Travels along the Missouri River; Sioux City and Saint Louis

Back in January I traveled to South Sioux City to attend a technical team meeting regarding restoration of the Missouri River.  I stayed in a very lovely hotel with an excellent view of the river out my window, which picture I can’t locate at the moment.  But the best part of the trip is that Laura and Tristan and  the parents and little Sophie came to visit.  I hadn’t seen them since August so to have them all stay over night was very exciting.  We had a very nice meal in the hotel restaurant, although Sophie would have much prefered McDonald’s, where you only have a 5 or10 minute wait for your food and you didn’t have to wait an hour for the grown ups to get done talking and eating.  Sophie did like the pool though as did Tristan.  It was Tristan’s first offical swimming pool adventure and both his and Sophie’s first hotel stay.  Sophie enjoyed the hotel much more than Tristan did, who really just wanted to be sleeping in his own little beddie back home.

Grampa/Great Grampa, Tristan, and Sophie

I know EXACTLY how both Goldielocks and Dorothy felt--there's no beddie like home!

Tristan and Mommy

This last week I represented the Tribes at another Missouri River meeting in Saint Louis.  The meeting went very well and I felt like I earned my keep as an employee.  I also had a great time outside of the meeting by eating well and attending some local live music venues.  And of course going to the top of the Arch.

The Arch

Saint Louis is also called the “Gateway City” and was considered the gateway to the West.  You can learn more about Saint Louis and the Arch here: http://www.gatewayarch.com/Arch/info/arch.fact.aspx  Fellow meeting attendees Russel and Elizabeth and I rode the scary little enclosed trolley car all the way to the top of the Arch, after first checking it out from the amazing view point of Steve’s office.

Looking east towards the Arch: Russel, Jeanne, and Elizabeth

Elizabeth and Russel looking out over Saint Louis from the top of the Arch

Not only does Saint Louis have the supper cool Arch, it also has very tastey places to eat and live music every night of the week.  Wednesday night Russel, Steve, and I had supper at the Broadway Oyster Bar (http://www.broadwayoysterbar.com/) where we feasted on oysters on the shell, oyster shooters (raw oysters, vodka, and tomato juice), gumbo ya ya (with okra, Cajun sausage, rice, and other yummy things), red beans and rice, corn bread, and crawdaddy etouffee.  I wish I had taken a picture of the place as it was very charming.  Steve did take a couple so when he sends them to me I’ll put them in here for you to see.  They had a singer who was pretty good but it was standing room only so we headed down the street to BB’s Jazz, Blues, and Soup ( http://www.bbsjazzbluessoups.com/), a cozy little blues club in the Soulard district with a very long and interesting history as place of entertainment.  According to the website, its been everything from a home, boarding house, reception hall, merchantile, millinery, transient hotel, bar, diner, to a House of Ill Repute with 37 rooms between its 2nd and 3rd floors.  We stayed on the first floor and listened to Big Dave and the Marquises.  Steve lives in Saint Louis and was very generous in sharing his knowledge of the history of the area as well as the best places to check out.  In addition, Russel and Steve have been friends for years and both have a lot of cool stories to share so it was a fun evening to say the least.

Russel and Steve

Thursday night Elizabeth and I decided to partake of some Irish food and music at John D. McGurk’s (http://www.mcgurks.com/).   Elizabeth ordered the cornbeef and cabbage and I had the Irish stew in a bread bowl. Both were delicious although I always forget when I am ordering that Irish food really just taste like Mom’s cooking. So when it gets there I’m always a bit disapointed that it isn’t anything new to my tastebuds.  Mom’s Grandma’s family came from County Cork, Ireland back in the late 1800’s.  After supper and a shared dessert of Bailey’s cheesecake we stepped into the next room to listen to the band, which was visiting from the Old Country herself.  I was too chicken to want to use the flash so the pictures are a bit red.

McGurk's Irish Pub

The band was good but the patrons were so noisy we could barely hear the music.  I would think that would be frustrating for the band but they didn’t seem to mind.  Next we aimed for a drag show but kept missing our exit.  We were only on the interstate for 2 miles so I can’t figure out why we couldn’t find that darn exit. After circling the city twice, and missing the exit twice, we gave up and went back to BB’s where we listened to Rough Grove.  Since we both had to get up early (the shuttle picked me up for the airport at 4 am) we sadly headed back to the Hotel at midnight.

I definately had a great time in Saint Louis (I <3 St Louie!) but man, did the trip home suck!  My flight was suppose to leave at 6 am, having me back home by noon. All 3 of my flights ended up having some kind of mechanic issue with the plane, stretching my return trip out by an additional 11 hours.  Talk about a long day!  But all in all it was a great trip, both work and pleasure wise, and I can’t wait to go back!

