Stephen Bodio's Querencia

I have another quick post here based on our visit to the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. This little exhibit as you can see, has a wonderful Bison antiquus skull and the tan block of excavated matrix in the case, shown in the shot below.

This block of matrix was excavated by Jesse Figgins of the Museum (then called the Colorado Museum of Natural History) at the Folsom type site in New Mexico in 1927.

One of the greatest questions in American archaeology has always been the timing and method of the peopling of the New World. Back in the 1920s, a strong and vocal faction, led by Ales Hrdlicka of the Smithsonian Institution, held that the Indians hadn't entered this hemisphere until a very late date, perhaps 3,000 years ago. When I was in graduate school, I remember seeing a cartoon of Hrdlicka standing at the Bering Strait with his hands up, trying to keep those future Siberian Americans from crossing over.

Another faction (Jesse Figgins among them) believed that humans had come here much earlier, sometime in the Pleistocene. In those days, before the invention of radiocarbon dating, the only method of proving this would be to find artifacts deposited in association with extinct Pleistocene fauna.

In a well-written piece from Natural History in 1997, Douglas Preston tells the story of how Figgins was alerted to the Folsom site, started work there, and what he did when he found what he was looking for:

"On August 29, 1927, Carl Schwachheim {one of Figgins' crew} found, one of the distinctive Folsom points embedded in matrix between the ribs of a bison {B. antiquus} skeleton. Still smarting from Hrdlicka's criticism, Figgins ordered the find covered up and the next day fired off telegrams to various colleagues around the country. Three preeminent scientists made the arduous trip to the site. They were Barnum Brown, the great paleontologist at the American Museum of Natural History; Frank H. H. Roberts, Jr., a brilliant archeologist from the Smithsonian Institution; and Alfred Vincent Kidder, who had established the entire cultural sequence of the Anasazi Indians. The covering was removed, and Brown carefully cleared the matrix from one side of the point without dislodging it. It was a fluted point just like the others. Here, finally, was convincing evidence that human beings had been in the New World for at least 10,000 years. These early bison hunters were named the Folsom people, after the nearby town."

This block of matrix in the picture above proved to be a turning point in the history of North American archaeology. Vitually every textbook on North American prehistory or the history of American archaeology has a photograph of this Folsom point stuck in those bison ribs.

Unfortunately, none of this scientific drama is reflected in the exhibit anywhere. It was quite disappointing. This is arguably the most important scientific breakthrough this Museum has accomplished. Don't they understand this is a Big Deal? Don't they want to toot their own horn?

Maybe I'll write them a letter.

Over the weekend Connie and I took a trip to the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, the first visit we have made there since moving back. This museum holds a special place in my heart: it is the first place I ever saw dinosaur and large fossil mammal mounts when we visited on a trip from Arkansas when I was seven. It thrilled me no end.

The Museum is justly famed for its wildlife dioramas, and on our visit I was particularly intrigued by a set on rare birds originally done in the early 1920s. I believe these are the oldest exhibits still on display there. The Museum has thoughtfully left the original signs in place, with modern signs added.

At the top you can see a picture of the California condor diorama. It's set in Ventura County (I assume the Sespe Mountains) and the original sign says that these three specimens were collected by the Museum in the 'teens of the century. Please click on any of these pictures for an enlarged view.

This diorama of whooping cranes is set at Aransas Pass, Texas. The original sign says these specimens were also collected by a Museum expedition in the 'teens.

The passenger pigeon diorama is set in central Iowa. The skins were collected by a farmer in Iowa in the 1880s. I have been so totally conditioned to think of this species as lost that my first irrational thought on seeing this was, "Where did they get all of these?"

I apologize for the quality of this shot, but the reflections on the glass were more than I could overcome. These Carolina parakeets are in a diorama set in Avery Island, Louisiana.

This beautiful pair of ivory-billed woodpeckers was also in the Avery Island diorama. There is another female on the other side of the case. The original sign says these mounts were all done from a collection of "old skins" but doesn't say anything about their provenance.

These dioramas were all done in 1921 - 1923. The condor and whooping crane populations were obviously in trouble at that time, and it appears that the mindset was that you'd better go out a bag a few of these birds while they're still around. The ivory-billed woodpeckers were in the same situation - they weren't considered extinct until a good 35 - 40 years later. Of course, Steve's friend Tim Gallagher and his colleagues recently rediscovered some in Arkansas.

The original signs for the passenger pigeons and Carolina parakeets don't refer to them as extinct. We now know (or at least think we do!) that the last passenger pigeon died in 1914 and the last Carolina parakeet died in 1918, both at the Cincinnati Zoo. It surprised me that this wasn't reflected in signs done a few years later, but all I can assume is that at the time there were still phantom sightings of both species and some hope wild populations existed.

