Annual Tree Survey

 
Woodhenge Tamarack

Three days ago, I eased past the gilded tamarack that grows along our stretch of driveway. The tree’s brilliance prompted a lingering glance over my right shoulder. It was then that I spotted, further back beyond our house, a new dominant tree rising above all the others in our humble little woods.  As if standing on its tiptoes, trying to be noticed above the crowds of dominating, broad shouldered red and bur oaks rises a single white pine.

Upon returning home later that day, I declared to my Lovely Lady that it was time for my annual inventory stroll. This ambling walk  forces me to move as slowly as the most skilled deerstalker and to simply pay attention. The goal is only to take note about what is going on out in our woods.

I entered the portal of woods-in-transition. Indeed, our ten-plus acre woodlot is a mutt of sorts, a collection of diverse trees; some native, an alien and others introduced. Admittedly some have been transplanted or sown, but most have managed to find their way here on their own. (Note I have included the updated tree census at the end of this entry.)

As I snailed my way, zigzagging through the woods, I made a discovery that stopped me in my tracks. Tucked in the leafy duff of the back corner of our woods I found the bleached skull  peering out from under a carpet of leaves. Immediately, I knew itt was  our beloved dog, Taiga. He had died an old dog back in the winter of 2009.

With the ground frozen, his big body was sledded to his final resting place, roughly a couple hundred yards from the house. With branches piled over his stiff corpse it was our wish to share his being with the local flora and fauna. We liked to think that the local deer mouse and chipping sparrow population might find his fur perfect for nesting materials. That coyotes, crows, ravens and raccoons might find his flesh suitable for their own feasting. And eventually the very rodents, the mice and squirrels that Taiga harassed on his forays back in the woods, would whittle his bones.  After a moment of fond remembrance, I tucked his skull back under the thick comforter of dried leaves and silently moved on knowing full well that Taiga’s essence lives on here.

I thought of how this woods has morphed over my lifetime of just over sixty years. Change is always on the prowl on the landscape. Like a game of musical chairs, there is a never-ending shifting of flora and fauna waiting to jump in when conditions are right.  And just as we watch our kids strike out on their own, we need to accept that no grounds can possible remain static.

As a kid I remember coming out here to my grandparents farm and helping call the milk cows out of this very woods where they were pastured.

“Here Boss! Here Boss!”

The old dynamite shed, that my great-grandfather stored his explosives  in was properly isolated  a good distance from the house and other farm buildings. These fused tools of destruction were used to clear the land punctuated with stumps.  Slowly he cleared the land so he could plant more potatoes and other crops.

As my grandparents aged, the milking stopped and the cows were sold. Consequently, around 1970, the grazing was no longer a factor in these woods.  Another decade would have us moving the old farmhouse, built by my great-great grandfather in the 1890s, to a semi-cleared corner of this old renegade pasture.

In the nearly 40 years that have passed, many species of woody and herbaceous plants have thrived without the annual bovine grazing. It went from looking like a fairly open park to a tangled jungle.

Moving away from Taiga’s resting spot, I noticed other changes. My stroll started to involve obstacles. Recent windstorms over the past two years have torn several big oak limbs from the trees and dropped a couple others. The downed timber assures me of a winter of chain saw work.

There is some oak regeneration. Out in he more open areas, there are many scarlet red oak seedlings. Back in the woods I was surprised at the number of bur oak seedlings.

In recent years there has been an explosion of  touch-me-nots (Impatiens patiens) in parts of this woods. Could there be come correlation with the increase of oak seedlings? With climate change happening, I’m pleased to see the high percentage of young bur oak seedlings. With a likely drier future, the oaks should do just fine.

Another highlight was discovering the increase in small white pine seedlings and saplings. There are easily forty to sixty or so young trees volunteering there way into the mix.  Luckily the whitetail deer in this area have other agricultural options to feed on because in some parts of our region, deer view white pine seedlings as a dietary prize, a hot fudge sundaes so to speak.

These fast growing trees can race to the sun as well as any tree in this woods. Clearly these are the progeny of the tall mature pines that grow in my neighbors yard a quarter mile to the west. Prevailing west-northwest winds deliver an annual flight of tiny winged pine sees.

I made my way to stand beneath the “new” tallest tree on our ten plus acres. The white pine has nosed past a tall red oak. I wonder if the oak is standing tall and bold as it faces its execution by oak wilt?

I’m torn about the impending march of oak wilt; the dead oak assures me of years of exercise and many cords of hand split firewood. However, as the oak wilt moves phantomlike from root system to root system, squadrons of gray squirrels are tucking acorns into the ground. Some of these will become winter calories while others will be mislaid and have the potential to be the next round of oaks growing here.

The biggest surprise on my stroll was finding an overlooked basswood tree growing near our eastern boundary. The fifteen-foot tall tree with its fat obtuse leaves provoked a smile from me. Also known as the Linden tree, it is the namesake for the surname of the famed 18th century Swede and so-called “Father of Botany,” Carl Linneaus. It is a species that I would expect to find on richer forest soils instead of the sandy soils of the Anoka Sand Plain. So pleased to see the sneaky newcomer, I have to admit I actually greeted the tree.

Living in the woods can do that to you.

******

2013 Basecamp Tree Inventory

Introduced (Intentionally or Otherwise)

1)   White Cedar

(planted in the early 1980s)

2)   White Spruce

(transplanted around 1981 from Cook County forest, near Grand Marais.)

3)   Black Spruce

(The ten inch seedling was smuggled back to Minnesota, blanketed with moist sphagnum moss and tucked in a #3 Duluth Pack, from the Hudson Bay lowlands of northern Manitoba. This international theft occurred around 1983.)