The Big 4-5

I had a most excellent birthday this year.  Not only did I enjoy birthday wishes via the USPO and by phone but Elizabeth and Mariah took me out for breakfast.  Then Doug stopped by for a nice visit.  And then I headed over to Park Grove to pick up Dixie to go for lunch at Sam’s. On the way over we observed the coolest thing ever–an eagle trying to catch a pheasant!  And we got it on video!  I had hoped to put it on here for you to enjoy too but apparently it cost ~ $60/yr to add videos to my blog.  BUMMER!  So you will just have to take my word that it was cool, especially when the pheasant charge the eagle, making it fall over backward hehe.  After that the eagle flew away hungry.

After lunch we drove to Patricia’s for a little snowshoe excursion.  It was pretty cold out but shoeing over those drifts had us warmed up in no time.

Patricia and Dixie

Sadie (dog) Dixie, Patricia (kneeling), Jeanne

Jeanne and Patricia

All that snowshoeing worked up and appetite so we went out for supper too.  Patricia’s boyfriend Wade joined us at the local watering hole.

Dixie, Patricia, Jeanne, and Wade

See the amazing handcrafted gifts they surprised me with?  Dixie made the candleabra out of Missouri River diamond willow, set it in a piece of sandstone from her backyard fountain (which she also created), and with beeswax candles her and Katie handmade.  Next to it is the coolest little lamp that Patricia made also out of diamond willow and  antlers, with turquoise, brachiopod, and crinoids inlaid around  the base.  I have very talented friends, don’t you agree?  Here’s a close up for you:

Diamond willow candleabra and lamp

It was a wonderful day of family and friends.

Wow, once again I didn’t realize it had been so long since I posted.  I’ve been keeping pretty busy since I last wrote but there isn’t anything too exciting going on.  We did  move 20 miles, to the town where I work and where Mariah goes to school.  Seems like that process took all freakin fall as I have way too much junk!  Mariah and ELizabeth both quit their jobs in the old town and got better ones in our new town.  Lets see, Mariah was in the school play called “Oh horrors, Murder!”, I  traded the CRV for a GMC Canyon 4×4, Elizabeth, Mariah and I met Jill over at the cabin for Thanksgiving, and I just spent Saturday over at Patricia’s making jelly with her, Dixie, Diana, and Katie.   Now of course I’m busy trying to get ready for Christmas by making wild plum jelly, cinnamon popcorn, and wrapping presents.  Oh yeah, and trying to figure out if we can actually GET to Iowa this year for Christmas!  It’s not sounding good, since theres a big storm brewing and we can’t leave before Wednesday morning due to work and school schedules.  So, for the first year in my whole entire life (we’ll say 39 yrs, give or take a few )I will not be spending Christmas with the entire family.  In fact, I think it will only be about the 2nd time that I can remember not waking up Christmas morning at my parents.  But, weather permitting, we will leave bright and early on the 26th and be there sometime the 27th.

Here’s a few pictures for your enjoyment:

MY Christmas tumbleweed

This year we, or shall I say “I”, have a Christmas tumble weed.  I think it looks cool but Mariah and Elizabeth had their hearts set on a nice GREEN tree.  They politely declined my invitation to decorate the tumbleweed with Doug and I.  Oh well, it must be an acquired taste….

 

Doug fixing my washing machine hookups in the 'new' house. Handsome and handy, what a guy!

I don't think you're holding your mouth right...

Jill and I splitting wood at the cabin.  We did just fine after we got the kinks worked out.

I'm not sure thats the right way to hold your mouth either.....

 

Our version of camping always involves alot of reading and game playing by candle light.

 

Cool digs in Philipsburg

If you haven’t ever been to Philipsburg MT, you should check it out.  Cool little town with some interesting houses, tastey eating spots,  and nifty second hand/junk shops.  There’s also a two story house made out of cord wood.  I wanna build a house out of cord wood too!

Our traditional "end of camp" breakfast in town right before hitting the highway home

The "girls" making jelly at Patricia's meat shop

Some of the final product

Mariah, Ivy, and Jacoby in the school play "Oh horrors, it's murder!"

 That’s probably about enough for today.  I’ll TRY to do better in keeping up with this.  Merry Christmas everyone!

Berry picking, crashing Liz, Montana rednecks

WOW!  I knew I was behind on my blogs but didn’t realize it had been quite so long.  I have several things to tell you about today so I’ll start with the most current and work my way back.  Elizabeth gets out of the hospital today, FINALLY, after spending 4 days “sleeping” in Intensive Care followed by 4 days on a regular floor. 

WTF?! you say?  How did this come about?!! Well, it seems Ms Wiz (when they were little her older sister couldn’t say “Elizabeth” and called her “WIZbef” ) likes to drive fast on gravel roads.  We believe TEXTING played a major role as well. Anyway, last Monday Elizabeth lost control on the gravel about a mile from home, bounced her car off the side of a telephone pole, sailed over a fence, and rolled her car, not necessarily in order.  From there she was ambulanced to the local hospital where the LIFE FLIGHT was waiting to take her to Des Moines.