We’ve had three snowstorms hit in the last week here in Wyoming, shutting down thousands of miles of roads. These spring storms mean that we have slick, snow-covered roads with no visibility one minute, and within a few hours, the roads will be dry again.

Yesterday, we had to haul hay from a farm in Farson, about 40 minutes from our ranch. It was dry and clear, so we drove down, had a nice visit with the farmer/beekeeper and headed for home. The storm hit when we were within 20 miles of the ranch, and by the time we were 10 miles from home, the road was so slick I pulled off the highway and dropped the trailer inside an allotment fence, so we could travel safely home (without being pushed down Blue Rim by several tons of hay).

We fixed lunch and had a short nap. By then, the storm had passed and we drove back down the highway to retrieve the hay trailer. That’s the flurry of spring.

Today’s photos are two of the residents of the stackyard. I love the brindle marks on the jack, which was pretending to be a rock, sitting in the shade of a feed trough.

The ground squirrels were racing around at high rates of speed, fighting and chasing each other. It looks like this guy had a chunk taken out of his cheek. My understanding is that the Wyoming ground squirrel is one of the least gregarious of the ground squirrels, so territorial disputes can be rather nasty.

Labels: rural life

"...Any portion of such people that can may revolutionize and make their own so much of the territory as they inhabit."

-Abraham Lincoln

A recent 2Blowhards post wondering whether secession will become one of this year's political themes got me thinking: How hard could it be?

As usual, the comments on that post were many, diverse, verbose and interesting. I had to chime in with my Wendell Berry inspired take on the concept of economic secession: It should be easy, in principle, to "secede" from significant government and corporate oversight just by refusing to buy in.

"...Much of our supposed oppression is self-imposed. We buy too much and make or grow too little. We drive too often and walk or bike too seldom. We borrow too much and save too little. We spend too much money on cures and not enough thought or effort on prevention. We watch too much TV and read too few books. We add needless cost to our lives by our government-supported over-acquisitiveness...

"By taking care of our own business and our own spouses, families, jobs, cupboards and neighbors, we essentially opt-out of most of what's ailing us."

Of course we have to then pick up these responsibilities and carry them ourselves, and that's not easy. Nor would it be easy to secede in the wholesale libertarian sense of circling the wagons and raising a new flag. As everyone's rotating crop of politicians suggests, the governance of a state-level entity is extremely difficult---or surely must be, considering how badly we do it. One shudders at the possibility our political system is already the best around.

So maybe raising a flag and drawing the borders of your new country is the wrong approach. (Although maybe Texas could pull it off.)

I'm more inclined to hide my plan in plain sight: the Neighborhood Secessionist Movement.

The tenets of the movement are simple. First: Find some neighbors and share your stuff with them. Decide what goods and entertainments you can provide for yourselves and for each other (with minimal commercial input from outside the neighborhood), and then do some of that. Do more as you get better at it.

The Neighborhood Secessionist Movement as practiced on my street is not motivated by High Principle of any kind; neither altruism, nor patriotism, collectivism, religious charity nor militant Idaho stovepipism. It runs on good humor, good eats, elementary school children, and shared free time and red wine.

In a post below, Steve mentions H.R. 875 (Food Safety Modernization Act of 2009), which may or may not infringe on the food sovereignty of Louisiana citizens. (I think people's kitchens may be exempt from registering as Food Establishments, but it's hard to say for sure. Looks like local deer processors and CSAs probably should be concerned.)

Assuming we will still be able to hunt, raise, grow, cook and share our own food without being subject to federal penalties, I think these good things ought to be encouraged. And in lieu of higher profile sources of encouragement, allow me to encourage you all with the following snapshots of this summer's Neighborhood Secessionists' Gross Domestic Product.

Matt's expanded beds: tomatoes, leaf lettuce, peppers, herbs, wild blackberries.





Tyler's new mixed veggie plot:


Monique's new tomatoes:


Tonya's new veggie garden and sanctuary:


Eat well, Revolutionaries!

Labels: The Revolution

The first one is of Lashyn when she squirmed into a too small crate with them and almost squashed them. The neurotic old girl had NEVER gone voluntarily into a crate. We got them out by unscrewing one side but she stayed in long enough to snap a photo

The rest are self explanatory-- at 6 and 7 weeks. Silver brindle is "Irbis", the word for Snow leopard and a Kazakh beer; we're keeping him. Cream male is Shunkar, who stays in Magdalena with Daniela. Grizzle boy Jhengiz and red girl Kyra are off to California.

Labels: Central Asia, Country Life, Coursing, Dogs

(They're always out there).

From Dr. Gale Goodman: PETA killed 95% of the animals they received last year. And they dare compare chicken farms to Auswitzch?

