it comes to battling illness and hardship as well as enjoying a life well lived. I hope that one day I can follow in his footsteps with even half the class and dignity he has shown me. I have to admit I'm pretty numb at the moment and am not exactly sure what I want to say here. But I did feel like stealing away to my room for a moment and saying something on here that was much more meaningful then this is coming out. Maybe in the next day or two my thoughts will quit running rampant and I'll be able to write out something more deserving of my dad's praises and accolades. Again please keep us in your thoughts and prayers. Dad is in a better place but it is we who remain that have it hard. Love you all.

Dad's Tribute

2009-02-01T15:23:00.003-07:00

Robert A. Bennett
July 31, 1943 – January 27, 2009

Longtime Cheyenne resident and Wyoming Bureau of Land Management State Director Bob Bennett,65, was called home to the loving embrace of God on January 27 surrounded by his family at his daughter’s home in Westminster, CO.

Born second son on July 31, 1943 to parents Don and Margaret Bennett, Bob was raised in Bremerton, WA where he graduated from West High School. In the summer of 1958, Bob met his future bride of 43 years, Patricia. In 1965, he received a Bachelor of Forestry degree from the University of Montana and was also commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant in the United States Army. After completing his degree, he married Patricia and was stationed as an armor officer with the 3rd Battalion, 35th Armor, 4th Armored Division in Bamberg, Germany where his two older daughters , Robin and Brenda, were born.

Upon separating from the active duty as a Captain, Bob worked as a forester for the Washington State Department of Natural Resources being located in both Burlington and Enumclaw, WA. After the birth of his son, Brian, he returned to the University of Montana to earn a Masters of Science Forestry degree. At this juncture, Bob dedicated himself to a lifelong career of service to his country as both an officer in the Army Reserve and as a civil service employee of the Bureau of Land Management. He served in various capacities and locations with BLM including Missoula and Miles City, MT, and then on to Cheyenne, WY where his youngest daughter Tracy was born. Bob retired as a Lieutenant Colonel in the Army Reserve in 1992. In 2000, Bob became Associate State Director in Salt Lake City, UT and culminated his career’s journey with his present position in Cheyenne.

He enjoyed many hobbies including camping, running, swimming, reading, and spending time with family and friends. He was especially passionate about hunting whether it be birds or big game getting out for the hunt as often as he could. Bob was an involved member of St. Mary’s parish and an ardent supporter of Seton/St. Mary’s Catholic Schools, with particular interests in youth ministry and the athletic association. Additionally, he belonged to both the Knights of Columbus and Right to Life of Laramie County.

Bob committed his life to being a loving husband and caring father and grandfather. He was a steadfast friend and leader who always greeted others with a broad smile and a witty comment. As family, friends, and colleagues gather together at this time, Bob will be remembered as a sincere, gregarious, life-loving, and faithfilled person.

Bob is survived by his wife, Patricia and older brother, Richard Bennett and wife Marilyn. He is also survived by the families of his children; Robin and Carl Hart with their sons Damon and Malakai; Brenda and Mark Hancock with their daughters Rachel and Rebecca; Brian and Cadie Bennett with their son Collin, and Tracy Bennett. His extended family also includes Mary and Larry Havens, Fred and Linda Phillips, Jackie and Biff Schaffer and numerous other relatives.

Services include a rosary at 7:00 pm Tuesday, February 3 as well as a funeral liturgy presided by Ret. Bishop Joseph Hart at 10:30 am Wednesday, February 4 both at St. Mary’s Cathedral. Flowers are welcome ( send to Wiederspahn Radomsky Funeral Home). Alternative contributions to Villa Loretto Sister Servants of Christ the King, the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, or the College of Forestry and Conservation via the University of Montana’s Excellence Fund are also appreciated. Donation information for these organizations is available from Wiederspahn Radomsky’s

26!!! WTF!!!

2009-01-22T17:13:00.002-07:00

I have come to the conclusion today that I'm an "old fart". Both my 13 year old niece and my 13 year old nephew made it a point to say that I'm twice their age today with and extraordinary amount of shock and awe. When did 26 become old you ask? When I get to be twice the age of my own family members. Now I know how my siblings felt when I said the same bloody thing to them. I guess its only fair then right? No actually I'm digging being 26 even though I'm only about 12 hours into my new age its been treating me well. Can't say as I've done anything all that spectacular but I am getting to spend it with my Dad, Mom, and the whole Hancock crew. Can't say thats a bad deal at all. Just wish Mace was here to share the day with me as well. I guess since we're going to married and all there are plenty of years to make up for a couple missed birthdays on both our accounts. Anyway... hope everyone else out there is having a great day where ever you may be. Love you and miss you all.

Long Couple of Nights

2009-01-07T08:37:00.002-07:00

It has definitely a few long nights here in Denver. Mom had to go deal with some stuff up in Cheyenne with Brain so Robin and I have been staying overnight in the hospital room with Dad. I don't think we have slept for more than about an hour over those 3 nights. The oxygen that Dad is on constantly makes him super thirsty and he somehow manages to ask for a sip of water in the middle of the night even when he is completely asleep. So one of us has jumped up and made sure he hasn't been getting too parched. And I thought I drank a lot of water over a 24hr period. Dad has been putting me to shame in that category lately *grins*. When Dad's awake we've all been cracking jokes just to get him to smile a bit and when we are successful it makes each day seem worth while. Sadly the smiles are harder to come by these days since Dad has been snoozing quite a bit. Healing from multiple surgeries over the past month takes the piss and vinegar out of a person. Our hope though is to take him back home to Brenda's within the next few days. The idea is that he will be less stressed and more comfortable there with just family taking care of him and a nurse coming every few days or so to make sure everything is alright. Hope all is going well with all of you and that you are enjoying each and every minute of your days.

The theme for today is "Foresters Rock"

2009-01-02T13:20:00.003-07:00

So one of the new things that the hospital in CO that my dad is in has added over the past few months is a white board in each of the rooms and an accompanying marker to go with it. Now most people would probably leave this alone thinking that it was just for doctors and nurses to write details about the patients on such as goals for the day and goals for discharge. My family on the other hand has gotten crazy with this little piece of easily changeable mode of art at the end of dad's bed. Each day since it has been up on the wall I write the basics on it such as the date,who Dad's nurse and CNA are for the day, and how many reps of his PT he has to do for the day which takes up very very little of the space. SOOOOO I've gotten creative much to the amusement of dad and my siblings. Anything to put a smile on dad's face. For the past couple days its been drawings and messages related to the New Years celebration but today it was time to get creative and reflect dad's roots at UM. In big bold letters I wrote Forester's Rock and then drew a pine forest that had gone through a selection cut... stumps and all! Dad thought it was great and that just made my day. Just have to start thinking about what I'll have to draw on there tomorrow to entertain my father and distract him from the pain. I'm taking suggestions so feel free to contribute. Keep smiling and keep us in your prayers.

Happy New Year!

2008-12-31T22:05:00.003-07:00

So I just wanted to take a minute to wish everyone a Happy New Year. I would love to expand on this a bit but frankly I just don't have it in me since I've spent the last 16 hours in the hospital. But please everyone be safe in your celebrations and ring in the fabulous new year in style! Love you all.

Snow Day!

2008-12-18T11:08:00.002-07:00

I used to only associate snow days with going to school in the winter in Wyoming but apparently they are much more encompassing. I awoke to over 3 feet of snow this morning and a call into my boss that said work was cancelled for the day. Talk about awesome! Normally 3 feet of snow wouldn't hinder any of us rough and tough Montanans but the stuff is still falling and we literally have a white out going on. I can't see out 10ft past my bedroom window so its understandable not wanting to make the folks from Noxon and Thompson Falls drive into work in those kinds of conditions. The local weather station is predicting that we get another foot or so before the days end and then the day after tomorrow we're supposed to have another big storm. It definitely looks like its going to be a white Christmas after all. Woo hoo. Boy do I love winter! And you should note there is not one iota of sarcasm in that statement... I really do love winter. So if you are curious about this picture this is PRE current snow storm at one of my higher elevation study sites. I took it after the first snow storm we got down here in the valley and there was about 7 feet already up at the site that I had to snow shoe over. The tops of most of those trees you see are probably covered completely now and will stay that way til at least March. So for you Cali folks thinking about moving to Montana... you might want to reconsider!

The Doty's Are Coming Horrah Horrah!

2008-12-04T19:47:00.003-07:00

Kami and Kenny are coming down from Kalispel Saturday morning to spend the weekend with me and Mace and I am sooooo looking forward to the visit. Not exactly sure what we are going to do but it will most definitely be the same ol "up to no good" game plan that we usually succumb to. Just kidding. Our time is probably going to used wisely by cooking together, catching up, and just being happy together. Its been way too long since I've seen the two of them. And out here in the middle of nowhere, visitors are a super big deal, especially ones as nice and sweet as the Doty's. As you can tell by the picture above they are a couple of wild and crazy kids. That's why I love em!

Something is not right... something is quite wrong!

2008-12-01T10:39:00.003-07:00

So here I sit in my office today thanks to management meetings that go on adnausium once a month on Mondays and I realize something just isn't right. Anyone want to venture a guess what it may be? Stumped? Well today is December 1st and I'm looking out my window on a bright clear sunny day and its nearly 50 degrees out! This is just messed up. Now as some of you know already I'm am the ultimate winter baby. I love snow, I love cold, and I even dig the shorter darker days during winter that most people bitch about. So having this sunny warm weather on the 1st day of December is just nuts to me. I keep hoping that one of these days I wake up to about 3 ft of snow on the ground so that my winter field work can get underway. Its hard to snowshoe into a study sight when the snow keeps melting on the tops of my mountains. Its slushy and slippery and flat out dangerous to work in. I'm just praying for those days of nice firm, compact snow that I can troop over the top of in my Alaskan Guide Series snow shoes. That's right... my office actually decided to go high tech this year. The snow shoes that I have been using would make any Eskimo say "what the heck?". So maybe I just want to get out and try the suckers out I don't know but I need some snow to make it happen.