4)   Red Pine

(planted approximately 1994)

5)   Tamarack

(4 foot sapling transplanted from bog near Twin Lake, about 2 miles distant, around 2004)

6)   Mountain Ash

(two trees transplanted around 1984; given to me by WNC volunteer Babe Allan, whose green thumb could grow a bushel of nails; she lived in northern suburbs. Birds love these berries and are responsible for a few new mtn. ash trees thriving here.)

7)   Black Walnut

(The late, Verner Dahl left two big cardboard boxes of black walnut fruits for me to plant back in the late 1980s. I neglected them but the squirrels didn’t. Their caching of the fruits resulted in several surprise black walnuts that are now approaching 25 feet tall.)

8)   Sugar Maple or the Britta Maple

(Planted in the spring of 1983 in honor of the birth of my first child, Britta. She was born the previous November amidst a snowstorm; making tree planting a delayed celebration. I dug up the man high sapling from a friend’s property near Afton, Minnesota)

9)   Apple

(Several were planted, but the most noteworthy and prolific, is a Prairie Spy (or is it a Haralson?) that I planted the spring after my Valentine daughter, Maren was born. Of course it is the Maren Apple Tree.)

10) European Buckthorn (first noted in the 1990s)

Native

10)                 Red Cedar

11)                 White Pine

12)                 Red Oak

13)                 Bur Oak*1

14)                 Paper Birch

15)                 Trembling Aspen

16)                 Large-toothed Aspen

17)                 Black Cherry

18)                 Red Maple

19)                 Box Elder

20)                 Basswood

(first noted October, 2013. Don’t know how I missed this fifteen foot tall tree before this!)

21)                 Willow

(The genus, Salix, is a confusing lot. My guess is that we have several species. Someday, I’ll challenge myself to sort them out.)

*1

I collected a handful of bur oak acorns from a mighty stand of find trees at a highway rest area along I-35 in southern Minnesota. I tucked them in gopher mounds and am pleased to say that I have three four foot tall oaks out in our open field. Without competition from other trees, and with a little luck, they should become signature landmarks another century.

 

 

 

 

 

The Hoarding Season

 

A friend of mine often tucked leftover tidbits of his breakfast, lunch or supper in scraps of napkins.  Then he slipped these caloric riches into various pockets of his clothing or even his daypack.  I remember spying such a package under his favorite reading chair!

His wife brushed off the hoarding behavior by sadly pronouncing, “He’s a child of the Depression. . .  family didn’t have much.”

It’s a common malady that folks have. I call it the “fear-of-running-out syndrome.” Folks usually hoard because they think that the collected items will someday be useful or valuable. Sometimes we hoard for purely sentimental reasons. And then there are folks stash and collect items because of afflictions of disorders such as obsessive-compulsive personality disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder or depression.

Anthropologists often debate when this hoarding business first started. It was likely some 11,500 years ago, when humans made the leap from being strictly hunter-gatherers, to learning to poke seeds in the ground to raise crops and that tending livestock and fowl. With surpluses at hand, people could barter for foods and services and civilization as we know it, experienced a jump-start.

Just last week we laid our first, later-than-usual, morning fire in our kitchen wood burning stove. With November on the horizon, Nancy and I celebrated our annual frenzy of firewood hoarding yesterday. This week we completed filling our two wood storage sheds and packed a third of a cord of wood down in the corner of the basement, near the wood burning stove. We use that only during the  honest-to-goodness cold spells. One could argue that we are indeed hoarders. Nothing spells winter security better than stuffed woodsheds.

Given that recent winters have been pretty mousey we don’t burn as much as we used to. And usually our kitchen wood burner is enough to do the job. A few years ago we spent the money to have a professional energy audit. Using a blower door test and an infrared camera, a professional energy technician checked for leaks, inspected home insulation and heating systems in our house. The infrared camera images betrayed the telltale orange-yellow hot spots showed where our heated interior heat was escaping outdoors. Consequently, we were able to target specific spots with caulk, foam insulation, and other energy saving efforts. It has made a significant money saving difference.

Granted we spend very little on propane in the first place since we heat primarily with wood. The forced air propane furnace is our back up if we are away from the house.

It’s true we are adding some particulate into the atmosphere but we are not adding any fossil fuel carbon. The carbon released from our burning wood was not extracted as ancient carbon found in the earth’s crust. The carbon in our burned firewood has been cycling for some time in that very thin layer of earth and atmosphere that is capable of supporting life.  Known as the biosphere, the carbon is released through burning and other decomposing mechanisms and then is taken in, or sequestered, by plants for their growth. Eventually those plants die and the process begins all over again.

As long as we are confessing to autumnal hoarding, we have enjoyed picking, freezing and putting up sauce from the five gallons of wild cranberries that we have picked over the last couple of weeks.  While that might seem impressive, a neighbor lady has put up 200 quarts of cranberry juice and sauce!

Most folks don’t realize that here on the Anoka Sand Plain the underlying sand, combined with abundant wetlands provide ideal conditions for native cranberries. Minnesota has two species, the large cranberry and yes; you guessed it, the small cranberry. The large cranberries are the ones that we find dished out every Thanksgiving.

In picking cranberries you need to get out into the wetlands where the ground quakes. I wear a pair of chest waders and Nancy wear hip boots so we can kneel comfortably on the soft, wet sphagnum moss to pick the tart, grape-sized red fruits.

We were not the only hoarders in this wetland of sedges, leatherleaf and tamarack. We found small piles of half eaten fruits, etched with tiny rodent incisors. . . likely red-backed voles or meadow voles.

One day we bumped into a flock of wild turkeys that had ventured out onto the boggy site to pick ripe fruits. Being a turkey hunter, I couldn’t help but wonder how one of these cranberry-infused birds might taste.