David Zincavage reports on Thought Crime in Central Connecticut (which may be in a race with California and Maryland to be the most PC state):

"On October 3, 2008, Wahlberg and two other classmates prepared to give an oral presentation for a Communication 140 class that was required to discuss a “relevant issue in the media”. Wahlberg and his group chose to discuss school violence due to recent events such as the Virginia Tech shootings that occurred in 2007.

"Shortly after his professor, Paula Anderson, filed a complaint with the CCSU Police against her student. During the presentation Wahlberg made the point that if students were permitted to conceal carry guns on campus, the violence could have been stopped earlier in many of these cases. He also touched on the controversial idea of free gun zones on college campuses.

"That night at work, Wahlberg received a message stating that the campus police “requested his presence”. Upon entering the police station, the officers began to list off firearms that were registered under his name, and questioned him about where he kept them.

"They told Wahlberg that they had received a complaint from his professor that his presentation was making students feel “scared and uncomfortable”. ..."

Words fail..

Here is a long, thoughtful, and not at all ranty discussion of how "theory" dessicates literature and does a disservice especially to the student, who is bereft of such things as sympathy for characters and their struggles.

A few paragraphs, a couple going to the heart of the matter to show that even old- fashioned revolutionaries valued high culture, the other to point at a pet peeve of mine.

"Some of its defenders genuinely seem to believe that there is something radical or progressive about the present system. But it is worth stressing how wrong this is. The radical tradition in British politics, as on the continent, was overwhelmingly committed to education as a powerful means of personal empowerment and social improvement, and this attitude persisted well into the sixties. The motivation for replacing grammar schools with comprehensives was not to water down what was taught at the grammars, but on the contrary to ensure, in Hugh Gaitskell's phrase, ‘a grammar school education for all.'

"Even among revolutionaries, similar views prevailed and, despite a positively post-modern penchant for indoctrination, the Soviet Communist Party accepted the centrality of high culture within the school curriculum. While some Bolsheviks sought to replace ‘bourgeois culture' with a new ‘Prolecult', Lenin himself defended the importance of pupils studying ‘the material that was bequeathed to us by the old society.' (!!)

And: "Some schools go to extraordinary lengths to suppress the instinct for knowledge. Frankie -- a pupil in a large inner-city comprehensive -- told me the following story. His school has the sort of discipline and truancy problems familiar enough to many British schools, but in one respect the place is remarkably well organized: every book in the library is colour-coded according to the age of the children who are permitted to read it, and nobody is allowed to take out any book of the ‘wrong' colour. So it happened that the school authorities, grappling with the daunting problems of managing a big inner-city comprehensive, took the time and trouble to track down and punish Frankie for taking out of the library a book on how the mind works, which they considered him too young to read. "

I may scan some photos soon to show exactly what I (and my parents) thought of that attitude...

The most important thing any animal person or freedom lover who reads this blog should do: write, email,and call your Representative and tell him or her to vote against HB 875, the so- called "Food Safety Modernization Act of 2009". This insidious piece of legislation would likely put an end to all small- scale gardening, urban farming, and local markets. It has been nicknamed "The Monsanto Bill". The woman in this video can seem a little drifty, but her points on CHOICE and heirloom seeds are well taken.

The easiest way to do this is go to www.house.gov/writerep : all you have to do is put in your zip and it will give you your congresscritter and how to get in touch with them. When you call their office someone will answer the phone, just tell them (politely) that you are calling to express your views on HR 875. Tell them your views, they'll take your name and address and pass your comments along to the congressperson.

And soon we will have to deal with NAIS as well.

Labels: AR, Country Life, Political correctitude

Annie Hocker sent me this rant from a park ranger. Couldn't make the link work (bug in my Mac I think) but it is so funny I'll print it all. Annie, maybe you could put the link in "Comments"?

"To all "Happy Campers"
Date: 2006-09-05, 12:00PM MDT


Folks, yesterday ended the regular summer season. I am in the West roughly between the Wasatch and the Tetons. I went home and drank a martini. I made it a double. Yes, there will still be more happy campers. But for the most part, Labor Day signals an end to the onslaught of humanity. Yes, we'll still have to put up with rude French Canadians for a little while but for the most part, we've made it through the storm.

It used to be that camping meant pitching a tent and hiking. Or maybe bringing the horses and doing some trail riding. But lately it seems like people are bringing their homes with them. The generators I can live with so long as they are quiet and used within reason. It’s the late night music and drinking that kept us running this summer. I saw more domestics, more of what we classify as "disorderly conduct" offenses, and generally more people being rude and obnoxious to neighboring campers than in years past. And what's with the big screen TV's out in the forest? Can't you cut the umbilical cord with your TV for just three or four days? I went through one campground last night and felt like I was at the freaking drive in.