Elizabeth’s new to her 2001 Mercury Sable, which she LOVED and had for about a whole 2, 2 1/2 weeks before the crash.  It now looks like this:

It’s a wonder she is alive AND expected to recover completely.  At first the drs were telling us to expect a month long hospital stay, followed by inpatient rehab, and a 50% chance of regaining fine motor skills in her left side.  Thanksfully we are looking at full recovery after only 8 days in the hospital to be followed with 3-5 weeks of outpatient occupational rehab and absolutely no fine moter inpairment.We’re headed back to MT as soon as we can get her stuff packed up so that we can get therapy started ASAP. 

Prior Elizabeth’s little crash adventure Mariah and I met the parents and neice/cousin Ravyn back in late July over by Helena to spend a couple days in a Forest Service cabin on their way to Washington to see my aunt and uncle.  Elizabeth stayed at home to finish up her summer college classes and to work.

On our way back home Mariah and I met my friend Nancy to do a little huckleberry picking:

For those of you not familiar with huckleberries, they are DELIC!  Kinda like a sassy blueberry only better.  We also picked what we thought were early elderberries but in fact were POISONOUS pokeberries.  We wondered why these “elderberries” were ripe when the others weren’t:

Again, these are POISONOUS pokeberries–you can tell by the red stems.  Sure are pretty though and can be used to make dye.

Once back home Elizabeth, Mariah, and I picked black currents (similar to gooseberries), chokecherries, and after Elizabeth was moved to Iowa Mariah and I picked wild plums back on the rez.  So far all we have gotten done is the picking and freezing, so there will be lots of  jam, jelly, sauce, and wine making going on this fall.  We usually had at least one dog along on each picking adventure and both Sadie and Lola got some mean berry pickin skills–they could gobble them off the bush almost as fast we could pick!

(Black currents above)

Early August Elizabeth and met Uncle John down in WY so that our beloved Bruce (Great Pyraneeze) can keep John company while he is ’stationed’ in Vail.  We miss Bruce but know that they make a good pair and keep each other out of trouble lol, plus it is hard to work with 3 pups (Bruce, Lola, and Sadie) all at once:

In early/mid August I  took Elizabeth back to Iowa to live with the grandparents and attend college.  Mariah was already there since she road back with them on their way home from WA state.  While there we got in some Tristan squeezin of course.

Tristan and Astrid

A couple weeks ago I went over to Patricia’s to celebrate her 35th birthday complete with guns, bbq elk burgers, birthday cake and of course beer.  Patricia just moved in to a sweet little 20 acre spread complete with house, cool chicken house with below ground level floor, a butcher shop set up, and several other outbuildings.  Its only about 6 miles from Fort Peck town and lake and everytime I go over I drive past multiple deer and antelope.  I am very apprecitve of her good fortune to say the least!

About a mile from Patricia's--too cool!

Me and my .20 over/under Mossberg shotgun

Birthday party Montana redneck style

Well, I think that pretty much catches me up for now.  If we get back before Saturday I have a bird hunting clinic to attend over in Glasgow that I’ll tell you about and I’ll try to get back to regular posting too.  Hope you had a great Labor Day weekend and EMAIL me sometime!

Bowdoin NWR, hard core birders

Earlier this week Mariah, her Jack Russel terrier Lola, and myself  attended a Montana Bird Conservation Partnership meeting over at Malta.  This was my first involvement with the Partnership and was happy to make new acquaintences as well as catch up with some people I already knew.  One of the field trips was over to Bowdoin NWR, which is one of the other places in MT where Franklin’s gulls have a nesting colony (Bowdoin, Redrock Lakes, Manning Lake, I think there are 2 others but can’t think where at the moment).  So I was quite interested in checking it out.  Lake Bowdoin appears to have  much more open water and shoreline than Manning Lake but I’m not sure what the exact difference in size is. 

Lake Bowdoin

Since it was a bird meeting, the other attendees included some hard core birders.  I love going to such meetings cause you always meet the most interesting people and can really learn alot.  On the flip side, I usually feel a slight complex developing as I am such a new comer to the exciting world of professional biologist.  Ok, maybe not really a complex, but I do feel pretty humble and facinated by their skills and knowledge.  Check out these cool scopes and cameras!

This is Christy.  She works with loons over in NW Montana.

Dear Santa, I have been a very very good girl. Please bring me one of these....

This scope made it seem like you were right next to these birds opposed to having to use the zoom on my nice little camera that still had you this far away:

Franklin's gulls just a hangin out enjoying the evening.

Well, I have to get back to packing as Mariah, Lola, and I leave bright and early tomorrow morning to meet the parents and niece Ravyn over by Gates to the Mountains.  I also have directions to some prime huckleberry spots a bit farther north and west so will hopefully have some pictures to share with you when I get back.  But before I shut down, here is a picture of a cool piece of drift wood and an interesting black rock I drug home last night from Crystal and I’s usual harvest recon trip and one of a piece of beaver jaw that I found tonight down at the river with Elizabeth and the dogs:

 

Way cool, huh?!