Another day, as we approached with buckets in hand, a pair of sandhill cranes croaked out their alarm calls as they took off. And I have even picked my way around perfect round bushel basket depressions of deer beds. I can’t imagine a more comfortable bed than one of thick soft sphagnum moss.

In about three weeks, I am hoping to hoard some venison for the upcoming winter. There are few marriages as perfect as venison and cranberry sauce served in a room lit and warmed with burning oak. Now that is prosperity.

Where’s the Balance?

 

 

The Whitehorse hospital doc finally came back to the exam room carrying the x-ray. “You broke your hand,”he said far too matter-of-factly.  “The good news,” continued the doc, “is that after consulting with the surgeon, he doesn’t think it needs to be pinned since everything lines up well. . .it’s an oblique fracture. So let’s get a cast on your hand.”

Damn. . . I was really hoping for just a bad, painful bruise.

And that is why I’m pecking painfully slow at the computer keyboard. Too tough to type upper case; good thing the apple knows to use upper case at the beginning of a sentence. bear with some abbreviated wrds and mispelings.

But it all could have been so much worse. Doc didn’t think the gash on my left shin required stitches. Bummer that the gauze leaked and left a crimson, abstract version of the big island of Hawaii on our bed sheets the night before. i didn’t show the doc the hand-sized scrape on my right thigh.

So what the hell happened?

For the sake of brevity (oh this is tough to keep it brief because I like to spin a story) I fell off a little pitch of a rocky spire. Stupid.  stupid decision to climb it. The handholds and footholds looked good. And I did note the scrabbly rock near the bottom. The rock pyramid was house-sized and I was tantalized by the challenge and the higher vantage point. And I have to admit some vanity rose up as well. Being a sixty something, I like to show myself and others that i can still scramble like a mt. goat rather than an old goat.

To get to this craggy mountain bump involved a long, bushwhacking hike through some pretty scrabbly ground that has, for the most part a pretty stiff grade where you are mostly leaning into the slope. Four of us, wife, nancy, friend banjo kim and her plucky, 16 year old, stone deaf husky, named  smoke and myself were trying to get to the top of needle mt.  nancy and I had been there  before but never going this route.

We were less than ¼ mile fro the top but decided to rest, collect some alpine flowers and snack. Also decided not to risk the tough climb. All of us were fine with the call it a day.

While we rested near the seductive spire, my inner dumbness nudged the moment of repose. Perhaps the spirit of George Mallory sidled into my dulled, decision-making process. (Mallory was the famous early 20th century british mtn climber who died on mt. Everest. When a news reporter asked Mallory why he wanted to climb Everest his now famous response was “because it’s there.”

Well if it’s good enough for George it was good enough for me. Sounds rational. And besides it was only about 20-25 feet up; not 29,000 feet.

I carefully made my way up. I noted some sketchy holds close to the bottom. I remember being super intentional. Almost guiltily, I glanced back towards nan and kim. Both were watching. I remember being relieved that nancy wasn’t questioning my tiny summit attempt. She is usually far more cautious. And sometimes I get frustrated in her black belt caution. So I was clear to go.

But now with this cursed cast onmy hand, and quiet time to ponder the fall,I wonder if subconsciously I was expecting, no wanting her to check my climb?

Long after that scrabbly foothold crumbled, (luckily only four feet off the ground) and long after we made the long slow trek back down to our truck, and long after kim went home after a shared supper, did nancy light into me. Mallory’s spirit sulked away like a wisp of Everest fog.

For full effect, nancy employed tears interspersed with corrosive cursing and Olympian gesticulations. And all of it was fully justified. It wasn’t enough that I had already claimed my stupid decision. An apology wasn’t enough. I had selfishly played mt. climber without clear thought on the ramifications of a bad accident. I had put us all at risk high up on Needle, hours away from any phone or road. A bad injury would require a helicopter evacuation that could only happen hours later and even then you would be racing good light.

My finger is getting tired of this keyboard tap dance so I need to wrap this up. Besides its taken far too long to write this post.

Lesson learned: be more patient with nancy’s more cautious stance. It’s in the interest of both us. We are so lucky to have each other and to share a desre to ramble around in scrabbly, wild places.

We leave the Yukon in 3 days. Catching the ferry to Washington. I reckon 4 days of cruisin’ the inside passage will be perfect for bone repair. Then we get a few days of hanging out with daughter, maren and so-in-law, ben at their home in Tacoma.

I guess this means there will be no mt. biking with ben. but he is a doc so maybe?????

Bush Kids

 

I had just pulled my knife out of its worn leather sheath. It was raining and we had retreated into a picnic shelter at the camping area for the Atlin Music Festival to grab a bite to eat. I had barely cut into the banana bread when a child’s voice next to me  matter-of-factly noted, “Nice knife.” I finished the cut and looked to my right. Sitting a couple feet from me at the picnic table was a pixieish brown haired girl.

“Thanks,” I said. I was caught off guard as I had never been complimented by a young girl for the knife I carry.

“I’ve got one too,” she quickly added and in an instant she was holding up a handsome Swiss Army Knife. “My dad gave it to me last year.” I nodded. “Here take a look at it,” she added as she held it out for me.

In a few minutes I learned that she was named Emma and that her favorite of the multiple tools on her knife was the fact that it had not one, but two blades. “It’s easier to carve things with two different sized blades.”

I handed it back  and she kept up the testimonial. “The scissors attachment is pretty cool too but it’s the hardest one to open.”