Listen folks, most people go camping to get away from it all. Who wants to here you screaming at your kids or berating your wife? No one wants to hear your stereo with the Bass cranked up to where my windows are vibrating before I even arrive. No one wants to here your drunken tirades and fights.

Saturday I handled 4 public urination (for the record, I don't care if your taking a leak behind a bush but what's up with you idiots that don't even try to conceal yourself?) 6 disorderly conduct, 2 domestics, 7 loud music complaints, and one possession (meth) arrest. Holy shit people! This is supposed to be camping, not the hood. Your Lincoln Navigator might have a premium sound system with a CD changer but does that mean we all have to enjoy your music? The answer is no. And to you people that cannot understand why the posted speed limit is 15 MPH,,,,it's because a lot of people bring little kids camping with them and these kids tend to run around. To the chick in the Dodge Neon with the Raiders Sticker, yes, you do get a ticket for going 50 in a 15 and no, I don't care that you called my supervisor (neither does my supervisor, she said you talk like a 12 year old that didn't get the prize you wanted from the dentist)

Being a park ranger used to mean a lot of PR, giving directions, occasional search and rescue, first aid, and a periodic encounter with some idiot who drank too much. But now it means responding to the same calls any department handles in an urban area. Instead of smiling at people and letting kids turn our overhead lights on, or petting our horse or sitting on our ATV and handing out junior ranger badges, we have to be on guard all the time looking for tweekers and gun totting survivalists who hate the government or want to use the wilderness as a place to stash shit for the Armageddon. And since when did it become popular to use the great outdoors to kill yourself? What happened to committing suicide in town? Now we have people coming out looking for the "natural way" to commit suicide and frankly, some of the places you are choosing make body recovery an all day ordeal. To the moron from Salt Lake that just had to take the 500 foot high dive, do you have any idea what it takes to stage a deep canyon body recovery when our only access is the river? I had plans that weekend!

Here are some of my summer favorites from this year

To the peckerhead from Denver standing out the side of the road skinning out a dead Coyote. I understand that it was road kill and that you didn't shoot it. My problem is your lack of common sense. Everyone driving by sees you standing there with your buck knife gutting this damn thing. Do you think they know it was road kill? Every widow from Cheyenne to San Francisco that drove by and saw you standing there with your prize had there cell phones in hand faster than Wyatt Earp could pull a six iron.

And to the Californian who stopped to help the deer that had been hit. You’re mad at me because I wouldn't call a vet? Are you nuts lady? This is the wilderness not The Bon Macy's. We do not call veterinarians for road kill.

To the kid that pointed the airsoft M-16 out of your car window at me as we passed on the highway,,, I’m sorry I made your dad wet his pants when I pulled you all from the car at gunpoint but hey, your the one who took the orange top off of your toy and don't you think that you being 16 means your old enough to know better? Hell, I damn near had my own private heart attack because of you. What am I supposed to think when I see a Cadillac with California plates and a big black gun barrel pointed at me?

To the Hispanic guy who tossed the empty Bush Lite beer case out the window,,how is me pulling you over racial profiling? I would have pulled you over no matter what color you are. You ought to get an ass kicking just for being a lazy pig. You paid how much for those rims and yet you drink the cheapest beer on the shelf and you can't afford a littering ticket? I don't think so. I hate writing tickets but you’re the kind that makes it fun.

To the guy taking a crap on the side of the road, do you think that just because your on the passengers side of your RV doesn't mean we can't see you squatting there on the asphalt? There's a whole forest ten feet away! When I came around the corner and saw that I almost crashed into a friggin tree!

To the guy doing the horizontal rumba with your girlfriend on top of the picnic table. Yes, I'm sure it was cool and yes, she is hot but can't you at least wait until its dark???? Not everyone is a voyeur. Someone must not have enjoyed seeing your naked ass pile driving some tart from town or they wouldn't have bothered to call it in.

To the guy who stole one of our ATV's. Don't you think you should have painted it a different color or did something to change its appearance before you start riding it around the same area you stole it from?

To the rest of you real outdoorsmen and women who respect the land, pack out what you pack in, and enjoy the outdoors for what it is, more power to you. But I'll never contact you unless we are passing on the trail and then it's only a mutual hello or maybe answering your questions about weather or terrain.

To the weekend warriors who bring your hate and discontent with you, stay home.

Realistically, 90% of the people who visit the outdoors are great. You make the job fun. It’s the 10% who seek to work overtime to put everyone else out that makes it bad.

The summer is over! Now I can concentrate on a little work around the house and maybe some fishing. Winter will be here soon and life will be good.

Until next summer!"

Labels: Country Life, The West

Spain is worried about its vultures and wants to help them by allowing carcasses to be left out for them. Good for them. I'll buy it all but "killing cows"-- Golden eagles will kill calves, but Griffon vultures on cows?? HT Reid.