Cool birding blog site for you to check out:

 

John Carlson has an amazing blog that you have just got to check out.  He is the one of the guys that lead the birding canoe trip tour that I talked about a month or so ago.  Now I will have to dress up my spot…..

http://prairieice.blogspot.com/

Surviving without my kids continued….. and Drew’s Custom Saddles = scammers

Hey, I did get a  picture of that black and white checked dragonfly so be sure to go check it out on the previous blog.  My handy dandy summer intern Marly looked it up for me and identified it as a 12 spotted dragonfly.  Thanks Marly!  And Laurie hooked me up with a couple float pics too–thanks Laurie!

SUNDAY:

Yes, we did get lucky and the meat soup had dried meat, potatoes, and wild turnips in it.  The other 3 pots were there too–wild mint tea, fry bread, and choke cherry soup/pudding. There was also baked tongue, bbq chicken, buffalo roast, beef roast, grilled hotdogs, baked beans, several pasta salads, fruit salad, many different kinds of chips, strawberry pie, and Crystal’s cupcakes.  There were about 20-ish people there but enough food for at least 50. At Indian get togethers it is expected that there will be way too much food and the guests are expected to take food home.  The guests are also given gifts in thanks for sharing the occasion with the hosts.  I was honored with a nice set of tea towels, a red bandana, a cell phone size pendleton-style purse, and a gorgeous beaded medallion necklace.  The other guests recieved just as cool of gifts.

I wish I could show you pictures of the ceremony itself, but pictures are not allowed due to the sacredness of the occasion.  In fact, the “bride” stressed to me that it was not a “wedding” but a union.  Being married the Indian way means it is a union for the life of both partners–no remarriage for any reason, including the death of the partner.  I am told that a Christian marriage is not recognized by the ancestors on the other side, that an Indian ceremony is required for the union to be valid.  I also can’t go into details of the ceremony but I can tell you that the couple wore beautifully beaded moccasins, the groom a ribbon shirt and print vest, and the bride a ribbon dress with a wide leather belt and beaded buckle.  The ceremony was outside and the couple stood on a buffalo robe in front of a tipi.  There were prayers in Lakota and singing accompanied by a hand drum.  The spiritual leader explained to  friends and family the importance and significance of the ceremony.  There was no exchange of vows.  It was very beautiful and intimate.

MONDAY:  I was suppose to meet Dixie at Fort Peck lake to try out my new-to-me inflatable kayak but just as I pulled into town I could see lightening strikes over the water. So instead we had a beer and split a BLT at the local hangout before going on  a short drive around the lake to watch the storm.  Then we headed back to Dixie’s to throw some steaks on her fire pit and enjoy her back yard.  Talk about an AMAZING yard!  Everwhere you looked there were flower and garden beds, with several fountains, all surrounded by large flat rocks.  It was very lush looking and had interesting pots and planters, all rescued from various places where they had been abandoned.  She also had a screen tent sent up with the floor covered in sand to hold it down and make it feel like the beach.  We sat in the tent and ate sushi off of little black ceramic plates that Dixie made herself.  Every where you look there are piles of antlers that Dixie either harvested or gathered, petrified bison skulls that she dug up out of the river, or heaps of petrified bison teeth.  Its like a combination of a museum and the botanical center all in one but even better! Dixie doesn’t consider herself an artist but she did all this her self!  I wish I had had my camera with me but we’ll see if this cell phone picture will give you an idea:

~Dixie’s yard~ 

The steaks were cooked over a wood fire and were excellent!  We also had veggies cooked in foil over the coals and a  double chocolate cheesecake that I picked up on the way.  Dixie’s teenage son ate with us.  By the time we finished eating and I drove home it was bedtime.  No walk for the dogs tonight.

TUESDAY:  Another rainy day but it cleared up before work was done. Things came to head today with the woman that had asked to keep her 5 horses in the little pasture I rent out behind my house.  She had asked if she could keep them there, and use our water and hose, for a couple of weeks.  After about FOUR weeks she still hadn’t moved them nor produced the leather work that she said she would trade for being able to keep them there. Her husband is starting up a leather business in town and has very nice work.  The horses had eaten everything in the tiny ~3 acre pasture plus broke into our shed and ate 10 bales of last year’s less than premium hay.  So Iwas planning on calling her this morning to tell her it was past time to move them elsewhere–you can even see their ribs now.  But when I got up this morning and saw that she had moved a BIG ROUND BALE into the pasture, I KNEW it time to call her for sure. She of course tried to make ME feel guilty, gave every excuse in the book, and then when that didn’t work, called me back to say they were moved and that she hoped I felt powerful cause I almost made her lose her job today.  Hmmmm, at no time did she admit that she was taking advantage of the situation by trying to keep them for at least 30 days beyond the agreement and without honoring the agreement in anyway.  When I didn’t back down the crazy bitch yelled that she didn’t ever want to see me again and for me to never call her again–like we had ever been friends or something?!  I had only met her once lmao.  Laura told me I should have known better as Drew still owes her a leather purse from her spending a couple weeks creating his website.  He quite taking or returning her calls after it was finished.  So, if any locals read this, do NOT do business with Drew and/or Julie Acheson of Drew’s Custom Saddles in Wolf Point MT as they are Scammers and crazy to boot. OMG, I just checked the website that Laura worked so hard on–it now has JULIE down as the webdesigner!  Exact same website with no changes what so ever except for that name.  Scammers for sure!!!