On a more personal note. I didn't shoot any deer this year. I shot at one yesterday on the last day of hunting season but missed. I actually pretty mad at myself though I'm not sure there are too many people out there that could have made the shot I was going for. I was up on a ridgeline and saw a doe running across the powerline about 400 yards away. I cranked up the power on my scope and started leading her as she ran but she stopped dead in her tracks the second I pulled the trigger and I knew it was a miss since I was aiming about 6 inches ahead of her hoping she'd keep running. I cranked another shell into the barrel and hoped to have gotten a second try at her but she had already ducked into the timber. Smart deer! Oh well... a couple of the guys I was hunting with got some does so it wasn't a complete loss and of course Mace filled his deer tags but no elk for any of us. Oh well some seasons are better than others and the warm weather and lack of snow didn't help any. All I have to say is Bambi better watch out next year *jokes*

Gobble Gobble

2008-11-27T11:55:00.002-07:00

Ahhh Thanksgiving! Today is my absolute favorite day, let along holiday of the year. I awoke, as I do on may days, when the sun hadn't even thought about coming over the horizon yet. The house was quiet and gave me time to reflect on everything I am most thankful and grateful for. I let the minutes tick by and decided to see if I could catch the start of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade on Satellite and by golly I could. So with my feet kept warm by sock monkey slippers (a great gift courtesy of Kami from a few years ago) and a fleece blanket wrapped around me I sat in the living room next to the crackling fire drinking coffee with cocoa enjoying the same parade I've always managed to watch year after year since childhood. There was something very comforting about watching the festivities. I can remember always getting up early as a child to catch the start of famous parade and an hour or so later mom and dad joining me down in our basement with their own mugs of coffee or cocoa. Its a tradition I just can't get past. It definitely made me miss spending Thanksgiving with my family though, but I'm trying to stay lighthearted today so I wont go there in this post. So as I'm typing this I have a break in cooking. The stuffed turkey is in the oven. The pies are already baked and cooling (apple, pumpkin, and mince meat... I couldn't resist). Jello salad is setting up in the fridge. All I really have left to do is mashed potatoes and gravy and green bean casserole. I am definitely a traditionalist when it comes to Thanksgiving day meals. Mom and I would always go all out even if it was just the three of us having the meal together that afternoon. We couldn't help ourselves I think. Each time we'd start to plan out the menu we'd remember things we liked and would just keep adding to it. Cooking would take hours but it was so much fun and so rewarding in the end... not to mention the weeks worth of left overs that always resulted. So if you can't tell today is a happy day and I do sincerely hope that you are all enjoying it where ever you are as well. Love and God's blessings to you all.

New News on the Dad Front

2008-11-17T18:41:00.002-07:00

Well I'll be buggered. For those that didn't know already dad is back in the hospital for like the billionth time, or at least so it seems. The docs were still worried about how much weight he'd been dropping so they admitted him yet again and started up a pump that runs 24 hours full of a nutritional suppliment called TPN. I'm sure its not the best tasting stuff in the world so its a good think they are running it through a Pick line in my Dad's upper arm. He ended up having a series of X-Rays the other day with Barium contrast and they found that his intestine has a nice kink in it which could be part of the reason that he still isn't able to keep any food down that he's tried to consume. If its not one thing its another. So how are they going to deal with this. Well thats a fabulous question actually since it hasn't really been long enough since his last radiation treatment to do surgery they are kind of tentative about their plans. Obviously they need to get the kink out and as soon as they can at that. Soooooo the skinny is that on Wednesday afternoon his surgeon is going to put Dad under anesthesia, make a small incision and see how things look. If dad reacts poorly to the incision and look about, the doc will sew him right back up and they'll try again in another 10 days or so. If things look good he'll continue on with the surgery and unkink the part of the gut that needs unkinked (is that a word???). So if you have a few extra minutes on Wednesday and the thought crosses your mind, please keep my dad in your prayers and hopefully things will start getting better for him after everything is said and done. Have a great week folks! Love ya.

Skating anyone?

2008-11-13T19:30:00.002-07:00

Okay I know that I was begging for snow in my last post so this one may come as a contradiction, but I ABSOLUTELY HATE ICE!!!! We've been having a ton of rain lately which means there is a lot of standing water on the roads, both paved and dirt. Well I had to drive up to Kalispel for a meeting yesterday which typically is no big deal and I usually enjoy the 2 hour drive going up through Plains then cutting through Hot Springs where I generally wave at the town since Scott still lives there (I think). I really should stop one of these days when I'm off the clock and see if I can hunt him down to say hello. Anyway I digress, I got out of Kalispel around 5pm which again isn't too bad except the rain had slowed down, the temp had dropped like crazy and all the standing water on the road was now just a sheet of ice. If you ever take the short cut between Plains and Polson, remember not to do so on an icy day since the road is about as curvy as a coiled up snake. Lets just say that it was a long, dark, tense drive back home and I was happy when the day was over.

So far... Not so good.

2008-11-11T09:43:00.004-07:00

I have officially declared that we need a bunch of snow. Why you may ask? Well that would be because I want to shoot a deer. And I know my vegetarian sister who may or may not read this at any point would be screaming "no no... don't shoot Bambi" but to no avail since I'm gonna do it anyway despite her vehement protests. Its not because I'm some horribly evil person that wants to kill things. Its because I enjoy hunting and also enjoy the venison jerky, roasts, and back strap steaks that come from a successful hunting adventure. So far however we haven't been seeing much in the line of "shooter deer". Seen plenty of does and little spike bucks and if it gets toward the end of season and I haven't gotten anything they will be fair game but for now they have an official Tracy Pass Slip. But as for the snow, we need some to push the bigger bucks down into the open and to also push the cow elk down off the high country so that Frank and Mace get a chance at a shot. It will be nice to have a freezer full of wild game. People think I'm weird for thinking that but then again they didn't grow up in my family where elk burger and steaks were more commonly cooked for dinner than chicken or beef. My brother, sisters and I were all raised on wild game and never thought anything about it. It was yummy and so much healthier for us than anything that mom could have picked up from the super market. So my preferences have remained toward wild meat and have missed having to available. So anyone and everyone who reads this, start praying to the snow gods for me and maybe I'll start having some luck.

Well thats an ixnay.

2008-10-24T23:14:00.002-06:00

So much for going to the Griz game tomorrow morning. Mom I took dad in for radiation and his normal Friday follow up appointments at the hospital this afternoon and he ended up being admitted for the next 5-10 days. The game plan is to keep him there until he stabilizes and hopefully quits losing weight. Maybe even gain a few pounds in the process. So instead of going to the game I'm going to try and bring it to him. Most of the UM games are broadcast over the Internet and the hospital has high speed wireless. So I'm going to take advantage of it and make sure dad sees his Griz kick some hiney tomorrow. Please keep him in your prayers. We're all pretty worried about him right now. Hope everyone has a good weekend. Go Griz!

In the Tummy of the Grizzly Bear.... GO GRIZ!

2008-10-24T09:39:00.003-06:00

It has been an excruciating 3 years since I've been in the awe striking presence of the University of Montana Grizzly football team. I tell you those are a long 3 years. But by tomorrow that will have all changed. Yes thats right. I'm going to go watch our Grizzlies kick some serious UNC butt tomorrow up in Greeley. Dad has been talking about this game pretty much non-stop since the beginning of football season when he found out the Griz were going to playing down here in Colorado. He has been looking forward to this game all through his treatment and told me that no matter what he was going to go to it. So we himmed and hawed about how to make the event as comfortable as we could with dad being such a hurting unit these days. Thankfully Brenda works in a Nursing home and therefore got us both a sporty wheelchair and handicap decal that we can use over the weekend so that at least dad will be warm and cozy in that rather than on the cold aluminium bleachers of the stadium. I'm seriously thinking I should decorate the wheelchair this afternoon with appropriate maroon and silver streamers. I figure if he has to ride in the thing he should be doing it in style. Don't you think? Lucky for me I was down in Colorado at the right time to go as well. So we'll have two huge Griz fans at least cheering our little lungs out at the game. Mom's coming too and she of course gets excited but its not quite the same as the annoying loudness my dad and I share at the games. I'll be sure to fill in the details of our extravaganza tomorrow at some point. FIRST DOWN .... MONTANA!!!!

Just another day in paradise.

2008-10-22T10:22:00.003-06:00

I realized today that I had been very neglectful of my blogger page over the last few days. I've constantly been checking Kati's page to see what she is up to (as usual) but just didn't seem to have the mood strike me to write. And in all honesty I still don't feel up to it but what the heck I have nothing else going on at the moment.