Meanwhile, a few American Indians continue to slaughter Eagles for feathers and profit, and, worse, try to justify it. It is particularly hard for falconers, who obviously love the birds, to hear-- we are more tightly regulated on this species than on any other. HT Annie Hocker.

Labels: Raptors

From John Updike in 1992 describing writing book reviews:
"Knitting and purling at these reviews seems to be harder work for me than it used to be; we feel like field mice painstakingly weaving our little nests while the shadows of the hawks swirl all around us." HT Richard Francis.

"If guns cause crime, then pencils cause misspelled words."(Anonymous as far as I know).

In perhaps the same vein: "Blaming Darwin for evolution is like blaming Einstein for gravity." -- Carel Pieter Brest van Kempen.

Labels: Qoutes

Labels: Blogs, Roundup of Usual Suspects

We are in the middle of a big Spring storm that we have really needed. It's been a very dry Winter, and we can use all the moisture we can get. We have about six inches of snow right now and it's predicted to snow through the night.

As usual, this kind of weather has driven a bunch of locals to our feeders, like this downy woodpecker.

And this house finch and white-crowned sparrow.

Over the Holidays, I made a visit to our local aviation museum, Wings Over the Rockies. The museum is in suburban Denver and located in one of the remaining hangars from Lowry Air Force Base, which closed in 1994. The majority of the exhibits are military aircraft and date from the Cold War. I'll cover the Cold War exhibits in another post as I wanted to focus on perhaps the museum's rarest aircraft, a Douglas B-18 "Bolo" .

If you read the Wikipedia link on the plane, you'll see it was the US Army Air Corps' first-line medium bomber in the late 1930s. Only five are known to exist, none in flyable condition.

From today's perspective, when we're flying 40+ year-old B-52s, it's almost amazing to think that this plane entered service in 1936 and was considered obsolete when the US entered WWII in 1941. It was widely deployed at the beginning of the war, and the majority of the bombers destroyed by Japanese bombing on 7 and 8 December 1941 in Hawaii and the Philippines were B-18s.

The remaining B-18s were mostly reassigned to coastal patrolling and replaced by the B-25s and B-26s that bore the brunt of war service. Coastal patrolling was soon taken over by PBY Catalinas and B-24 variants. B-18s spent most of the war as training aircraft or were converted to transports. During the war, Lowry was a center for bombardier training, and this picture shows B-18s on the flight line there with a group of cadets.

Another very cool exhibit at the museum was this Norden bombsight. This was a technical marvel and closely guarded secret at the beginning of the war. I have been reading about these for ages, and this is the first I have seen. It occurred to me that this was the same type bombsight used by Steve's father who was a bombardier in B-17s over Europe during the war.

The NY Times has an interesting piece on Texas rattlesnake roundups. Fascinating that they actually put it in the sports section.

Get your Simon Bolivar action figures!

Nederland, Colorado just hosted the 2009 edition of Frozen Dead Guy Days. I need to get up there next year to give you all a first-hand account.

And speaking of dead folk, here's a profile of Dr. Bill Bass and his famous Body Farm. I mentioned in a post some time back that I worked with Dr. Bass on an excavation project in Tennessee in the 1970s. He really did expect us to go straight for the burials and ignore all the other archaeological remains.

Homeowners in Perth may get to pay their water bill by the flush.

A couple of "Web Miscellanies" back I had a link to a piece on a coyote trapper in the Los Angeles area. Here's a profile of one of his colleagues in Colorado.

And here's a piece on alternative methods of wild animal birth control.

The Roman Catholic Church has a long history of incorporating other cultural phenomena into its ritual (Christmas trees, anyone?). It goes for it again by issuing a prayer book for use with the Latino custom of quinceaneras.

Click through to some wonderful pictures of "armored" beetles in a piece on Nature's arms race.

Get in touch with your inner Captain Kirk by owning a USS Enterprise captain's chair. Beam me up, Scotty!

On Saturday, Jim and I encountered a ferruginous hawk busy with nest-building. The nest we saw being constructed is located amid sea of sagebrush atop a rock outcrop adjacent to a highway. Unfortunately, it is just inside the highway fenceline, and a road upgrade project will reach it in the coming days. The nest is doomed, but the good news is that there are plenty of better nest sites nearby, and it’s early enough that there has been no incubation involved. When we checked again yesterday, there were three ferrgs on the bluffs near the nest. I'm hopeful the female will frown upon the current home construction project and will make her selected mate pick a better location. Ferrgs typically build several alternative nests.