The day improved after work though as Crystal and I went berry picking again.  We spent about 3 hours and were rewarded with a nice amount of berries. 

crazy ol ladies pickin june berries

 

We also had a blast and got quite silly:

Silly ol ladies eatin berries off the bush

It was after dark when I got home and the po’ ol dogs didn’t get to the river yet again.

WEDNESDAY:  Another work day.  Crystal called to see if I wanted to go pick sage.  I told her the dogs thought they were being horribly neglected so I needed to get them to the river and do some work around the house.  That was the plan, really, I swear.  Another friend called during the drive home to offer to come rivet the canoe seat back where it belonged.  We ended up eating McDonalds out front of the house in the lawn chairs and catching up on Tribal gossip, along with fixing the canoe.  Then I had to bring out my pretty little .20 guage and the next thing we knew we were down at the shooting range taking turns throwing clay pigeons for the other to shoot.  After that we took a “quick” scenic drive down by the irrigation ditch to look for deer and lightening bugs (lots of deer, maybe a couple lightening bugs). Lola went with while the other 3 dogs pouted, with good reason. It was a very nice way to spend the evening.  The rest of the dogs missed yet another night of the river though.  I told them tomorrow for sure and I’m sure that they will make me pay for our missed nights by being very wild when we do finally get there.  Oh well…. 

The girls get back home tomorrow.  I’m not sure if I can say the experiement was successful or not–I wasn’t home long enough to have a chance to get bored or loney.  But maybe that’s the point-you can always find plenty to do if you want to.  Either way, I’ll be glad to see my girls again.

Remember–boycott  the scammers!

Surviving without my kids…..

Wow, I am REALLY behind on blogs!  I have 3 half done ones sitting in my draft section right now but you will just have to wait for those cause I’m gonna go ahead and write about my great experiment of “baching” it.  Elizabeth and Mariah are in Nashville at a FCCLA (pretty much what we always called home ec) conference for a whole week.  I decided that this is the perfect time to do a trial run of being completely on my own as Elizabeth leaves for college in about a month and Mariah will soon follow her the summer of ‘11 (that will be here in like 2 months!).  I have been whining around off and on for a couple weeks thinking how much I will miss them both (remember Mariah will still be here for 2 years…) and how pathetically lonely I will be, and on and on, even though I am excited for them and know that I will be just fine.  It will just be a change for all of us and a new chapter in our lives. So, anyway, my hypothesis at the beginning of the week (they left 3 am Thursday) was that  I will do just fine of course, will be lonely of an evening, and will get a lot of stuff done around the house.  Here’s how the week is coming so far:

THURSDAY:  Dropped girls off at school at 3 am. This was a very short night as some guy was ringing our bell at 11:00 asking me to call the cops to come and pick him up.  5 minutes later he was knocking and very polietly asking if I had called them and was I sure they knew the address (booze did not appear to be involved).  I don’t know if they ever came or not but he paced at the top of the drive for about an hour, which kept the dogs barking off and on since the crunch of his feet on the rocks was very loud at that time of night.  Went back to bed, got up and went to work, the usual stuff.  But after work:

Today is the start of the Wild Horse Stampede Rodeo, THE biggest social event of the whole year in this neck of the prairie.  Supposedly there will 20,000 people show up over the 3 day event to partake in it’s pleasures, which include a good size carnival, 3 days of rodeo with REAL cowboys/girls, a good sized parade 2 days in a row, cowboy church, street dance, art in the part, etc, etc.  And all this goes on between 2 and 3 miles from my house.  Its the first year its started on Thursday but there’s a huge rodeo up in Calgary so they are starting this one early to give the cowboys plenty of travel time between the two.  So anyway, Vina and I ate at the Chinese restaurant (very tasty) and then went to opening night at the rodeo.  It was good.  Small crowd due to it being Thursday.  The cowgirls/boys put on a good show, almost as good as the show put on by the border collies being ridden by monkeys while herding rams with big ol horns.  But the best is the actual wild horse stampede.  This involves 6 or 7  teams of 3 crazy, um, brave cowboys and 1 wild horse per team.  The horse is let out and bucks and carries on like crazy while the cowboy designated as the “mother” grabs on to the horse’s head and hangs on for dear life while trying to bite its ear (for some reason this makes the horse stand still, go figure).  The other two quickly try to saddle it and then the rider jumps on, rides a certain distance, jumps off, they rip off the saddle and run back to the chute to win. This is great fun to watch, can make betters a nice chunk of change, and often ends with bloody and bruised cowboys.  PETA members no worries–the horses get the better end of the deal.  I wish I had pictures to share but I forgot to take the camera. 