I’m guessing that Emma was maybe ten or eleven years old. I thought of how astute it was that her father gave her  the gift of a knife the previous year. Seems to me that we need far more parents willing to give kids pocket knives. Oh blasmephous words! I can hear the cries of horror at the thought of giving a child, and a girl no less, a sharp-edged tool. A good, sharp knife gifted to a child is a rite of passage. It is a pronouncement of confidence that the youngster can and MUST handle and care for the knife properly . So such a bladed gift must come with a serious discussion on the proper handling and care of all knives.

Mors Kochanski, a friend and one of the top survival experts in North America, is the author of the highly regarded book, Northern Bushcraft. Last fall, Nancy and I stopped on our return trip to Minnesota to spend a couple nights with Mors at his home in northern Alberta. We got to talking about kids and bush skills. Mors said he always encouraged parents to teach knife skills and campfire building skills as early as five years old. He insists there is no better age to instill the correct and safe use of matches and knives.The real danger is having kids play with these things on their own without proper instruction.

In chatting with little Emma, I learned she liked to camp and was eager for the music to begin the following day. It was clear that her world did not revolve solely around knives. As she and I watched an impromptu music jam begin next to our table, Emma said, “I play piano and some guitar, but I really want to play a stand up bass.”

Suddenly something shifted and she got up and headed out into the drizzle. “Well Tom, I’ve got to go. . .see you later.”

I had just met an honest to goodness “bush kid!” Had I been an eleven or twelve year old boy, I would have been mightily smitten by Emma. The youth designation of “good bush kid” was a label I had never heard of until we came up to the Yukon in 2008. And right away I knew I wanted to be knighted with such a noble title. I became aware of such a designation in casual conversations.

“ Oh, Knute is a good bush kid,”  said one good friend.

And one mother declared , “My 16 year-old daughter, she’s a good bush kid.”

It’s not a title that is cast out freely; one has to earn it. I would have far preferred being known as a “good bush kid” than a good boy scout or good Lutheran.

So what are the qualifications for such an honor? There is no definition or secret order of bush kids. But here is what I have observed. A key component  of  bush status is you must be really confident. You can handle yourself well anywhere and you don’t loose your cool.

Clearly these are excellent bush skills for surviving in the wilds. But besides being super comfortable rooting around in the outdoors, these kids carry the confidence throughout their day whether they are in school or on a trip in the back country.

Emma seemed profoundly happy. And no surprise here as studies show that kids who play and explore outside are less stressed, more relaxed and tend to have greater social skills and confidence. Bingo!

Stephen Kellert, a Yale professor with the School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, has written extensively on the subject of child development and nature. In his book Building for Life: Designing and Understanding the Human-Nature Connection he argues that, not only is contact with nature important for children’s emotional, intellectual, and evaluative development, but that their “physical and mental well-being depends on the quality of their experience of the natural world.”

My guess is that if I looked closely at the lives of those “good bush kids,” I would likely find that each of them spent a lot of time outside messing around with their imaginations.

Two nights later I was in the main tent waiting for the next band to take the stage. Hundreds of people were in the tent enjoying the day’s music. I looked over to my right and sitting on the ground in the front row, about twenty feet from me, was my friend Emma. She had a bandanna wrapped around her forehead and was having a good time. She glanced my way and saw me looking towards her. She waved… and winked. Yes, she winked. Now that is confidence!

If we had a generation of optimistic and confident  bush kids on the rise, the world would be a better place. I have a “good knife,” received a wink and the band onstage was about to play a new song. Life is looking real good.

DUMP ECONOMY

 

“One man’s rubbish may be another’s treasure”

         – 19th century proverb

Dump:Mike 

I find it interesting that when Europeans first settled in North America they found the natives had no name for “waste.” There simply wasn’t such a thing.

America, alone, accounts for over one-third of the world’s waste and most of that trash ends up in landfills. It amounts to one ton of landfill waste per USA citizen per year.  That is shameful and we call ourselves advanced.

While living at our Yukon Outpost in the hamlet of Mt. Lorne we have discovered a virtual “gold mine” far from the rich ore strikes of the Klondike gold fields. Our weekly schedule often involves going on one or two all-day hikes, going to town for groceries, supplies and an art fix and going to the dump. All of these are highly desirable activities.

In fact, exploits of  our dump discoveries have spread far and wide.  When friends and family make the trip from the Midwest to the Yukon they expect their travel itinerary to include a visit or two to the dump.

There are three community dumps within an hours drive of us and they are the best dumps I’ve ever been to. For one thing, there is very little trash. The recycling efforts here are the best I have ever seen. You can recycle aluminum and galvanized cans, bottles, cardboard, paper and ALL plastics, but they will also take all batteries, from those tiny ones found in hearing aids to the 12 volt variety found in autos. (Note: It is estimated that ten percent of all the world’s plastics end up in the oceans.)

They also take tires, milk and juice cartons, computers, televisions, speakers and sound systems. There is a large dumpster for metal recycling and for household appliances. And there is even a shed to leave compostables.

The Mt. Lorne dump does an excellent job of  minimizing the concept of waste. By the time you throw away your actual trash here, it amounts to very little.  It only requires that you take the time to separate things. This dump is a model for the rest of North America.

Here at the dump you can enjoy a community picnic, an impromptu music jam or an athletic workout. Admittedly the Mt. Lorne dump does not appear welcoming with a four-strand electric fence surrounding the grounds. While it might keep out after hours trash dumpers it is designed to discourage black and grizzly bears.

The dump’s greatest attractions are the two “Free Shacks.”  The sign actually reads ” Reuse Area.” One is for clothing and the other is for just about anything else. The larder that accumulates in the Free Shacks increases with the spring and fall cleaning tides.  Residents in the area live back in the bush or are thinly spread in the hamlet. Garage sales are not practical with a spread out population so it is easy to simply give stuff away to someone who might need it.