Mornings are slow here at the Hancock Bungalo. Thats not to say they aren't nice but it seems like a far cry from hiking the vast terrain of the Cabinet Wilderness by 5 in the morning. I still can't seem to sleep in past about 5 but I guess thats a good thing since I have to get back to it in less than a week. Typically I wake up and the house is absolutely silent. Mark isn't even up yet rummbling around. So what do I do... lay in bed, wide awake, staring at the umbrella that has been decorated to look like a hawaiian hut over my nieces bed. Sometimes I plug the little lights that Rebecca has carefully wrapped around the underside of it and sometimes I don't. Its a quiet and reflective time for me. I find myself having a very frank and humbling conversation with God at thesetimes of the day. Once I hear Rachel's alarm go off in the room next to mine, I start getting with the program. This usually means getting up and listening to all my joints and bones creak and crack a bit. There certainly are days that I feel much older than my 25 years. I blame it on those years of competitive sports and now beating my body against the landscape I love so much. I have a cacophony of sounds from my knees, ankles, back and neck as anyone who has been my roommate can testify to. Mark, Rachel, and Brenda are the first to go out into the world while Rebecca's school doesn't start until an hour later so she and I get to do breakfast together. Its pretty nice having our own little time together. Once she is gone the house is again so very silent. Mom and dad take their sweet time coming upstairs in the mornings though when they finally are up and about Dad and I break out the coffee as I've mentioned in a previous post.

After morning rituals are done, or as dad would say, the 3 S's. We head down to the hospital for Dad's radiation treatments. The treatments themselves really don't take very long, maybe 15 minutes at most but for dad they are excruciating. A few years ago he broke his back and he's had trouble laying on hard surfaces ever since. Most of the time he goes in pretty chipper but by the time he is done we can see how tired he is. It definately takes a lot out of him. But the good news is that Dad is down to 4 more treatments and we're definately having a countdown. There is hope and light at the end of this tunnel. I keep teasing dad about the hair he has coming back... his normally silver fringe of hair is actually darker than it was before he started the whole ordeal. I keep telling him that he's going to have less grey hair than I do by the time everything is said and done. Thank god for dye.

By the time we get back from the hospital and picking up prescriptions and what not, the girls are back from school and our evenings of cooking dinner, the girls going to swim practice,helping out with homework, and watching the normal barage of politcal commentary on Fox News ensues. I must say that I'm really sick of all the hype about the upcoming election. It seems like for the past 3 years that is all that has been on the news. Its not like its honest reporting either. Both sides are skewed so much that its more of a comedy routine than actual news. Thats me on my high horse there if you cant tell. I do get a kick out of watching Fox News with Dad though. He keeps getting so fired up whenver something about Obama is discussed. Can we say that I come from a conservative republican family or what? I like it though because its nice to see dad get worked up about it, its almost as if he saves up his remaining energy just for that purpose in the evening.

So thats my days down here in Denver. Its nothing really exciting but I have to admit that I'vc enjoyed my time with my folks and family. The time has gone by so very fast and its not exactly fair. But I'm sure there will be days in the near future that I come back down to see everyone again.

Coffeeeeeee!

2008-10-16T10:24:00.002-06:00

Why is it that something so cheap and easy to produce tastes so fan-fricking-tastic? I'm just talking about plain ol add some cream and sugar if you want coffee. For the last several months I've been trying to cut down on my coffee consumption and switched to herbal teas. But I felt like there was something missing in my life. Sad but true. So one of the first things I did when getting down here to Denver was buying some coffee since my sister hates the stuff. I know I know... talk about blasphemy. I've been enjoying my black brew ever since. Dad has been drinking about half a cup with me every morning when he gets up. We just sit in Brenda's family room and chit chat about a little bit of everything. I think its one of the few times during the day that he feels halfway normal. Mornings were my time with dad. Having breakfast together and talking about what was going on in our lives. So the coffee drinking is pretty significant, especially since he is actually able to drink coffee again after 13 months of not having a drop of the liquid life force.

I have to say that yesterday was one of the best days my dad has had since I've been down here. Eating was still an issue when it came to plain foods but he was more his normal self. Joking around, giving my nieces a hard time about boys, and even sitting on the front porch and bsing with the mail man who was walking his route. We sat out there together talking and enjoying the fall evening with me slipping dad a chocolate chip cookie every once in a while. When Brenda came home from work we were still out there and she contributed to the fun by breaking out a bag of candy corn. Even after all that sugar in the afternoon his blood sugar levels were good and he kept it all down. Thankfully he only has another 8 more radiation treatments to go and then he'll have to wait a few weeks to find out when they will do surgery. Hopefully that will mark the end of this whole cancer thing for him.

Hope everyone's week is going well. Love and miss you all.

Everyone Came out on Top

2008-10-12T08:40:00.002-06:00

Well so far this weekend has been grand in terms of football wins. All the teams I was cheering for (note: I have no voice now) won yesterday and Friday night. Gators, Huskies, and Griz all reigned supreme on the gridiron. Just as it should be.

As some of you know, when Brenda and I get together we happen to embibe just a wee bit. After everything was said and done with Rachels hair, makeup, and dress, she and Dusty scedadled to the dance and Brenda and I popped open a bottle of her favorite chardaney to go with Cheesy Potato Bacon soup from Safeway. I must say with the bread and soup it was a perfect wine. Two bottles and a shot of blueberry vodka later, Brenda was snoozing away happily in the big overstuffed chair while Rebecca and I were still up and watching the movie Harold.

After the movie ended I was still wide awake so I gave Mace a call to find out if he was feeling better. A nasty flu bug has inundated Trout Creek and it finally made its way to Mace and the rest of his family. Guess I got out of Trout Creek at the perfect time to avoid that plague. Thankfully Mace sounded 10 times better than he had the day before. I know he was miserable and its absolutely no fun being sick like that when you are alone. He's still a pretty weak and dehydrated but I'm sure by this evening most of that will have been resolved as well. At least thats my hope anyway.

Welp I need to go finish getting ready for church. Hope everyone else's weekend is going well too. Check you on the flipside.

Today Go Gators Tomorrow Go Huskies and Griz!

2008-10-10T13:31:00.007-06:00

I am being inducted into the multi-team cheering hall of fame this weekend. Rachel, my oldest niece is having her high school's football homecoming day tonight. I have been invited to come along and hang out with her friends at the game and cheer my lungs out for her poor little Stanley Lake Gators. Apparently they don't have much of a football team but how can you not go to your own school homecoming right. The dance is tomorrow night though and I get to do Rachie's hair for it. Thats pretty darn cool. She has a fabulous purple dress that her boyfriend Dusty is going to go head over heals for. I tell you I'm glad he is an upright and decent guy because I'd hate to be the one to beat up my niece's boyfriend for being a jerk... and I would if that was the case. They actually make a really sweet couple and I'm excited to be getting a change to get to know him better and see them interact so well.
As for tomorrow I'll be in the stands of Platte Canyon High School up in Bailey cheering on the team that Mark has been coaching for years now. I've only been able to see a few scrimages over the years and it will be nice to see Mark's Huskies kicking butt. So far they are undefeated this season and hopefully tomorrow will just be a continuation of that trend. Now while I may be sitting in the Husky stands and wearing blue and black war paint with the girls but my heart is also going to be with my fellow Griz fans as they play Eastern Washington on Saturday. So yeah... thats my weekend so far. Mom and Dad headed up to Cheyenne today to spend the night and get some simple house stuff done. If I hadn't already promised Rachel I'd do her hair I'd have gone up with them but I'd made the prior committment and I want to hold those kind of promises. I think its good for them to have some time to themselves too and they'll be back by tomorrow afternoon so I'm not horribly worried about not going with them. But since the weather is turning south even as I'm writting this, keep them in your prayers for the return trip tomorrow. Have a great weekend all.

I Hate Circadian Rhythms

2008-10-08T08:41:00.002-06:00

I swear to God I had every intention of taking advantage of sleeping in on this trip but my internal clock is making that rather difficult. I woke up only 18 minutes later than my alarm at home would have gone off. I guess small progress is still progress but waking up at 4:48 rather than 4:30 doesn't seem like much consolation. I have to say though Becca gave up her bed for me and it was fabulous. So much better than sleeping on the hidabed in the living room. Not that I would have really minded that either but its nice to not be sleeping in the middle of the common areas of the house and having a little peace and quiet to myself. Just so you know... my nieces are just the coolest kids in the world. I love that we are so close and that we can always have fun together. It was nice sitting with them both this morning before they headed off to school and goofed around together. No matter how old any of us get we'll always be silly together. Its also nice to see what beautiful and considerate young ladies they are both becoming. They are showing some more serious and introspective sides and have such a good relationship with each other even when they are both in pissy moods. I know by family relation they are my nieces but I swear they are more like my little sisters. Its a nice relationship.

That's it for now... I need to get some work done. Woo hoo for writing grants on elk winter habitat restoration.

ps...Even after Kati reminded me to take my camera with me to Denver I somehow managed to forget it... forgot my razor too but that's another story. My Bad!!! So much for taking cool pictures while I'm here. I guess you'll just have to deal with pictureless posts or just some representative pictures of Denver like the one from last night that I kyped from the internet. So sorry... its a bummer. But I will get Brenda to take pictures of Rachel's homecoming and email them to me so I can post them later.

Mile High City

2008-10-07T23:37:00.002-06:00

I made it to Denver safe and sound. All flights went off without a glitch for a change. I already miss Mace like crazy, but I am glad I am down here. I can already tell that this is going to be a good visit. Have a good night all and God Bless.
Tracy

Short and Sweet

2008-10-07T09:52:00.002-06:00

I should have more time during the next three weeks to get some posting in since work wont be getting in my way. I'm flying down to Denver today and wont be back until the 27th of October. So keep me in your prayers while I travel and please more than anything keep my dad in your prayers because he's having a rough time with his treatments right now. Love you all!

Tracy

How About a Pumpkin Split?