After the rodeo we went up town and wandered around the street dance.  Beings it was a Thursday it was not as wild or crowded as in year’s past.  After about an hour we headed home (no we didn’t drink or dance–work tomorrow remember?).  When I got home I discovered that Sadie, who was tied up to Lola’s dog house since the ‘electric’ dog fence was malfunctioning, had gotten within chewing distance of a pair of brand new $40 TEVA sandles.  Whoops, glad they aren’t mine……

FRIDAY: Work as usual.  Then came the exciting news!  Since the Tribal Chairman is the Grand Marshal of the parade the Tribes are shutting down at 1:00!  Whoo hoo!  Our office has 2 floats in the parade (theme:  Cowboys Hawaian holiday) but I headed home to get some work done.  But then Vina (our environmental educator) called and talked me into riding in the truck with her as she pulled her float.  It was very cool with a fancy water fall with bright blue water (toilet bowl cleaner). It was kinda boring to be in the actual parade though, especially since this seemed to be the grandaddy of small town  parades!  I’ll see if I can find some pictures when I get back to the office so you can see too. Laurie shared a couple pics with me.  The first one of is of her (frilly skirt) and Sandie riding their float.  Thanks Laurie!

Water quality program's float

 

Front of Vina's float.

After the parade I did go home, take the dogs to the river, then do some work around the house.  I was not bored nor lonely.

SATURDAY: 

Crystal called me yesterday during the parade to tell me the June berries are ready to pick.  So we made arrangements to go first thing this morning.  For us first thing meant by 8:30 (I live 20 miles away). June berries are very big deal here on the rez and are one of THE most traditional foods.  Made into a berry pudding or soup, they are found at all the best powwows/ceremonies/social events.  Crystal likes to keep some in her freezer ready for the next inevitable funeral (in Iowa you take a ham to the family, here you take June berries).  I plan on making jam while  keeping a few back for cultural emergencies.  

 We spent a couple hours picking and each got a good gallon or so.  Mariah’s little Jack Russel terrier came along for the ride and to ward off any bobcats lurking in the berry patch.  Next we headed out to a secret location where I thought I had seen some wild mint (another important cultural mainstay) for making tea.  On the way we stopped at B&S Laundry for a couple of their most excellent cheeseburgers. Its the most interesting place–a laundry mat/movie rental/grill combination with 1 table and 2 chairs and the MOST bestest hamburgers this side of the state.

The mint turned out to be some stinky kind of mint but not tea making kind, damn it anyway. We consoled our selves by picking a good supply of soldier sage (another cultural mainstay) and avoiding the pissed off cattle that had just recently been shut up in this part of the range unit, appearantly against their will.  We also stopped at my favorite fishing spot where we whiled away a good hour trying to catch a pair of really cool black and white checked dragon flies on film.  Don’t think we ever got them but if we did I’ll put a picture up right here:

Twelve-spotted dragonfly

By this time we are about dehydrated and wiped out even though we brought water along.  So we made a drink run for waters, cups of ice, and my very favorite lime and chili almonds (Blue Diamond brand-you gotta try them!)  By now we’re a good 50 miles from my house so we started heading back.  We had planned on harvesting some willow shoots for baskets and yucca roots for shampoo but we were too tired, and besides, we have no idea how many roots we need to make the shampoo yet anyway.  We’ll be out picking berries again later this week so we’ll do some research and harvest the willow and yucca then.

On our way back to town we decided to stop and visit our friend Helen and ask her about that mint.  We found Helen busily getting ready for her traditional wedding ceremony to be held tomorrow.  Helen and her husband have been married for over 30 years but decided to celebrate their lives together with a traditional ceremony.  Such a ceremony requires a lot of sage, which they hadn’t had time to pick yet.  We told her to come out to the truck and loaded her up.  Crystal is will be bringing a couple cakes tomorrow as well and I said I would cook a bison roast to bring. There will be traditional foods served:  the four pots, which will are mint tea, fry bread, berry “soup”, and meat soup.  If we’re lucky the meat soup will be dried buffalo with corn and wild turnips–cross your fingers for us!  After this we ran back to our sage harvesting spot to restock, then headed back to town for real.

After I got home I took the dogs to the river, de-ticked, took a shower and now here I am: writing this blog while listening to Sirius blues channel, drinking a plastic cup full of Happy Camper wine, and eating some more chile lime almonds and breaded mozzarella cheese sticks. Its almost midnight and MAN am I tired, but definitely not bored or lonely.  But I do very much enjoy Elizabeth’s nightly call xoxoxox.

Stay tuned for the rest of the week’s adventures: the traditional wedding ceremony tomorrow, kayaking with Dixie on Monday, more berry picking with Crystal on Tuesday and who knows what on Wednesday.  While this has been a unusually entertaining week so far, its looking like I will manage just fine when I am childless.  But just in case maybe I should keep my eye out for a potential side kick.  After all, I do have 2 years to weed out the riffraff…..