One day I pulled up to the Free Shack  and in moments I was putting a a thick sheepskin winter coat and a German-made backpack in the truck. I’ve also added some nice wool sweaters to my Yukon wardrobe and secured a favorite belt, though it’s a bit long for my svelte midsection.

I always scan the books and have found some great reads like “Deep Survival” by Lawrence Gonzales and “The World is Flat” by Thomas Friedman.

For my wife Nancy, the dump is the equivalent of a rich blueberry patch. While I can often make my scan in a matter of five minutes, she wants at least triple that. On the other hand, Nancy’s plunder has far surpassed mine. She has snagged garden tools, quilts, duvet covers, cute pants, shorts, tops and even hats that look like they just came off the shelf at L. L. Bean.  She even found some of our kitchen holdings  including, plates, mugs, glasses, silverware, a nearly brand new bread machine and a sparkling, unscratched Cuisinart blender.

Over the past weekend I learned that over at the Marsh Lake dump, a 45-minute drive from our dump, a woman connected with a mink coat that was in excellent shape! I’m serious.

Loading camper

Last week I helped a local woman load a camper on the back of her pickup. Yep. . . a bonafide over-the-cab camper! Word has it that the week before the fellow who brought in the camper dropped off a boat and trailer. It disappeared very quickly. Apparently the guy who dropped off these treasures is moving south and he did not want to fuss around trying to sell any stuff.  (For clarity’s sake, “moving south” means moving anywhere south of the Yukon).

Camper loaded

Given that many folks that live in the Yukon are here for only a few years, they  often accumulate more than they need.  Consequently to make the move south more easy they often bring good quality items to the dump.

Recently, my good friend Mike stopped at the Marsh Lake dump and got himself a car.  His brother is running that dump this summer so he could have provided insider information.  The car was half-filled with gas, and an easy starter with a perky battery. There was a note on the front seat that included a phone number so the car’s title could be transferred. He called the phone number and discovered that the owner was a neighbor! She had been trying to sell the car for some time and simply gave up. Oh yeah, the glitch turned out to be a bad axle. He noticed when turning a corner that the car made some noise. Upon further inspection he discovered it had a bad axle. So he found a used one and replaced it himself.

The same day I helped the woman load up the camper, I found two gas stove knobs in the dirt outside a dumpster. I eyed them over and jammed them in my pants pocket.  Our small stove/oven is missing two knobs and we have tried several but none have fit. I am pleased to say that we now have four perfectly operating burners that are easily adjusted with a turn of the knob. Who cares if they don’t match.

In regards to social benefits, the Annual Dumpster Dining event offers grilled bison burgers and bison smokies (brats).  Combined with  live music the event attracts scores of folks. When we first arrived in the Yukon and had to make a trip to the dump we soon found other folks flocked there. Consequently, we have met some of our dearest friends after a visit to the dump.

People get a little wacky going to the dump.  During one cold winter day, I saw a bundled man hunkered over a row of computers. Suddenly he let out a steaming, triumphant cheer. I walked over to see what he was celebrating and he excitedly told me that he had just found some sort of computer component that would have cost him hundreds of dollars if he bought it off the shelf.

While shack “shopping,” the protocol is honorable and polite. Although I have seen folks anxiously wait for you to put down the wool shirt or mixing bowl that you inspected and then like a hungry raven drop in and claim it as it slides from your hands.

This dump will get you in shape. We now have a nearly new spare life jacket, a taped hockey stick and puck, cross country ski poles and a set of weights. I’ve passed on rickety looking treadmills. But a neighbor girl got a very nice mountain bike that simply needed to be cleaned up and have it’s tires pumped with air.

Mike, the Mt. Lorne dump manager, enjoys golf and basketball. So it is not unusual to see him practicing sand trap shots from the sandy landscape that sits under the dump.

mike BB shot

Mike and I both enjoy picking up the basketball and shooting hoops on the backboard and basket that came in to the dump. We can make up some very inventive shots for a wicked game of Horse when you consider dumpsters, crates of bottles and parked cars.

The dump can provides forays into the arts. One day Jeremy, dump watcher on duty, reported proudly that he had his new guitar along. He asked if Nancy had her fiddle in the truck. She did so in minutes they were jamming.  Soon neighbor Ruth pulled up to leave some things and she quickly pulled out her mandolin. I found a reasonable chair from inside the Free Shack and listened to the spontaneous concert.

And the beautiful thing is that if we don’t like something that we found, we can bring it back next week. A stack of pocket books are poised to make the trip and  I see that Nancy has put the bathroom scale by the recycling tubs. That means it’s going back to the dump as social currency.

Sad, I rather like that I only weigh 69. . . . kilograms.

Attacked!!

 

It had to happen sooner or later. Particularly in a land that has far more large wild mammals than humans. It’s only more ironic that as the author of four regional editions of Things that Bite, something other than invertebrates like mosquitoes and black flies should finally nail me.

But before I give you the sordid details, let me lay out the events leading up to the attack.

It was my birthday. . . 62 years old.  With the day opening with a flawless blue sky, Nancy inquired what I would like to do. Smiling at my first request, she wondered what else I would I like to do. I said, “How about hiking that unnamed peak a couple peaks south of Red Ridge by Annie Lake?” We had never climbed this peak and I was curious about it and wanted to get up to alpine to collect some flowers.

After a short drive, we parked the truck, donned our packs, adjusted our hiking poles and headed up. With no trails to follow we started up through the bush. The base of the peak rose up quickly through lodgepole pine, aspen and some clumps of hefty willow with lots of thigh-high soapberry bushes and dwarf birch in the understory.  Dwarf birch is commonly referred to as “buck brush” up here and no one likes hiking through it.