2008-09-27T10:14:00.004-06:00

Yesterday was dooms day for Polly's pumpkin. About 3 weeks ago her pumpkin had stopped putting on any size to it and we all figured that it was because it was just too cold at night for it to be growing anymore. So yesterday Polly decided it was time to cut it off the vine and get the official weigh in. Frank made a handy dandy platform sling that he hooked up to the bucket of his tractor so that after we cut the pumpkin off, we could easily get it out of the corral it had been growing in. Much to our disappointment when we lifted the thing onto the platform we found it was no 260 lbs like we'd been figuring. Something was very wrong. After hooking the platform to one of the sping scales Polly had for weighing beef, we found that her pumpkin only weighed 180 lbs after subtracting the weight of the platform from the total.

After taking a few pictures of it with the kids and consoling each other over the bumminess of not at least having a 200 lber we started rolling the pumpkin around to check it out in its entireity. In doing so we found the problem. In one of the creases on the back side of the pumpkin there was a split that ran almost from the stem to the butt of the pumpkin. Not only that but right where it had been setting on the ground there was a hole big enough to slide most of my hand through. I could reach in and start pulling out seeds that were rotten. That was the reason it was so light... it had lost all its solidness and bugs were eating it from the inside out. We're not exactly sure why it split but our currenty theory is that the pumpkin tried growing around the board we had it set on and the strain on the wall was too much so it just split at the edge of the board. Mace and I are going to get onto Pumpkin Chat and ask around to see what may have caused it to happen or if our theory is valid.

The good news is that even for the problem of it splitting, Polly's pumpkin is still gorgeous. And for our first try at this its still a big pumpkin. The bad news is that with the split, we doing think its going to make it to Halloween. Its already trying to rot and other soft spots are forming on the back wall. But for now it looks awfully cool sitting on the lawn in front of Polly's house and the kids think its pretty darn amazing. My pumpkin is still growing strong so I don't think there is any worry of it being split. Mace and I plan on cutting it off the vine a couple days before I head down to Denver so I can see how much it weighs. Then when I get back I'll carve it with Lane and Gracie and we'll set it up for Halloween.

I have to get my camera back from Polly... we took a bunch of pictures and she's downloading them to her computer. Once I do though I'll post some of the pictures on here and you can see how hers did. Have a great weekend all.

Talk About Amazing

2008-09-20T10:37:00.007-06:00

My parents just celebrated their 43th wedding anniversary on Thursday and I can't help but think I hope and pray that I will be as lucky some day. Its becoming such a rarity that people actually stay together at all, let alone 40 some years. I think I'm truly blessed to have come from two such strong and caring individuals. And the best thing is, I know they are still madly in love with each other. I'm not saying its the same giddy kind of love that they probably had when they met as teenagers, that's right they'd been dating from the time they were 15-16 years old to the time they got married, but a mature and deep love that you only get from knowing and being with someone that long. When I first think about my parents individual characteristics I think of two very different people, so maybe opposites really do attract. But when I continue to dwell on it I see more and more similarities between the two of them. Their deep rooted Catholic faith, their love of science, nature, and history, their sharp as a tact intellects, their ties to family values both from past generations to their own children and grandchildren, their desire to be the best people they can be in this short life, and the fact that they grew together toward common goals. That's the stuff of love for a lifetime. Yep I really am lucky to have grown up as theirs. And as you can see by the picture, the grandkids are lucky to have them too!

Since my dad has been sick I have been thinking more and more on these kind of things. I guess that's only natural, though I wonder if the rest of my siblings have done the same. It definitely has been a year of reflection on my part and maybe that's why a lot of emotions have been closer to the surface for the past few months. And as most of you know I tend to keep a lot of things bottled up pretty tight so its been weird not having that same control over it as usual. Frustrating actually. Good thing Mace is a patient listener.. well patient in that he'll calmly wait till I'm ready to say anything about what I may be feeling. Hard to let go of old habits. But in some ways its harder anyway because I miss all my girlfriends from Missoula. I'd never been one to hang out with any number of girls until college and found it great when just chit chatting over random stuff. The serious stuff would come up and it was easier to talk about it with them. But I really don't have that here. Trout Creek is by far a male dominated community, and not meaning to sound horrible here but there just aren't many women my age with a "non-party" and halfway intellectual attitude or lifestyle that I might feel comfortable having as a friend. Heck... there just aren't that many women even close to my age! So it gets a little frustrating at times. And even when I do get a chance to talk to my college gal pals on the phone I don't feel like getting into the sad parts of my life (that just gets depressing), I want to enjoy hearing from them and joking with them instead. Messed up I know... lol. Gah even on this I don't like getting into it.

Sooooo we're going to leave that all by the way side. I started this post on a positive, MY PARENTS, and by God I'm going to leave it on a positive as well. What could be more positive than the awesome apple pie I mad this morning and letting cool right now. That's right... nothing. I must say this one is gorgeous don't you think? Apple pie is the shizzle. Polly has a great apple tree in her garden that had a boom crop last year. We spent hours picking, pealing, slicing, and freezing most of them for apple pie and apple crisp fillings during the year. I tend to like to put the apples in oatmeal in the morning before heading off to work. Its filling and delicious. But I looked in my freezer this morning and saw one lonely ziplock bag stuffed with apples from last year and realized that a new crop is going to be ready for picking any day now so I might as well used these babies up. So I am. I should be a baker... I swear! Set up a bakery for other people to enjoy my goodies. Most of the time I'd rather bake it than eat it and cooking has always been a stress reliever for me. Good thing I have a bunch of people that love what I make so that I'm not really hogging out on it myself. My rear end thanks them as well... lol. The staff in the office love me. I'll drop off some goodies in the morning in the conference room next to the coffee maker and by the time I come back from the field every crumb is gone. I think the guys in my office are glad to have me around. I keep watching food network and finding more and more recipes that I'd love to try. Glad the holidays are fast approaching so I can try out a few of them for Turkey day or Christmas.

I suppose I ought to go check the pie and make sure Flash hasn't gotten to it while its cooling, and then go down and check out Mace and my pumpkin. 270 LBS PEOPLE!!!! If it grows just another 7 inches it will make 300 lbs. I'll be happy with that though if the weather holds out we might be able to reach 350 lbs. Really makes me wish we had started the plant earlier and had a little bit longer of a season. I can't imagine how huge it really could have been. Signing out for now... have a great weekend everyone. Oh and of course ... GO GRIZ! (its homecoming today).

Pumpkin update

2008-09-17T22:41:00.003-06:00

Just had to post this before I went to bed. I measured our pumpkin this evening and by our calculations it should weigh over 250 lbs now!!!! Its also started to turn to a nice deep yellow-orange and shines when the sun hits it just right. Talk about gorgeous. I'll be sure to take some pictures after work tomorrow and post them on here. Its even filling in some so its much more round rather than like a big flat wagon wheel. Okay... thats the excitement for me today. Well that and I avoided getting sprayed by a skunk that wandered by while I was eating lunch on Gem Peak. Woo hoo!

Colorado Rocky Mountain High

2008-09-13T11:47:00.000-06:00

My tickets are booked, my itinerary sent to those who might need it, and the appropriate people are excited about me coming to see them. Yep that’s right; I’m going down to Denver again. Initially I’d hoped (many months ago) that this visit would take me to Cheyenne but with Dad still going through medical problems and still living with Brenda, Mark and their two girls in Westminster my travels will take me to Colorado. Not that I mind. Over the past 7-8 years I’ve probably spent more time in Denver with my sister and her family than anywhere. Whether I’m sleeping on the hida-bed in her living room or down in what I call “my room” in the basement, going to Brenda’s is always a good time. Even when I was there for a month in Feb/March under pretty horrible circumstances I still had the comfort of being with close family and being in a familiar setting after spending hours in the hospital during the day.

I’m a little nervous about this trip. Not the traveling or anything like that, but not being sure how Dad is going to be feeling. The last time I was down there I knew he was going to be pretty miserable after surgery and I was better prepared for some long emotionally challenging days, though there were some things that I’m not sure I could ever have been prepared for if they had happened, but we won’t dwell on that today. With Dad starting radiation on Monday, and continuing that 5 days a week for the next 6 weeks, and still being on oral chemo treatments during that whole ordeal I’m not sure what kind of condition he’s going to be in. And that alone worries me. I just know that I wanted to make sure I got down to see him and my Mom before the snow starts flying up here and I’m not able to get out. Even flying in October may be a little tricky since its predicted that we are going to have an early and very hard winter here in Northwest Montana. I’m just keeping my fingers crossed that I’ll be able to fly out of Missoula on the 7th.

But for good reason I’m also excited about the trip. I love spending time with my family. Anytime we get together great memories are both shared and created. Brenda told me she is running out of meal time ideas so in my spare time I’ll try and find some cheap, easy ideas that I can take down there and help out in the kitchen. Dinner usually revolves around some sort of chicken or ground beef as the main protein so I can understand how that can get repetitive after a while. I have the same problem here at home. If nothing else I can make pancakes from scratch on Saturday mornings and through so chocolate chips in there for Mark and the girls. The last time I was down there I made a few loaves of lowfat banana bread that got scarffed down pretty fast. I’m sure I can make some more or some coffee cake that Rachel and Becca love.