 

Trainings on the Blackfeet Rez and at Red Rocks NWR

Last week (June 7) I did a little traveling to NW and SW Montana for some trainings.  First I went to the Flatiron Ranch just outside of Browning over on the Blackfeet Reservation (http://www.blackfeetcountry.com/). I spent 2 days there soaking up mountain air and getting snowed on while training with the Montana Natural Heritage Program on wetland assessment and plant collection and id protocol.  Here’s the view from the training center (old farm house):

The 1,160-acre ranch, home to grizzly, elk, and other animals held in reverence by the Blackfeet, was purchased in 2000 by the Nature Conservancy (before that it was owned by some famous western sculptor whose name I will have to ask again).  Ownership was then transferred to the first Indian land trust in the nation: the Blackfeet Indian Land Conservation Trust. The ranch is also being used as an education center, where Indians and non-Indians can come to learn about the biological and cultural heritage of the land. The ranch hosts camps for young people to learn about native plants, water quality, the land’s natural history and the culture of the Blackfeet (taken from page 11 of http://www.insightcced.org/uploads/assets/Stainbrook_Chris/LIT_ILTF.pdf).  I could very happily live there.

                                                          

This is the old chicken house but what I'm really wanting you to notice is that it is SNOWING

The group

My fellow “trainees”  were from other state and tribal wetland programs.                                              

Soon upon our arrival, our group was “adopted” by this very nice, friendly, but in serious need of rescue pooch:

She was very skinny, couldn’t hear, and was so wooly in the back end that she could hardly walk (looked like someone had attempted to do a rough shear job on her leaving her back kinda scabby). We fed her well for two days, let her sleep in the main building with us out of the wet and cold even though she stunk to high heavens, and collected over $100 toward getting her shots and sheared.  One of the Natural Heritage biologist is taking her back to live with her and her other pets in Helena.  Pretty sure she would have soon been a dead doggy if left to fend for herself.

UPDATE:  “Poochy” turns out to be female, almost completely deaf, and about 7-8 yrs old.  She is now very happily living in Helena and enjoying her new look and her new fellow pets.  She is currently trying out new names before she selects one.  Being deaf she isn’t too chosey….

All cleaned up and lovin life!

I accidently stuck the following pictures too close together to write under each one so will have to improvise.  The next picture is off some moose scat (poop) that was thick in the fen outside the main building. I was disapointed that we did not see the actual moose though.   We also found what we are sure was bear scat.  The second picture is of some mountain flowers and the last picture in this group is of me standing next to a mountain creek whose name I do not know.

From here I went to Red Rocks Nat’l Wildlife Refuge over in the general Yellowstone area (by Lima MT) to help count white-faced ibis nests.  Mariah joined me for this part of the trip.  On the LONG drive we snapped a few pics of some wildlife that I haven’t already shown you in previous posts:

Twin fawns

Elk

The elk were THICK!  Our first sighting was of  herd of that had to be close to 25 animal–we were sure it was an elk farm but nope, just good habitat.  Pretend this picture is of better quality than it is:

More elk...

We finally arrived at Red Rock NWR about 10:30pm after driving down 27 miles of gravel in the dark. It was great!  I could happily live here too.

We spent 3 nights “camping” in this cool retro trailer that came with a mountian view and babbling creek right outside the door.  It  was hooked up for electricity and had water/bathroom capabilities although they weren’t hooked up.  We were just down the road from the bunkhouse though so we cooked and used the facilities (including washer/dryer–very nice!) there.

I want one of these when I grow up!

We saw this cow moose and calf out our camper window one evening:

Moose and calf

The bunkhouse was very nice.  Along with the usual living room and kitchen it boasted 5 bedrooms with bunkbeds, 2 closet sized shower rooms, 2 bathrooms (1 with a shower), laundry “room”, and 2 mudrooms/porches.  I think they said that there were a total of 10 interns living IN the bunkhouse with several other people living in assorted trailers and houses surounding the bunkhouse and using the facitilities.  It was a very cool group of students all with VERY interesting projects that center around cool animals such as beavers or shorebirds.  I wish I had a complete list of the projects to share with you but just take my word–they are very very cool projects. Friday afternoons they all get together for bunk house cleaning while Jeff, the refuge biologist, bakes a big batch of his special chocolate chip/peanutbutter cookies or brownies, then they have project presentations while enjoying  the fruits of Jeff’s baking.  The Friday we were there the presentations were about the success rate of trumpter swan relocation and how to band white-faced ibis chicks–educational and entertaining!  Jeff was also generous enough to gift Mariah and I with a package of elk steak which we feasted on for the next 3 meals.