The volume and volubility of our chatter accelerated as we eased through the thicker cover. There is no need to ever surprise a bear. Let them know you are coming and they usually will vanish before you are near them. And a bear around here could be either a black or a grizz.

Our route was not direct. There were plenty of zigs and zags as we slowly slalom-trudged uphill. After half an hour of climbing we encountered our first patches of exposed bedrock.  Here and there were small clumps of sub-alpine fir and always some clumps of willow. But now most of the willow was shorter than the plants we encountered at the lower elevations.

Willow is everywhere up here. There are approximately 30 species of this woody plant in the Yukon. It can found in the lowlands, along rivers, on mountainsides and even a stunted version high in the alpine.

The grade became steeper and even with hiking poles, we found small willows and aspens as handy anchor points to pull ourselves up. About a third of the way up we found an open patch of grass and crowberry to sit down on and enjoy some water and snacks. Enjoying the view, we turned and looked up and realized that we still had some gnarly climbing ahead of us.

We resumed the ascent and soon found ourselves scrambling in more exposed areas of rock. The rock was scrabbly in spots so we proceeded cautiously, never directly below one another so as to avoid any dislodged rocks from hitting the other person. Now we were more frequently encountering pitches that required us to use our hands to grab secure rocks to help us along. Hiking was morphing into rock climbing and this is not what we really wanted.

About two thirds of the way up, we did a check with each other. “Are we bending the map?” I asked. “Bending the map” is a phrase coined by Lawrence Gonzales in his fine book, Deep Survival. In the book he explores who lives, who dies and why when confronted with an accident, catastrophe or being lost.

When one “bends the map” they are attempting to make a trail or route conform to them. In other words I was wondering if we were trying to minimize the difficulty of our route to the top. Nancy and I often check each other with that “bending the map” question when we are out on big hikes or paddles.

This time we both agreed that perhaps we were biting off too much. And besides, with a birthday supper of halibut enchiladas and rhubarb pie for dessert, we didn’t want find ourselves in a sketchy situation with the coming of evening. So we began to traverse to the north looking for an easier route down.

We had only gone about 200 hundred yards or so when we found the grizzly bear den.

The opening was large enough to easily let me walk in if I bent over at the waist. I didn’t. This was likely a den where a grizzly spends the winter. If it was a female’s den she might have birthed a pair of cubs here. Or a lone male could have claimed it. Once the warmer spring weather starts to melt the snow up this high, the bear(s) would leave the den and head downhill looking for some greening produce to eat.

We moved past the den and were celebrating the fact that we found a less steep descent but it also was a thicker garden of undergrowth. We could take bigger steps downhill and the gravity helped our momentum.

Suddenly the attack came.

As I passed through a moose-high clump of willow, one of the supple limbs I was pushing ahead of me snapped back and had its way with the orbit of my eye. I grumbled a curse and in stoic, male-stubborn fashion, I forced my way through.  No blood; just a good smack on the head.

We ultimately made it down and back in time for a wonderful birthday supper with some friends and Nancy’s sister, Jane. (Jane had wisely stayed back at the Outpost while we hiked.)

It was the next day that I discovered my tattooed left eyelid. The funny thing is the bruised eye socket didn’t hurt. In fact I had to pause to recollect how I hurt it.

Some folks up this way call willow “moose candy” because it is the most preferred moose food around. Funny how this plant, the same one that is the origin of the ubiquitous pain reliever, aspirin, got a “sweet” lick at me.

 

Willow Attack

More than Food for Thought

 Hydrating

Nothing makes the news with greater frequency these days then food. The stuff we ingest to motor through life is controversial and daily we are faced with reports of food recalls, the unknowns and dangers of eating genetically modified foods (GMOs) and the obesity epidemic.
Just yesterday, while listening to a report on CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation), I learned that during our specie’s history on the planet,  the human brain likely grew larger with greater capacity when access to food became easier and easier.  In other words our success in growing crops, domesticating animals and creating tools supported good nutrition. The report went on to say that 1/3 of the 2,500 or so calories that the average North American male needs each day is utilized by that big calorie burner, the brain.

Two weeks ago I burned more than that many calories in a single event.  My brain seemed like it was on a timeout as it  diverted needed calories to my legs, lungs and heart that pleaded for more calories. The physical event was the annual Chilkat Kluane International Bike Relay. The race starts in the community of Haines Junction, Yukon and ends 149 miles away up and over the Coastal Mountains dropping into Haines, Alaska. The setting is stunning with snow-capped mountains in view during the whole ride. And there is a good chance of seeing a moose or bear as you pedal through their homescape.

I have participated on two previous Chilkat races but in each case I was on four-person teams where each of the riders must ride two consecutive legs of the race. This year I was riding it solo and was able to complete it because the weather cooperated, I was ready for it and mostly because of my awesome “support team.” The team was wife Nancy, daughter Maren and her college buddy, Karen. They kept my water bottles filled, varied my food and then made the delicate hand-offs as I cycled by.

The trick on such a long ride is proper hydration and consuming calories that can quickly go to work in fueling your effort.  My success was highly attributed to the following:

1) huge drafts of mountain air with hints of sub-alpine fir melded with balsam poplar oils

2) Lots and lots of water. .  . about half of it was fortified with Nuun supplements.

3) Plenty of Save Your Ass Bars. These are homemade and have been known to work wonders in North America and high in the Andes in South America.

4) Two Pearson’s Salted Nut Rolls.  Frank Lundeen, co-owner at CyclovaXC, highly recommended these.

4) Organic bananas, cut and peeled into chunks.

5) Clif Shot Blocks during the second half of the race. (About one per hour)

6) Sportsleggs supplements. Another Cyclova recommendation.