Marks football team is doing great so far this season and I’m hoping to be able to go up to Bailey at least once and see the boys play. I lived down there for 4 summers and while Mark always told me how his two a day practices were doing I only was able to stay long enough in the season to see a scrimmage. So it would be a real treat to see an actual game. Mom and Dad have been going up and rooting with the family since its kind of reminiscent of the small high school football scene at Seton Catholic where my brother and sister went to high school. There is a special feeling when it comes to rooting for the underdog because they always seem to come out on top even though they don’t have the numbers in their population that the big time high schools do. I can scream my lungs out with the best of them. Heck I haven’t been to a football game since my last year at U OF M… I need a little sport in my life!

Anyway… I’m rambling now so I’ll stop for now. Hope everyone is having a great weekend. God Bless and GO GRIZ!!!!!

Care Bear Stare

2008-09-05T13:43:00.005-06:00

Well it is that time of year again when the bears are out and about getting fat for the upcoming months of torpor (fancy word for hibernation... aka bear lethargy). Bears don't technically hibernate. My mammalogy professor took 3 days in college explaining why it wasn't actually hibernation but a food induced comatose like situation called bear lethargy or torpor which is why their body can still have productive contractions during cub births in their dens. I wont bore you with the details but it was interesting stuff at the time and you'll just have to accept it.

I was out running another stand exam yesterday morning and within a two hour period I came across two sets of black bear. The first was a sow with two cubs from this season that were absolutely adorable. I wish they hadn't been so spooky or I could have gotten a couple more great pictures of the cubs. I was lucky even to get this one. There is absolutely nothing as cute as a bear cub. Note of caution though... try to stay out of mama bears way. Black bears may be skiddish but they aren't stupid. If they think you are going to try and harm their cubs they wont wait a second to come after you. Most of the time though they either tree up or go running off through the forest. This mama bear and one of her cubs ran for the nearest dark patch of woods while the last of the cubs was confused and started to climb up the nearest aspen tree. He got about halfway up before he realized the rest of the family wasn't doing the same and came crashing down the tree and rumbled after his mom and sister. I basically just leaned against a tree and watched with a smile on my face. They were a good 50 yards away from me before they realized I could be something dangerous walking through the woods with tree borer and tape measure in hand. I think it was the orange vest and hard hat that gave me away... *laughs*.

The next bear I came across was a young female that was pretty curious about what I was doing in the woods and just climbed up a nearby tree and watched me while I worked. She didn't seem fazed in the least that I was intruding on her grazing. I made my measurements pretty quickly however and continued on my merry way in order not to spook or anger her to much. She posted herself in a tree down hill from me so with the zoom on my camera I got a really great shot. Luckily enough I have not run across any grizzlies in my adventures out in the woods though there are plenty of them out there. Several area's in which I work are grizzly relocation points of bears that have tried pestering camp sites in Yellowstone and other prominent tourist areas. I've seen sign of them but thankfully they are smarter than their black bear cousins and boogie out of an area long before I even know they were there. Last summer I made some great castings of grizzly bear prints with a grad student and bear researcher from MSU. I know I know... booo to MSU but he's a great guy and is do ecological studies that will be really interesting if they get published. Environmentalists keep saying the griz population around here isn't healthy and vibrant... this kid has other news for them. David has seen enough proof to know that our population is actually one of the healthiest in the griz recovery areas... plenty of cubs... plenty of habitat to grow in... not as many people for them to come in contact with. Take that you GREENIES!!! Not that I'm bitter or anything. It just gets frustrating when you're told over and over there isn't a sustainable griz population in the area and you know otherwise. I know I'm preaching to the choir here so I'll stop. Hope everyone is having a great day. I'm loving my super short Labor Day Holiday Week! I'm already in my weekend here. Woo wooo!

Boo yah!

2008-09-03T17:04:00.003-06:00

My pumpkin reached the 100 lb mark today. I might get 200 out of it yet. Pray that it doesn't freeze. I've begun to make gord sacrifices to the pumpkin gods... dancing around a fire and lighting pumpkin spice candles for effect. *just kidding mom, you know I'm not into false god worship* But it is a joke between Mace, Polly and myself. I still say if our pumpkin had gotten as good a start as Polly's had we would be kicking her little hiney. Her pumpkin has a good 20 days on our and is only 40 lbs heavier now. I'm gonna catch up ... I just know it.

Appreciate Your Heat

2008-08-31T10:17:00.005-06:00

That's right I'll say it again you city dwellers with electric or gas heat, you better appreciate that luxury and how easy life is with it. Out here in the boonies most people resort to two types of heat. The first is clean burning propane, as Hank from King of the Hill would say. Its a great fuel source for heating anything but its downsides are the price up here and the fact that you have to have a monster sized propane tank sitting somewhere relatively close to your house in order to get you through the winter.
The second option, and seemingly most popular in this neck of the woods is WOOD! Just about everyone I know has some sort of wood stove or even wood belly furnace to keep their houses warm in the winter. I tell you what, nothing keeps a house as warm or dry in the winter as wood heat. I certainly learned to appreciate that over the past two winters when I would come into the house after a day in the field snowshoeing, getting cold and wet. But of course wood does not get delivered by little elfin type fairies, no no, if you want it you either have to have the chainsaw and wood permit to go out and get some, or know someone that will do the work and sell it to you by the cord (for those of you that don't know, a cord is a volumetric unit that is a pile of stacked wood measuring 4x4x8 ft).

Now Frank, Polly, and Mace are all hard working, independent people, so I'm sure you can guess which option they go for every winter, that's right WOOD! That's not to say that they don't have propane on the side in case of a particularly hard winter, but their primary source of heat is a wood stove in each of their homes. Each spring and fall Frank and Mace buy a wood permit, lovingly provided by yours truly out at the ranger station, and head out Martin Creek or Huckleberry with two 3/4 ton pickups and a 17 ft flatbed trailer. In a days work the two men can load the trailer and two pickups with anywhere between 3 and 4 cord of wood. That may not sound like much but when you look at everything loaded it seems like a ton. Mace's house is smaller so he only goes through about 8-10 cord of wood in a winter, the other house is a lot bigger and has a fireplace which is less efficient than a stove, so I shudder to think how much would we go through there. All I know is that Frank fills a bard full of wood and by the time spring rolls around there are only a few hunks of red fir or larch rolling around.

So over the last couple years I've participated in getting wood with the boys. Yesterday was just one such occasion. You all know me, I'm not one to sit around and have things done for me. I'm living here so I think its only right of me to help. Besides I'm no fragile little gal that's afraid to break a nail. Nope, not me, I'm out there with a set of gloves, work boots on, and picking up 30- 50 lb pieces of wood with the best of them. We all take turns between running the chainsaws, moving the trucks, and loading the rounds in each one of the vehicles. Between the three of us it goes pretty fast. Mace and Frank pretty much have it down to a science so the first few times I felt like more of a hindrance than a help, but I've gotten the hang of it and will run the block and cables from the downed timber up to the road as fast as any guy, maybe even faster than some. Now I couldn't go work with the guys from that show Axeman or anything like that but I pull my own weight.

Once the trucks are loaded, the battle is only half over. This time of year with the rain fall and freezing and thawing between night and daylight, the roads off the mountains are pretty well beat up. Around every turn you either meet a washboard surface or some pothole that makes the truck dip precariously in one direction or another, which isn't too great when you have round pieces of wood stacked about 5 ft high in the bed. So we take our time and occasionally have to pop out of the cab and go adjust the load a little. Then we head home to offload and restack the wood. By the time everything is said and done we're all sore and tired and ready for a shower. All in a days work right? Oh wait... yesterday was my day off... *laughs*.

ps... I guess that means today we need to split it all and restack it again. It never ends.

Update

2008-08-30T10:44:00.003-06:00

I am happy to report that, after measuring my pumpkin today and comparing the measurements to a very sophisticated table provided by bigpumpkin.com that a lot of people with too much time on their hands compiled, my pumpkin has grown quite a bit. The last time I blogged on here about it an put that picture up the circumferences was 37 inches was only 15 days old (the number of days it has been set on the vine) and weighed approximately 23 lbs. As of today, only a week later, the circumference is 58 inches and weighs 59 lbs. Talk about growth! I know its nothing compared to those giant pumpkin growers on the East coast that are breaking records with pumpkins that weigh over 1600 lbs but its a start. The seed that we started from came from a guy living in Pennsylvania and was about 830 lbs when the season was over an done with. I had hopes that we would get at least a 2oo lber by the time our season ends so maybe it will still happen if we can keep it safe and warm into the first part of October. We started the seed way too late compared to what those East coasters do, but then again they have a longer season to start with and don't have the big temperature difference between daytime and night. Mace and I are even talking about running an electric blanket out from his house to the pumpkin so that when its covered by all the tarps the entire system will be water proof and warm. If it gets too much colder at night we might just have to. I want my chainsaw worthy jack'olatern! Polly's pumpkin is a behemoth weighing in at over 100lbs already though hers doesn't seem to be growing at nearly the speed ours is. Hers is a prettier pumpkin by far though; perfectly round, bright orange and not a scar on the sucker. Ours on the other hand... well its had some identity issues. Its trying to change to orange but taking its sweet time doing it. It has a few blemishes that I can't figure out how they even happened. And there is no such thing as round in its pumpkin vocabulary. One side seems to be growing faster than the other and the top of the sucker near the stem has a big indentation for no reason whatsoever. With all its little imperfections we still love it though and treat it like the king of the garden it has become. So all hail King Pumpkin... ruler of gardendom!

ps... I'll post a picture of it with this blog tomorrow. I forgot to take one today.