Labels: ferruginous hawk

After a busy morning of computer work, the other day I went for a walk in the afternoon with livestock guard dogs Rena and Rant, and herding dog Abe. It was about 40 degrees and we went up on the Mesa, watching the two bald eagles sitting on our fenceposts behind the house. There are prairie dogs out and chattering, bothering the dogs. Abe and Rena chased a jackrabbit. I could hear a bluebird singing. A couple of young pronghorn bucks were playing, shoving each other back and forth.

As I walked, I was getting ready to step over a burrow in the ground, and I suddenly heard this deep-throated growl that sounds like what I imagine a grizzly bear would sound like, but it was coming from a hole in the ground. I screamed and sprinted away, but within about three steps started laughing out loud as I realized I had heard myself scream, and indeed “I scream like a girl.” Of course it was a badger not happy to have me walking atop its hole. Actually Rena had just snooped around the hole, so the growl was probably meant for her.

Labels: Pronghorn antelope, rural life

Grouse leks are traditional breeding grounds that are fairly large open areas surrounded by sagebrush. Generation after generation of grouse use these traditional sites.

This morning, I went to what is usually a very large sage grouse lek to find only about 60 birds on the vast breeding ground. Last year there were a few hundred birds, and about two weeks ago, we flushed about 400 birds from the area. But since then, there was a snowstorm that dumped a lot of snow, and the lek is back under snow. I’m a few weeks early for peak lek activity, and breeding will take place through April.

It was cold this morning (just below zero) when I arrived, and parked away from the lek. I planned to walk in to photo range, but the snow was too deep, and when I tried, the snow crunched, making my tip-toeing sound like elephant stomps. Fearing I would disturb the birds in already energy-draining situation, I gave up and went back to the truck to watch and listen to the birds from afar. As the sun started to rise, I could see that as the grouse puffed the air sacks in their chests, they also released little clouds of steam from their beaks. First time I’ve seen that, so I really started to pay attention.

As I turned to leave, I noticed there were more grouse out in the thermal cover provided by thick stands of sagebrush. I was driving the noisy flatbed GMC feed truck, which emits a low rumble while it idles (teenagers love it), but was trying to be quiet. I saw two male grouse next to the road, and one wandered away into the brush, but the other stayed close.

I shut off the truck to watch, and the second bird started to leave. I turned the truck back on, and the noise attracted the bird, as he spun around to challenge the truck. He strutted and puffed out his air sack on his chest numerous times, making a drumming noise, tail feathers fanned out behind him. When I shut the truck off, he would calm back down and start to walk away, but if I revved the truck back up, he pranced again. Apparently the noise of the truck must be at the correct decibel level to be of interest to the bird – at least this individual bird.

I watched this male sage grouse for about an hour before leaving. The bird remained, obviously winning the battle against the GMC for breeding rights to that territory. What hen could resist something that adorable?

Here's the handsome male grouse before he starts strutting and puffing:

The air sacks are starting to inflate:

If you click on this next one for a closer view, you'll see the grouse's beak is open:

Deflating:

Labels: sage grouse

A packed house for the HopKins Black Box Theater is about 70 people in folding chairs, the first row seated two feet from the stage and inescapably part of the show.

I took a seat in the back, center isle, elevated by a plywood riser above a stagehand running sound from a school desk. The house settled and the lights dimmed.

For the next ninety minutes we sat transfixed, folded into our chairs and into the story: "DNA Play," a dramatization of the discovery of the genetic molecule. The playwright was LSU's own Vince LiCata, our diversely talented professor of biological sciences. The young Black Box players were wonderful, each so reminiscent of a familiar actor--Neil Patrick Harris, Paul Giamatti, Tom Cavanagh--that you felt immediately comfortable in their hands and smugly certain to get your $5 worth of entertainment.

And so we did; and not only that, but now I can tell you a little about crystallography and the structure of the double helix!

How long had it been since I last saw a play? Two years, at least (that was Cocktail, also by LiCata). Before that, maybe twelve.

If the same is true for you, we've both been missing out. It's hard to imagine a better entertainment value: five dollars (suggested donation!) to enjoy the result of countless hours of hand crafting by a team of talented local artists. The entire company of writer, director, actors and technicians works basically for nothing except a few nights of our pleasure and their own. It is the oldest economic system in the world, and despite the claims of stock market experts, the most complex. The most important.

As we whittle down our expectations of disposable cash--disposable anything--and ponder our creep into relative poverty, these more rich and rewarding pleasures should reemerge: little theater, live music, literature, gardening, carpentry, cooking, hunting. All in the old ways, all to the old standards of generosity and enjoyment.

I’ll do a bigger post about this very soon, but I spent a little time this morning on a sage grouse breeding ground, which is called a “lek.” Since I live in the sagebrush sea, and love early morning photography, I have a choice of about a half-dozen leks that are located fairly close to my house – this one actually straddles a seldom-used county road.