Ok, back to what Mariah and I were doing there.  Jeff was nice enough to invite me to come over and help with their white-faced ibis and Franklin’s gull nest counts.  I have these same birds on my refuge but have had a heck of a time trying to figure out the best way to do the counts due to the thickness of the vegetation in our nesting colony.  Plus you have to time the counts JUST right as if you go to early you risk distrubing incubation or causing too young of chicks to jump in the water (they can swim but not always find their way back if still too young). If you’re too late in the nesting season you run the risk of the water being too low to canoe out to the colony and the bullrush being too high for easy access and the mud too deep, or that the nesting platforms will be too decomposed to be able to locate. These gulls are considered species of concern in Montana and there are only 5 known nesting colonies in the state.  My trusty intern Marly took the following pics at our project site while dodging poop bombs (don’t tell her but one those bombs got her with a  direct hit!):

Franklin's gull colony, Manning Lake Tribal Wildlife Refuge

Franklin's gull close up

Franklin's gull chick

 Back to Red Rocks though.  Due the weather being cold and nasty, which makes it hard to paddle a canoe, we did not get to survey the Frankin’s colony.  However, we did spend 2 afternoons  in the white-faced ibis colony, also a species of concern in Montana.  We counted about 60 nests here compared to our 3 or 4 nests back in our neck of the prairie.

White-faced ibis (standing), Frankin's gull (flying), yellow-headed black bird (perched)

 One of the volunteers got a couple shots of ibis chicks.  She has promised to send me a copy so I’ll put that in here when I get it.  Probably it would speed things up a little if I actually got around to sending her the pictures that I promised too.

                                               ~ white-faced ibis chick pic to go here~

 

Volunteers Pat and Kathy, Red Rocks biologist Jeff

 

Red Rocks biologist Jeff, princess volunteer Mariah-hontas, and intern Chris

Ahhh, this is the life!

While doing the ibis nest counts we also ran across American coot and various duck nests.  The duck nests are hard to find and hard to tell apart as they hid them well and keep them covered to boot.  Here is a picture of Gina (Red Rocks’ summer intern) candleing an egg to check for fertility and incubation stage:

Gina candleing a duck egg

Mariah and I were sure that I need such a might fine candler for my project, so we were excited to find out that it is simply a piece of radiator hose–how cool is that?!.  Now all we have to do is find on old raditor hose of our own!  If you have one laying around that you could spare a piece of please let me know:)

We also checked a trumpeter swan nest for egg shells, feathers, and vegetation.  The samples will be used in a study to determine which habitat is most important to swan reproductive health/condition: winter feeding grounds or nesting grounds.  Currently it is looking like perhaps winter feeding grounds have a bigger impact than the nesting grounds, meaning that if a bird is not in good condition when it arrives at the nesting/breeding grounds then it will not be able to get up to good enough condition fast enough to be able to breed succesfully.

Mariah collecting trumpter swan feather and egg shell samples

We headed back to the rez Saturday morning after a very enjoyable and productive couple of days.  I’m not sure Jeff understood exactly what he was saying when he told us to come back anytime!! 

Feather Fest Mo. River float trip, Blues and Brews

Uncle John and lovely wife Rayanne drove up from Denver area to visit this last weekend.  Friday night they took a quick ride on my Honda Shadow, then we grilled salmon on a plank, drank a few beers, and shot the breeze.  Hard to believe now but John used to have waist long hair and a beard almost as long.  My 12 year old self was very proud to have such a cool uncle.  I still am.

I’m trying to locate an old long-hair picture of John but until then here is one of when he was a nice sweet young thing.

John, Elaine, Anita, George and Jean

Saturday morning we were up and on the road by 5:00 am and ready to float down the Missouri River on a birding trip with the annual Feather Fest.  By the time we got to the meeting spot, got checked in, ate a doughnut or two, and finally got our canoes on the river, it was a little past 7:00.  We didn’t care, we had a great time birding with the magnificant birders Woody and John, who can identify just about any bird call/song that we heard.  It was pretty cool.

Mariah luvs to paddle.

From bikers to paddlers

Most of the birds were  pretty fast moving but I did snap a couples pics of the slower ones.

In case you haven't had your fill of baldies in my blog yet

Just regular ol Canada geese but a nice background to go with them

Duck/goose blind

 

Wood pecker tree

We were amazed to discover that not only do morel mushrooms grow in Montana, but that they grow really big!

Mariah and her giant 'shroom

The Missouri River runs pretty clear until the Milk River dumps in.  In the shallow areas you can find treasures, such as this old buffalo tooth.  Mariah and I gave it to Rayanne as her offical Montana souvenire.  She seemed pretty pleased with it.

Buffalo tooth

Lark sparrow perched on a silver sage brush

Red headed woodpecker

 

Beaver tree

After the trip we had lunch at the Gateway bar and grill and took a short nap before heading to the Blues and Brews fest, which consisted of 3 bands and all the bbq and microbeer that you could possibly want.   The next day consisted of John changing the oil in my bike and fixing the lawn mower, taking the dogs to the river, and driving out to the Tribal buffalo ranch in hopes of some bufs being in sight.  They barely were and even then only with binocs.  Supper was grilled buffalo steak and morels friend in butter.  John and Rayann left bright and early the next morning.  It was a great weekend!

Foxy's behind, Lola, Elizabeth trying to keep from being knocked into the water, Bruce, and Sadie