7) Cooked boiled potatoes rolled in olive oil and Parmesan cheese. I had these wrapped in foil but my support team quickly learned it was easier to simply hand one off as I pedaled by them. I really liked these and would even put leftover fragments in my bike jersey pocket. The key is not to overcook them.

And finally. .  .drum roll please. . . .

8) Nah, I can’t tell you. A photo is far better. And this ain’t no joke. . .this really staved off the bonking and fueled me with renewed energy! Plenty of fat, salts and carbs. And yes, it was another tip from Frank at Cyclova.

Race Food

And a superlative and creative support team is the top secret. They cranked up the music in the truck as they leap frogged me, stopping several miles ahead of me to supply me with water and food. Eminem’s classic hip hop hit  “Lose Yourself” was truly inspiring

Look, if you had one shot, or one opportunity
To seize everything you ever wanted. one moment
Would you capture it or just let it slip?

Each time I approached the truck pulled off the side of the highway, I was witness to sheer enthusiasm as they danced, sang and cheered. And they had an abundance of props like inflatable palm trees, wigs, crazy skirts and so on. Smiling helped me forget the task at hand.

When I pedaled across the finish line 8 hours 33 minutes and 55 seconds later, I was a happy boy. And there was my lovely support team cheering louder than ever with a full quart of organic chocolate milk for my recovery drink.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yukonasia

 

 IMG_9411

 

My wife and I practice “Yukonasia.”

Perfectly legal, Yukonasia is the practice of terminating a sedentary life by intentionally living large in a land north of normal.

Even the controversial Jack Kevorkian, also known as Dr. Death for assisting over one hundred terminal patients in assisted suicide, would have approved at our boreal play on the word “euthanasia.”

“Normal” for the bulk of humans living in North America means living in urban environments where asphalt and concrete are the dominant groundcover.

“Normal” is being connected to Wi-Fi or broadband to computers, phones and various pads rather than connected to the natural world.

“Normal” is having multiple bathrooms with multiple showers and televisions are generally twins,  triplets or amazingly even larger litters.

“Normal” is pursuing comfort between walls and a roof overhead rather the potential discomfort of being caught outdoors in rain or snow.

For the past five years we have spent much of our time living in the Yukon Territory in northern Canada. Some call us renegades or even brave. I would call it paying attention to our hearts. Not surprisingly we have become hopelessly smitten with a land that is rough around the edges.

This is a destination where wild lands abound and large mammals like moose, Dall sheep, wolves, caribou, grizzly and black bears far outnumber humans. Somehow, living in a land where I can get lost, become bear food or lose my breathe while hiking high in the mountains makes me more alive.

Approximately one-quarter of the Yukon’s 36,000 human residents are native aborigines, or First Nation members. For thousands of years they have lived and thrived in this vast, mostly untrammeled land that we would call “wilderness.” Ironically, none of the First Nation native languages have a word that means “wilderness.” The closest description is simply “home.” Imagine moving through such a diverse landscape with the same familiarity that you maneuver through your own home . . . in the dark.

If we each followed our lineage lines, we would find we all have evolved from a past where wild places were normal rather than something that is now threatened and disappearing.

Yukonasia has nothing to do with death; it has everything to do with living.

Bird Song Dawning

As a naturalist, I’ve always wanted to instill the need to pay attention. As mentioned in earlier blog, I’ve always had a keen interest in bird song. As noted, hearing loss, has hampered my ability to identify the number of birds by songs and calls. According to one recent federal survey, bird watching is the fastest growing outdoor recreational activity in the U.S. With the surge in interest comes a corresponding interest in learning bird songs and learning why birds sing.

A trick in learning some bird songs is to use mnemonics.  According to the Oxford Dictionary, mnemonics is a device such as a pattern of letters, ideas, or associations that assists in remembering something. One of the most popular mnemonic devices has been used by generations of school kids to recall when Columbus sailed to the new world : “In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue.” Bird enthusiasts often use words and phrases to help them remember bird calls/songs. For example, the spring song of a cardinal sounds like it is repeating “Cheer! Cheer! Cheer!

Through the years, I had collected various bird song mnemonics from various bird field guides and birders. Some of the phrases are downright silly and others are simply proper nouns. One day, back in 2005, I put together a sheet of the phrases as learning aids to use in a class on birding. My right brain hijacked the moment and as I looked the phrases over, I started arranging them together to create a sort-of-conversation between the bird species.

The first stanza refers to the advent of summer, going to Canada and taking it easy with some favorite brews. The second stanza is all about an enthusiastic greeting and introductions to a hard-of-hearing friend. The third section clearly addresses school bullying and the following not-so- politically-correct disciplinary actions meted out by the teacher. Each line of the poem is the mnemonic phrase of a different species of bird. And the final stanza offers a treat and a taste of tea followed by a query about the chef.

I shared the poem with some colleagues and they encouraged me to propose airing it on Minnesota Public Radio. So in the early days of spring I managed to navigate my way to the public radio Program Manager and he thought it was a fun idea.    I suggested that after each line was read that they air an actual recording of the bird. Knowing Public Radio likely did not have a collection of bird songs, I suggested they contact the Macaulay Library at the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology to obtain the necessary recordings.  The library is the world’s largest and oldest scientific archive of biodiversity audio and video recordings.

So in honor of a most tardy spring I am going to resurrect the poem.  Accompanying each line is the identification of the songster or caller. Now get outside and bend your ear towards something really meaningful. Sit down and listen to the poem, preferably in the early morning when birds are most boisterous.

Note: When you click on A Dawn Chorus, a box will appear that says, “No Preview Available.” Click on “Download Anyway.” That will direct you to a box where you have the option of hitting”Download Anyway.” That’s your call. . . but there were no bugs when I posted it.