I arrived in the dark, shutting off the lights of the truck as I rolled into the lek, cutting the motor so I could watch and listen. The moon was full and I was hoping that I could be in a good enough position to be able to see the moon sinking over the Wyoming Range Mountains, with the grouse in the foreground. (Yes, I have strange goals in life.)

All was going well on the small lek, with grouse strutting and squabbling, posturing and prancing, and me patiently waiting as the sun began to rise and the moon began to drop.

I started taking a few photos, knowing full well there really wasn’t enough light yet for really good shots, but happy about it because I was in a prime position when we had just a little more light.

Just as that little more light was beginning to shine, the birds suddenly shot into the air, like drunken bombers, noisy wings beating the cold morning air. I frantically scanned the lek for the trouble. Ah there. Leisurely cruising about 20 feet above the ground came a rough-legged hawk. I swear that bird was buzzing the lek just for fun. I had to laugh, because the rough-legged posed little threat to these four- to seven-pound sage grouse.

I have been haunted by a rough-legged for about the past month. I think these are such beautiful birds, and absolutely cannot get a half-decent photo of one. We have one hanging out by the sheep pasture, and I see it every day. It seems to know when I have the big lens, because it takes flight before I can set the focus. When I don’t have a decent lens, the hawk sits on a fencepost and scowls at me as I drive by. I’m sure we’ve got some kind of karma happening …

Anyway, I’m off to another lek in the morning, and we’ll try this again.

Labels: rural life, sage grouse

I had to make a run to the courthouse this morning, and met up with a traffic jam, prompting this entry. Let me provide a short etiquette lesson for cattle drive encounters. First and foremost, don’t get impatient and uptight when you see livestock being moved down a highway. Instead, get out the camera and take it easy for a few minutes to allow the herd to calmly proceed while you enjoy the glimpse of western life. These drives are not everyday occurrences, but are usually major movements to seasonal pastures.

Generally, as long what you’re seeing are not the first cattle about to cross a bridge or other hazard, keep driving, but proceed slowly and carefully through the herd. The cattle will move out of your way, but don’t pressure them too much. Be careful around the cows and cowboys on horseback because you don’t know how individual animals will react to a strange vehicle in a somewhat stressful situation. If you honk your horn, expect to be jerked out of the vehicle for the throttling you’ve earned.

Roll down the window and greet the cowboys/cowgirls/cattle kids. Ask a question, if you want. They’ll appreciate your friendliness and interest. Happy trails.

Labels: Ranching, rural life

Our pithy Patrick Burns, the irascible Terrierman and dogged policy wonk, appeared this week on the prime-time ABC news magazine Nightline. The story by Nick Watt titled, "Best of Breed? Pedigree Dogs Face Disease" picks up on the saga of Kennel Club and Cruft's dog shows recently put on the defensive by a BBC expose of the dog fancy and registry industries.

I say the industry was "recently" put on defensive, but readers of Terrierman's Daily Dose know he's been waging an almost one-man war against the fancy for years. Burns is on camera in the ABC story and on message, as ever:

"Take your own nose and pinch it, then try to breathe," Patrick Burns said of the feeling for a Boston Terrier or Bulldog with breathing problems.

Burns, who hunts in Maryland's fields with terriers of fuzzier pedigree and longer snouts, and blogs voraciously as "Terrierman," is scathingly critical of the dog-show world. "Most of the breeds don't have a function," he said. "They're not running dogs, they're not catching rabbits. That's fine. There's nothing wrong with that. But if their only function is to be a pet, then they have to put health first."

Enjoy!

It seems like spring is a month early this year. The geese arrived the last weekend of February, and the prairie dogs are even peeking out, chattering at me and the dogs.

As you can see from this photo, by last weekend, the snowcover was gone from the sagebrush, and the pronghorn were looking great enjoying the weather. It’s an embarrassment of riches, but all the photos in this post were taken while I was standing in my front doorway.


When I’m in the house writing, I spend a lot of time glancing out the window, and I have cameras at the ready. The pronghorn antelope have been getting so close to the house, approaching Rant the Aziat and snorting at him. He knows he’s not allowed to chase, but he tries to keep them from coming to the yard. It’s a silly truce, because the antelope tease the dog, knowing full well their flight would keep them out of danger.

Now for the sniveling and whining. I spent most of last week in meetings in various towns in the county, driving my son to another town for a necessary trip to a shopping mall (gag, gag), attending social functions, etc. It was a week where I did nothing creative, and my cameras gathered dust. All week was spent with perfectly nice people, but being perfectly nice generally isn’t part of my nature, so of course by Monday morning, I was sick, headache, cold, crud. As I whined to my family from the couch in my flannel PJs yesterday, “See, people just make me sick.” A snowstorm arrived in a swirl, and I vowed to do nothing but read all day.