Woodland Elk Crossing Guard

2008-08-27T14:51:00.007-06:00

I got an up close and personal view of a bunch of cow elk today. There I was minding my own business using my factor 10 prism to find what trees where in and what trees were out of my stand exam when suddenly I hear the snapping of twigs and the rustling sound of underbrush. Normally this wouldn’t be a big deal to me except for the fact that it was literally over my right shoulder and very near, which would give me very very little time to react if the critters coming my way were dangerous. I don’t know if these cow elk were particularly dumb or the breeze was just wafting my scent away from them but within a few seconds 4 cow elk and one very young bull broke from the underbrush into the clearing to my right.

Deciding to enjoy the experience and since they didn’t seem to be all that worried about me, I took my pack off and sat with my back up against a huge larch and watched them while I entered habitat type data into my stand exam mini handheld computer. Yes the days of recording data entry after data entry by hand are past. Now I have a computer the size of an old school game boy prompting me to answer stand questions. The cost of each one of these little buggers is $2800… seems outrageous compared to a piece of paper and a pencil. In some ways it’s great because it makes sure I don’t leave out information, but at the same time it doesn’t really give me the option of writing further notes to explain some of the entries since old growth stand exams run a little bit differently and require additional information. So I still lug around a big metal folder clipboard to write more things down. It is a bigger pain in the butt really. But my gripes about technology aren’t the point here.

As I was sitting and watching over the next few minutes I realized that I hadn’t checked the status of my cow tag online yet. Yep, I can be watching and animal this noble and majestic and still be thinking about how good it’s going to taste this fall. Creepier yet (for those of you non-hunters) and better yet (for those of you fellow hunters) I began thinking which one of these particular elk would make the best meal and of course began wishing it was about 2 months later, I wasn’t on the Forest Service clock, and had Mace’s 7mm with me. So what do you suppose the first thing I did when I got home was? That’s right, get on the state’s fish, wildlife and parks website, type in my ALS number, and check and see if I got a cow tag. Much to my major disappointment and chagrin I hadn’t been drawn. My hope of putting an elk of my very own in the freezer is not to be this year. I know… so sad isn’t it. At least I can still go deer hunting. This buck I saw last spring would do nicely. I actually wonder how big its antlers are now. Doesn't matter I guess. I'm just looking for a nice tender deer for roasts, jerky, and backstrap steaks. Robin (my vegitarian sister) is cringing right now reading that I'm sure.

Mace was bummed about my lack of elk tagage too and gave me the “well there is always next year speech” (little solace at this point and time). He had checked his status a few weeks ago. Luckily he got his cow tag and so did his dad. Hopefully the weather will cooperate this year and we’ll find a nice juicy cow since last year it wasn’t till the last day of the season that Mace found one and couldn’t get a shot on because of how warm hunting season had been. My countdown to opening day though has begun….. Tminus 56 days! Woo hoo!

Pumpkin Prowess

2008-08-24T12:55:00.009-06:00

Fall has definately come around this neck of the woods. Its not just because the weather is cooling down a bit or the fact that the sun doesn't hang for quite as many hours in our big sky as it did during the long days of summer.There is a difference in the air that I just can't quite explain but can definately feel. It wont be long now before the western larch's needles start turning a bright yellow-orange. Thats actually pretty cool around here because of how many larch there are in our forest. You don't really think about how many there are until the needles turn and whole hillsides are a contrast of orange against the deep green of all the other trees. Those will make for some great pictures to post on here when the time comes.

With the creeping in of fall I find myself hoping my pumpkin will grow faster. I feel like a witch or mad scientist out in the garden waving my hands chanting "grow my little one grow". Don't worry I haven't gone off my rocker, I'm just excited about how big this little sucker might get. It set on so late that its having to play catch up to Polly's 100 lb one now. I'm very jealous of my future mom-in-laws gourd actually. Its a nice bright orange and a perfectly round 67 inches in circumference as you can see from the pic I took of hers yesterday. *sniffle sniffle* It puts mine to shame at the moment. I can't really complain though. My pumpkin is still in that light yellow baby pumplkin stage of development though it should start to get more orangy any day now. My little guy has put on about 20 lbs in the last week and is starting to so show some umph. I think its weights close to 35 lbs total now, though maybe even a bit more than that since its getting harder to lift. Its kind of a pain in the rear end though. Mace and I are so paranoid that it might freeze at night (already had frost Aug 1st) that we have a system of covering the entire pumpkin plant every single night. It starts with wrapping the pumpkin itself up in a giant towel, then putting a big box over that to keep the little guy as warm as we can. After the pumpkin itself is covered, we use the system of boards we set up running the entire length of the plant to support the 6 tarps we need to cover the plant. It looks pretty haphazard after all is said in done but it keeps the plant a good 20 degrees warmer than the rest of the garden, which is worth it after all the work we've put into pruning and burying the vine itself day after day. I know it sounds like a lot of extra work, and it is, but its been really fun seeing something grow so much so fast that it seems worth it. Again... there isn't much to do in Trout Creek Montana, I have to get my kicks in somehow.

I picked the last of my raspberries and made the very last batch of jam yesterday. Mace's chest freezer is pretty much filled to the brim so I'm not exactly sure where I'm going to put these last 8 jars. Between making raspberry and strawberry jam, freezing the peppers we've roasted from the garden, and the litany of other stuff we've made and canned over the past few weeks cupboards both at Mace's and Polly's house are getting stuffed. Its a nice feeling really seeing all the hard work paying off. Weird thing is is that both gardens still haven't be fully harvested. We've just been picking at it as thing have ripened but there is still a ton out there. All the onions, carrots, rest of the beets, more peppers and tomatoes, green beens, peas, etc etc I'm not sure where everything is going to go. Its been a great growing season and the produce has been yummier than ever for it.

Last night Mace and I cooked for the whole family using pretty much just stuff from our garden. We had a giant salad with carrots, lettuce, cucumbers, yellow peppers, and red onions all of which came from our garden except for the lettuce. Then we had elk steak cooked on the grill with roasted new red potatoes and carrots (again from our garden). It was one of the best meals we'd all had in a long time. Fresh veggies are just too yummy. To top the night off we all sat around a fire pit outside and roasted marshmellows with Lane and Gracie (Mace's nephew and niece) and watched the shooting stars til midnight. All in all it was a great evening.

It Feels Like the Plague

2008-08-21T10:16:00.003-06:00

I had been battling a cold for the past 3 or 4 days. Apparently yesterday's adventure in the rain was the last straw. My body gave up the ghost and I had to call in sick today. I barely slept last night because I kept tossing and turning in bed. I hate when you get a head cold and only one nostral is stuffed up so you flip over to your other side to try and get your sinuses to adjust only to make the original nostral clear and the other stuffy. So its a tetter-totter act all night trying to find some comfort. Hopefully today I'll recouperate and I'll be able to go in to work tomorrow so I don't use a sick day up since tomorrow is actually the start of my weekend for me. I'd like to save any time off I have in case I need to go back down to Denver if Dad has another surgery. Time to take some more Theraflu (the non-non drowsy kind... I want to sleep) and get back to bed and a book. Anyway, keep me in your prayers and waft some healing juju my way.

Rainy Day Blues

2008-08-20T19:59:00.004-06:00

The weather around here just seems to go from one extreme to another. Sunday we had 100 plus degree weather and now its down to the mid 50's and rainy. I just can't win. I was out in the field by 5 this morning and it rained every single minute of the day. Luckily I pack my rain gear no matter what everyday. It definately came in handy. I think I need to re-waterproof my old pair of Carhartts though. I did it a year ago but I think the waterproofing has finally given up the ghost in the wash because about 30 minutes into my hike to my first site my pants were absolutely soaked through from rubbing against scrub brush and bear grass. By the end of the day I was glad to get home to a hot shower and a warm pair of pj pants and a hoodie, not to mention some coffee as well. I must admit the rain did make for a pretty picture though. Hope everyone's week is going well.

I'm Mellllting!!!

2008-08-17T11:50:00.002-06:00

Why is it that anytime you want to spend the day outside that it turns out to be like a furnace outside. I woke up this morning, went to Thompson Falls to go to church by 7:30 and it was so nice out. Perfect 70 degrees, sunny, nice little breeze so I was hoping it would stay that way. Boy was I wrong. I stepped out of church an hour later and was welcomed by a blast of sweltering heat as soon as I opened the door. Ick! Have to say I made a quick dash from the church steps to the air conditioning that I knew awaited me in Mace's car. It had to be 90 degrees by then and even hotter by the time we rolled back into Trout Creek. After a quick change into shorts and a tank top I thought that maybe it would be tolerable to be outside but soon found out that I was mistaken. I was going to go down to Mace's and help him mow his yard today but he said he wasn't up to battling the heat either. Can't say as I blame him. Hopefully as the sun begins to set this evening it will cool off and we can tackle at least part of it. I almost feel like going outside and joining Gracie and Lane in their little kiddie pool out back. Every half hour or so Lane gets out and turns the water faucet on to cool the water down again.

This kind of weather makes me think of when I was working down in Denver and living with my sister Brenda. Over the 4th of July one summer we both had the day off and I invited my friend Kati to spend the day with us lounging around in Brenda's hot tub and drinking ice cold margaritas. Don't worry Mom, we were both over 21 at the time. Actually Brenda and I had several hot tub margarita parties. It was pretty cute when Mark brought out a round with fresh cut roses from Brenda's garden decorating the glasses. He's such a sweetie really, though he would rather die than ever admit to it. I have to admit that spending those few summers down in Denver really brought me and my sister closer together. You'd never know there was a 16 year age difference between us. We developed an adult relationship that is pretty special really. Thats not to say I don't have great relationships with Robin and Brian, my other sister and brother, but its not exactly the same either.