If you want me to send you the aired recording you will have to contact me at Tom <at> AligningwithNature [dot] com

A Dawn Chorus

Sweet, sweet, summer sweet. (Yellow Warbler)

Oh sweet Canada, Canada, Canada  (White-throated Sparrow)

I am so lazy. (Black-throated Blue Warbler)

Quick-three-beers! (Olive-sided Flycatcher)

Lazy daisey. (Golden-cheeked Warbler)

 

Please, please to meet you! (Chestnut sided Warbler)

Who? Who? Who?  (Great Horned Owl)

Old Man MULDOON, MULDOON, MULDOON  (Prairie Chicken)

Who? who? who?  (Great Horned Owl)

JAY! JAY! JAY!  (Blue Jay)

Who? Who? Who?  (Great Horned Owl)

PETER!, PETER!, PETER! (Tufted Titmouse)

Here I am, way up here, see me? (Red-eyed Vireo)

Here sweety!  (Black-capped Chickadee)

 

Creeep! Creeep! Creeep!   (Least Sandpiper)

I’ll grab you and I’ll hold you and I’ll squeeze you til you squirt!  (Warbling Vireo)

Teacher! Teacher! Teacher!   (Ovenbird)

Sweet, sweet, I’ll switch you!  (Chestnut-sided Warbler)

Whip-Poor-Will! Whip-Poor-Will!  (Whippoorwill)

Weep, Weep, Weep!  (Great Crested Flycatcher)

 

Plum puddin, plum puddin, plum puddin!  (American Bittern)

Potato chips……potato chips……potato chips.  (American Goldfinch)

Tea kettle, Tea kettle, Tea kettle!  (Carolina Wren)

Tea-for-two, Tea-for -two! (Ash-throated Flycatcher)

Drink-your tea!  (Rufous-sided Towhee)

 

Who-cooks-for-you-all?  (Barred Owl)

 

(Copyright 2005 Tom Anderson)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Let’s Go a Little Higher

Nan and Claire

Humans have an affinity to climb. Irresistibly we are pulled, like iron filings to a magnet, by perches, multi-branched trees, hilltops, mountain peaks, observation towers and even through the hierarchy of a job career to “reach the top.”  Many biologists and evolutionary scientists would argue that gaining elevation offered early savanna-dwelling humans a vista to watch for game or approaching threats. Such an advantage, science argues, was so desired for survival that it remains inexorably locked in our conscious. In the past castles and forts were built with commanding views. Today, prime house building sites are often sited high with grand views. Architects continue to defy limits in designing skyscrapers that stretch towards the stratosphere.

Higher and higher. . . . let’s just go a little higher.

Those six words, “Let’s just go a little higher” are powerfully seductive. Over the past few years, when Nancy and I have returned to the Yukon Territory and it’s seemingly infinite crop of peaks, we have often had our day hikes stretched into more hours than planned.   Oftentimes the beckoning siren call of an adjacent higher vista, next to the one we have just climbed, commands our attention. We confer our maps, watches, energy levels and then, more often than not, go for it. More than once we have raced darkness back to our vehicle. That means in the land of the midnight sun, we have wearily come off a hike close to midnight.

In my last blog entry, Tough Efforts, I addressed a recent trekking trip in the Peruvian Andes and the challenges of high elevations. Someone was asking me for more detail about what happens when you climb to elevations that tax the body. So here is my attempt.

First, some basic atmospheric science. In the lower realm of the atmosphere, where we live, there are roughly a dozen gases that mingle together like an invisible, but critical gaseous soup. But two, nitrogen and oxygen, make up approximately 99 percent of the mix.(Note that carbon dioxide is not in the top two, but it has been increasing at rather astonishing rates in the past two centuries, hitting 400 parts per million, for the first time in likely 2 million years. Stay tuned for  some gnarly climate change that is changing the biosphere.)

The atmosphere is an ultra-thin layer of gases that surround the earth. If the earth were the size of a basketball, the atmosphere would be the equivalent of a thin piece of tissue paper. But that thin layer of gases make life possible for us. And as that is not amazing enough, the very mix of gases is what is really critical for us. Most important for our survival is oxygen and that is possible only because of the gift of photosynthesis, the production of oxygen from green plants.

An important property of air is that it has weight. It’s weight can be measured with a barometer and is referred to as barometric pressure. Basically, as one climbs higher,  there is less air, consequently less air pressure.  Our lungs depend on that air pressure to function properly. During periods of very low air pressure, the vacuum that is normally experienced to force the breath to the lungs, barely exists and consequently the air barely seeps in. And if it doesn’t get to our lungs, it fails to get picked up by red blood cells and there is ultimately less oxygen reaching the brain. In a sense, the oxygen-starved brain sends out an alarm to the lungs and heart to work harder. So you start to breathe deeper and your heart begins to race to get oxygen to the brain. (For further, more detailed reading on the subject, I highly recommend you read Surviving the Extremes: A Doctor’s Journey to the Limits of Human Endurance by Kenneth Kamler, M.D.)

You can experience the same phenomenon of oxygen deprivation simply by exerting yourself to the max. There is no need to climb above 14,000 feet, simply try running up several flights of stairs as fast as you can and witness the heaving of your lungs as they work hard to bring oxygen comfort to your brain.

Amazingly we can climb to extremely high elevations if we do it very slowly and acclimatize ourselves gradually to low oxygen concentrations. That is why climbers who tackle Mt. Everest, must do so over a period of time that allows a slow ascent. To do otherwise will kill them.

Perhaps the euphoria, the ecstatic giddiness, I feel when I reach the top of a hilltop or peak is simply because of my oxygen depleted brain. And here I thought it was something more divine than simply biology.

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