I felt better today, but had fallen behind on work, so today was spent at the computer all day. That is, until I heard Rena the Akbash raising hell, trying to jump over the yard fence to get out. I put her in the house so I could attempt to photograph the commotion. Someone had killed an antelope buck on the highway in front of the house, and four bald eagles and a few ravens had arrived for the feast.

Somehow, for some reason, two of the eagles went after the antelope herd that had taken up residency here by the house. The herd all bunched together and ran. I didn’t capture it well with my frantic scrambling, but it was pretty flipping cool to watch. The balds were not very serious about trying to take an antelope, and instead continued to play and interact, making their way back to the carcass.

Labels: Dogs, eagles, Pronghorn antelope, rural life

Chas has joined the local volunteer fire department and thinks he may get called to duty during today's Red Flag alert. Early this morning I saw a couple of Army Blackhawk helicopters headed south to help fight a big fire at Ft. Carson.

Cowboy poets get a fair amount of press - Baxter Black used to be on NPR all the time. I must admit I've never heard anything about fisher poets. Maybe I just live in the wrong part of the country.

Tough economic times bring a rise in homeless horses.

A new moon has been discovered orbiting Saturn, hiding in one of the rings. That brings the total up to 61, I believe. In grade school, I remember just trying to keep straight that Saturn had eight moons and Jupiter twelve.

People are coming out of the woodwork all claiming to own this 840 pound emerald. Where do I sign up? That's like 1.9 million carats if my math is correct.

Wild boars (and other critters) are terrorizing Germans. Yes that's b - o - a - r - s.

The fact that we even have to have "Good Samaritan" Laws speaks volumes about our modern culture.

Just as conditions seem to have stabilized some in Iraq, the southern marshes are under threat again. Probably just as well that Wilfred Thesiger has gone to his reward.

Some industrial archaeology has unearthed a bottle of the first batch of plutonium, vintage 1944. Someone call the Atomic Nerds.

Booming business, collecting dead people's debts from bereaved relatives who have no legal obligation to pay them. I'm at a loss for words.

An octopus disassembles a valve in her aquarium tank and floods the Santa Monica Pier Aquarium. Amazing what you can do without opposable thumbs.

I will not argue with the assertion that this is the ugliest cat in the world.

As Connie will be glad to tell you, this horrific horse perched outside of Denver International Airport drives me nuts. Officially known as "Blue Mustang" it is especially obnoxious after dark when the orange eyes light up. I have offered to contribute to a fund to buy C-4 to blow it up. The NY Times tells me today I'm not the only one who feels this way. The thought that I am going to have to look at this every time I go the airport for the next four years is maddening. As I am not a Denver resident or taxpayer, I won't comment on how much it cost.

Just to show I'm not totally closed-minded, I want to point out that I have no problem at all with this sculpture of a giant blue bear peering into the Denver Convention Center entitled "I See What You Mean." In fact, it doesn't seem to strike sparks like the horse does - I don't think I've heard anyone say they didn't like it. IIRC the artist made a batch of small scale models of this that were hot sellers at the Democratic National Convention here last summer.

I can't exactly put my finger on why I feel so differently about the two pieces. I'd be interested to hear how you feel about them.

As long as we are on the subject of art at DIA, this rather strange mural inside the main terminal has set off a whole series of conjectures of how it is linked to secret Masonic symbolism, the New World Order, or the extraterrestrial aliens that are purported to live in subterranean chambers under the airport. Some apparently refer to DIA as "Area 52." The NY Times article alludes to this, but the best rundown I've seen appeared in the local weekly Westword a while back.

Frankly, "Dream of Peace" is rather peculiar and if you travel through DIA I'd recommend you take a look at it.

Pluvialis is posting again. Except I just noticed she dropped her nom de blog and is just regular Helen now. Go on over and welcome her back.

This warm spell we're having came at just the right time for me to get to work on the peach trees.

I hope he doesn't mind. It might have helped to ask...

But Henry sent some nice photos from our Blogger meet-up last weekend, and I wanted to share. I posted some cell-phone quality videos of the squirrel hunting below; here are better images of the hawking portion of the trip.

First stop, a walk across a reclaimed mine site in search of rabbits and birds. A couple hefty feral hogs leaped up from this stuff, none of it more than knee high, and scared the heck out of us.... they are a little more bear than we came loaded for.






There's a bird in there somewhere, dog sniffing around and hawk waiting. I don't think we ever got this one up for another flight.

This one (my new screen wallpaper) captures something about the Harris' hawk that is difficult to photograph.

These hawks are so tame and comfortable in company, their typical photograph shows them puffy and soft. Is it just me, or do most Harris' hawkers wish their birds would pose more like the sawed-off hawk-eagles they are? Here Ernie is all feet and talons and beak and bad attitude. Something is about to make its last move.