Well enough of this writing stuff. I think I'm going to go rent a movie at the local store and head over to Mace's to hang out in the coolness of his air conditioner until it cools off a bit and we can mow the yard. Hope no one else is melting like we are or like these clocks are for that matter. Kudos to Salvidor Dali... lol

Critter Twitter (part two)

2008-08-16T09:16:00.008-06:00

Ahhh, Saturday morning and I finally have time to continue with my critter/work related saga. Life is good! So where were we? I already talked about my wolverine, doing goshawk and harlequin duck surveys, my bats in an earlier post, and old growth stand exams in a previous post as well. I guess that means I'm up to flamulated owls and mountain pine beatle attacks.

From about May to the beginning of Aug, I work intermitently at night. Not just because of my work with various species of bats but also because I spend several weeks calling for flamulated owls. Because this owl is strictly nocturnal and you wont hear a peep out of him during the day, I use a multi use caller to try and get a response from the little bugger at night. If I get a call back from an owl I keep calling and taking azimuths until I can triangulate the position of that particular bird. Then in the day time I return to that area and see if I can find a nest site to monitor. This species looks like a minature version of a screech owl with eyes as black as coal and live in Ponderosa pine stands. Its actually pretty amazing we have any of flamulated owls on our forest since we have few true old grow ponderosa stands. They seem to have adapted to a mixed stand of ponderosa, doug. fir, and lodge pole pine. I think they are kind of cut really. And they have really long "whooo whoooooooooooo" kind of call. What every kids grows up thinking an owl should sound like.

Another project that I'm involved on with the Siviculturist on our district is a genetic improvement project for Western White Pine and Whitebark Pine. This is a pretty big deal. For those of you who were in my forestry/wildlife classes you'll know what I'm talking about but since this blog is for everyone here is a little history and breakdown of the problem. Mountain pine beetles inhabit pines, particularly the ponderosa pine, lodgepole pine, and the white pines. During early stages of an outbreak, attacks are limited largely to trees under stress from injury, poor site conditions, fire damage, overcrowding, root disease or old age. As beetle populations increase, the beetles attack most large trees in the outbreak area. The beetles kill the trees by boring through the bark into the phloem layer on which they feed and in which eggs are laid. Pioneer female beetles initiate attacks, and produce pheromones which attract other beetles and results in mass attack. The trees respond to attack by increasing their resin output in order to discourage or kill the beetles, but the beetles carry blue stain fungi which, if established, will block the tree resin response. Over time (usually within 2 weeks of attack), the trees are overwhelmed as the phloem layer is damaged enough to cut off the flow of water and nutrients. In the end, the trees starve to death, and the damage can be easily seen even from the air in the form of reddened needles. Entire groves of trees after an outbreak will appear reddish for this reason. Usually older trees die faster. After particularly long and hot summers mountain pine beetle population can increase dramatically which can lead to the deforestation of large areas. The attacked areas are hard to miss as you can see here to the left. *sigh... whew didn't know if I could make it through all that* Everybody still with me or was that too much??? If I bored you I'm sorry, I think this stuff is pretty interesting. So what does that have to do with me? Well those trees that resist the attack are super important. They are the trees we use for genetic improvement of the whole stand. Each year I go out and find white bark and western white pine trees that have indicators that they have survived and beat out pine attacks, such as the streams of hardened resin. I code and mark each individual tree then come back and cage as many of thier cones as I can to protect them from clarks nutcrackers (like the one here to the right) and all the squirley species that will eat the cones. A month or two later I go back and de-cage the cones and collect them to send off to the Forest Service Genetics Lab. There they look at the resistance factors and create genetically improved seed from which to grow new sapling to plant in areas that have been devistated by the pine beetle attacks. This kind of work is important for many reasons. Whitebark pine and western white pine forests are habitats used by many different species of critters, including grizzly bears and being as I'm a U of M grad and our mascot is the griz, I think we ought to keep them thriving don't you?

So what else do I do? Well last year we had a miserably hot and dry summer and so I spent a good 3 weeks to a month up in a guard tower watching for fire starts. Thats the tower I was in up on Star peak last year. It not much to look at but it served its purpose. I give a lot of credit to those guys in the old days that did that all summer long. It doesn't sound like a tricky job but it really is. Its amazing how tired your eyes get when looking out accross the forest through a pair of binoculars day after day. Its also kind of a lonely job. Sure you have radio check-ins with the dispatcher and call-ins for supplies and what not but thats not the same as having a nice conversation or even chit chatting with someone. Another problem is that at certain time of the day the clouds swirl in a way that look like it could be smoke. So you have to sit there and check and recheck until you are positive its just a cloud. It wasn't all bad though. I got to rough it for a while and eat out of a mess kit. Yes, thats right... I call that fun. Makes me think of camping. Plus the night sky up that high is amazing. Shooting stars all over the place, I started to learn my constellations since I brought one of my field guides with me that had those kind of charts in it. It was a peaceful and someone reflective time when I had the chance to let my eyes go back to normal.

Well I think that concludes my critter saga for a while. I'm sure I'll remember more and experience more things that I'll have to post on here. But for now this will do. Hope everyone is having a fabulous weekend. I'm going to go out and garden up a storm now. Hasta luego mis amigos.

What should be isn't

2008-08-12T19:52:00.002-06:00

I was going to continue with my critter saga today but found I just didn't have it in me. So sorry to those who were waiting on the edges of your seat for it. You'll have to bear with me and give me another day. My headache is going full swing and I actually spent most of the day sleeping. But now I have to go off to work and hope that my throbbing head abates a bit through the night. I'm sure its due to lack of decent sleep but hopefully I'll be back on days within the week and can get back to a normal sleep schedule. But until then be patient and the critter twitter post (part 2) will soon follow. Peace

Heck with Stranger Danger... Try Critter Twitter!!! (part 1)

2008-08-09T09:29:00.000-06:00

Since I don't talk to my friends and family every day, or with some even every month, when I finally to talk to them and they ask what I've been up to my mind seems to go blank. Its not that I've been doing nothing. No quite the contrary. Its that I've done so much that I don't even know where to begin. I work in a field that you switch from project to project and have about 20 things going at the same time that my focus from day to day switches. That also means that I need to be able to access the knowledge needed for a specific project just as fast. During the winter its a bit easier since I'm not out in the field nearly as much and I spend a lot of my days in the office going over all the data I collected in the summer. But while spring and summer field season are in full swing I feel like I'm going a mile a minute. So here is a little break down of some of the things I do. Yay... its Story Time with Tracy again!!!

One thing that I have going on, and one of the most exciting in my little book, it my monitoring project on a wolverine that we caught and collared last winter. Some of you already know the story but for those of you that don't... here ya go. Sometime before this past Christmas, I'm not exactly sure when anymore, we had a local come into the office and say that he was pretty sure he saw a wolverine cross the road up over Steven's Peak in front of his snow mobil. Now for those of you that don't know, wolverines dont usually just pop up out of no where, especially in the middle of the day. They are night time critters. But not only that, wolverines had never been known to exist in this part of the country. The closest one we knew about was up in the Yaak, just south of the Canadian boarder up in Troy District. And at that, that was a fairly recent occurance. Wolverines just didn't come down this far south in Montana. My boss was a bit skeptical about the whole story and thought that maybe it was a fisher or martin that crossed the road and the local was mistaken. But just to be sure Doug (the the big chief) and Steve (the second big cheif) told me to take the big diesal 4x4 powerstroke (thats the big guns in the winter) and check it out... and oh try not to get stuck in the 4 feet of snow on the way up. So after making sure the big boy green rig had chains in the box and a snow shovel in the back I made my way up to the peak. A couple hours later, and a glorious few dig outs to put the chains on those huge tires I got into the area. Low and behold the local was right. There were wolverine tracks crossing the road a couple times up there. So after straping on my trusty snow shoes, donning my gloves and hat, I took after the set of tracks that looked the freshest. The further I got from the road the more tracks showed up, and not only one set, but two. It was a mother wolverine and a kit that she, for some reason, didn't throw off for the winter. Finally it got too late and I headed back home to tell the office the news... it was a big deal. So after relaying the event so the big chiefs they decided that I was going to get ahold of a few of the biologists in the Fish and Wildlife service and see what they wanted to do about our little find. Thats when I met Ray Pederson, one of the carnivore kings with Montana FWS. Great guy I might add. After about a month of planning and everyone sending me back and forth up the peak to find where exactly the wolverine and her kit were denning (thank god for remote sensor night cameras), we set a day to capture and radio collar the adult wolverine. Now this truly was an experience for me. I got to be up close and personal with a critter most folks will never see in their lifetime. Ray darted her and I got to collar, record, and program all the gps settings because I was going to be the one monitoring her for the next few years and relaying the information to FWS. I'm happy to report she is healthy and still in the area, though I'm not exactly sure what happened to the kit. I think she finally threw it off this spring to make room for possible new kits. Big thanks goes out to Ray for forwarding the pics he took of the collaring since I didn't have any of my own.

The first project I usually start off the field season with is monitoring Northern Goshawks nests. If you are every interested in doing this yourself you need to invest in a good hard hat. Why? Well because when you happen to be in a nest area, the Norther Goshawk, particularly the male, is pretty damn protective. They dive bomb you with beak and claws at the ready. In our area the Goshawks are a species of special concern, so we are trying to monitor how many returning pairs we have return every year to nest and hopefully find some new pairs in the process since they seem to be moving into the area more and more. We go to each known nest site at least 4 times in a field season. The first time is to find a pair in last years next area and pin piont if they've moved and for what possible reason. The second and third times is to check on hachling success and the forth time is to check on fledgling success like the one over here on the left. Well he's more of a juvenile but you get the point. Its the last three times you really have to worry about being attacked. These birds are a pretty neat critter and have a really neat call if you like that shrill cross between and eagle scream and a crow caw. Once you hear it you'd never forget it. Well and the fact I have a caller that we use over and over to find the suckers. One of the neat things about the Goshawks is that they are an indicator species for the overall health of the forest they put their nests in, guess that means we are doing something right in those particular areas. Woo hoo, thats a switch.

Another bird project I get to do over the summer is one I absolutely love since it really beats the heat in June. Harlequin Ducks! Yeppers I said I get to work with some pretty niffty duck. Not only are the really pretty to look at they are fun to get near. This project entails me walking up and down some of the creeks that feed into the Clark Fork River in a set of hip wadders. Harlequin ducks are fast water ducks so you'll often find them in the rocky breaks on the creeks where whitewater starts to form. They nest next to the calm water pools though so you really have walk the whole creek to find them. This is usually best when done with too people walk the creek though. Usually you have one person start at the head of the creek just about where its wider than 3 feet, and the other person walks up from the bay side or the mouth. The only real dangers in this project is slipping on the river rock and getting a little wet, but then again thats how you beat the heat. Again we're monitoring hatchling sucess with this species because they are another indicator species of water habitat health. Its fun when you finally find a family of them and they are piddling around trying to teach the bambinos how to swim behind mama. Usually it involved a lot of baby quacking and flopping around near the shore until they finally get the courage to take the plunge.

In the interest of time, I'm going to have to make this a multi-part post. So I hope you enjoyed this segment and others will soon follow. Plenty of critters to go.

Gorgeous Scenery

2008-08-07T17:19:00.000-06:00

So what you might be asking, since there isn't much to do in the god forsaken middle of nowhere town, is why do I live here in Trout Creek. Trust me it isn't because of the two bottom of the line bars (boy do I miss the Rhino and Arriba) , post office, and country store that sells everything at about 200% mark up. No its definately not any of those. I does have to do with the job and the country though.

Most people probably wouldn't appreciate it as much as I do, especially those folks that have lived here their entire lives *cough MACE cough cough*. Its always been around them so they don't think about the beauty and wonder of it all the time. See coming from Cheyenne the surrounding area looks like this picture over here on the left. Now don't get me wrong. I love where I grew up. I loved feeling the wind (and there is plenty of it) blow against my ears when I would walk my dog in the praire above my house. I loved the sunsets and the rolling hills. I loved that you could see for miles over the waving long grasses. But my love for the forrest developed fairly young. My mom and dad tell stories of going camping with before I'd even turned 1. They plopped a box on the floor of the camper and made me a bed. As I got older, 4-5 yrs old, I couldn't wait till the spring and summer rolled around because it meant going up to the Snowies and camping for the weekends. It meant being in the woods. It meant hiking, chopping firewood, getting to shoot dad's .22, and cooking on the coleman stove. I still love the smell of white gas in the stove and lanturns. It meant playing cards with mom and dad when it was pooring rain out. It meant taking my dog and dumping her in the lake up at Lake Owen and Rob Roy. The woods held this special place in my heart and I wanted to be there as much as I possibly could get away with. The older I got the more I loved it too, since I was able to do more.

So once I had the career of my dreams working in the woods and working with criters how could I really complain. Well I still complain about Trout Creek itself but thats just a minor detail. The country is truly spectacular. One place that I've spent quite a bit of time in this past year has been the Cabinet Moutain Wilderness Area. This pic here on the right is the view from the other side of Freezout Creek up over Vermillion Pass. Actually Vermillion in general is where I've spent a great deal of time since thats the latest area for Old Growth Stand Exams. Basically that just entales going into specified stands and making sure they meet old growth criteria for protection. The forest in my district pretty much all burned out in the 1910 fire so we really don't have much for old growth and the Forest Service Forest Management Plan says that we should have at least 11% old growth forest for species habitat. HA HA HA... thats a joke. When you are dealing with a single story stand as the remainder of the forest I'd be shocked if we actually had 2% old growth. So what do we do about this? Well thats where I come in again and perform Common Stand Exams on "potential old growth" stands. Meaning I look for indicators in a stand that within the next 50 or so years that the stand would make suitable old growth habitat. If we have "potential old growth" that goes toward that 11% I was talking about earlier. I know I know... it seems kind of like a cheat but its the best we can do in a single story stand that evironmentalists wont let us thin and make at least multi-story. But I digress again here. The point was that the scenery actually is quite lovely even if it isn't the healthiest forest in the world. I see that as one of my goals. Making the forest healthier for the critters that live in it. Dad would be proud of that bit of forestry intellect I have in me.

The picture you see right above is another view of the Cabinet Mountains but from on top of Chicago Peak. I took this in the middle of May so you can tell we had a lot of snow over the winter and a late spring at that. In a lot of ways it made for a great year. I got to do a lot of winter work and hiked my buns off (unfortunately not literally... still have more buns that I'd like) with a set of well loved aluminum snow shoes. I keep thinking its a good thing that my field assistant didn't start work in Feb. He wouldn't have made it. I tried getting him to let me take a pic and put it on here but he didn't want his mug photographed. What is it with boys and pictures??? Sheesh. No worries I'll catch him before he leaves next week to head back to his final year at U of M. I have to say its been kind of fun having him around. We've had some of the same profs and he's basically taking the exact same set of courses I did my senior year... not all 22 credits but 17 of them. 22 WAS INSAINE!!! Having someone around to teach and train has been an interesting experience for me. It was really cool sharing knowlege that I've acrewed over the past couple years with someone so interested in learning it all. I told him he should reapply next year if I'm still up here and hiring. Besides if he can make it working here he can work anywhere. Even though Kyle was in great shape before starting this summer, the terrain was a challenge for him. There isn't much for trial work and everything is pretty much and up hill climb on 60 degree slopes since Trout Creek lies in a valley bottom. A couple weeks ago we hiked up to this little piece of heaven on the left called lovingly Devil's Gap by the locals. Its a series of shear rock outcrops and slides up to the top and runs about half the length of Martin Creek. I took this picture early last fall the last time I had to hike up to the top for something. The first time going up is always the hardest. After that you have a better idea of where the "mini-trials" are so its a hike rather than a climb all the way up. Anyway Kyle was an asset to the office and of course really nice having someone closer to my own age to tease in the field.

Anywho, thats enough from me for now. I'm going to go enjoy the weekend. Its Huckleberry Festival Y'all! Tootleloo.

I Vant to Suc Yur Bloood!!!

2008-08-06T11:13:00.000-06:00

Have you ever gotten scratched up by a Hoary Bat? No? Well you are truely missing out. Not really. During the summer field season I periodically have to go out and do bat monitoring for threatened bat species in the area. Its a way of making sure that the species are thriving throughout the season and making sure the youngins are getting enough food to eat. I know it doesn't sound glamorous but it actually is quite fun. To the left here is the Hoary Bat (Lasiurus cinerus)... by God I did learn something in college... LATIN!

A grad student I went to college with and one of my old professors developed a protocol for bat capture and recapture that I adopted and brought in my repetour when I came to work with for the Forest Service. I'm glad I did since some of the old school surveying they were doing was leading to bat injuries. Not good for threatened species right? So fixing that is great, but the only problem is it requires me to go out alone at o-dark-thrity with a pack full of ultra-light weight pvc type pipe that I build a harp trap out of and set up at the mouths of caves, mine shafts, and other creepy places that go bump in the night. The picture below is basically what the trap looks like. What you cant see very well is the vertical "harp" strings running from the top of the bar down to the bottom bar where the collection bag is.

Once the set up is complete the night is usually pretty calm until I hear a "sprong... flap flap flap.. scratch scratch... then silence" when a bat hits the harp section of the trap and rolls down into a canvas colleting bag at the bottom of the system. Then with head lamp on and heavy leather gloves donned I go about weighing, aging, marking for recapture, and sexing (get your mind out of the gutter) the critter and then letting it go. Sounds pretty straight forward right? Well most nights it is but last night one of the Hoary bats I caught was ticked off about something, struggled like a mad dog, and attacked me after I let it go. No biting but it landed back on my arm and scratched me up pretty good. Good thing my tetinus shots are up to date and I carry around a jug of rubbing alcohol swipes, antibiotic ointment, and of course bandaids. All in a nights work. Tell you what though, if I ever recatch that little sucker we're going to have some words.
So other than that, the night was pretty uneventful. Caught and marked over 250 bats in one sitting. Makes for a long night though. I leave the office to go out in the field at 7pm then dont usually get back til about 10 the next morning. I should be exhausted right? So why am I sitting here at 11:30 in the morning bloggin? Thats a very good question. Just can't seem to sleep during the day time. Its a good thing that I only go on this schedule for about a week at a time. Otherwise I'd probably be a zombie and cranky with everyone I knew. But I suppose that means I should wrap this up and give it the old college try anyway. Tootleloo

Time for a new blog

2008-08-05T19:36:00.000-06:00

Its been several years since I've had anything to do with blogging. I used to have a livejournal account but decided to forgo writting in it weekly to actually try to pull off decent grades in college and spend that time studying. Who would have thunk it. So when my friend Kati decided to up and travel the world and start and new blog for her new chapter in her life I figured what the hell... I might as well too. So big props to you K-bug for getting me started again.