Making a Come Back

It's been quite a while since I have posted anything. I was thinking I was just going to abandon this blog, but not that I've settled into a new place and am getting out a bit more I will see about getting up and running on this thing again.

I am now living near Green Lake in Seattle. Green Lake seems to be a decent place for birding - at least there are a lot of water fowl there - I'm not yet a good enough birder to be very discriminating. On Sunday I went for a walk down at the lake (after having been inspired to get more into birding following volunteering for the Audubon Christmas bird count) and saw a pair of shovelers, European and American widgeons, coots, mallards, a common goldeneye and few ducks that were hanging out with the mallards but looked different and a bit bigger though I couldn't find them in the field guide (I wonder if they are escaped domesticated ducks?)

Today I walked through part of Ravenna park. It has the only semi-decent ground for tracking that I have found nearby. Unfortunately much of that is heavily trampled by people and dogs as well as strewn with broken glass. I did see a few sets of raccoon tracks though. I wonder how much time they spend in the park. I would guess they do much of their foraging in the surrounding urban areas, maybe just passing through the park to get to the next garbage can, perhaps they sleep in the park as well.

While I was looking at the raccoon tracks, I noticed a couple looking for a winter wren that was chirping in the underbrush. I talked with them a bit and they mentioned seeing a bird that looked a bit like a nuthatch but was small and had white marks on its shoulders a little further down the trail. When I got down the direction they came from I heard several bird calls that I didn't recognize (there aren't too many calls that I do recognize yet), but was not able to see any close up (and I don't have a decent pair of binoculars to help out with the ones further away). It was interesting to me to see the contrast between my bird knowledge and that of the couple. While I had been clearly more comfortable identifying the winter wren, while describing the other bird they displayed at least a cursory knowledge of several other birds which I am not familiar with at all (other than recognizing the name and having a vague idea that they might occur around here).

Scout Camp

There's been a lot going on in the past few weeks, but last week began three weeks of intense experiences.

I'm going to bend the first and second rules about scout camp here.

We left for scout camp in eastern Washington Monday morning and headed back home around noon on Friday. I think I got about 10 hours of sleep while I was over there.

During the days there was a gradual build up of skills: learning to "sink and fade", camo up, choose good hiding places, etc. We were broken up into four clans and at night the game was on. Some people just slept, others were on guard and some went and scouted (or at least tried to fine) the camps of other clans. Most people did some combination of those three things. Each clan had a flag posted up so it was a challenge to go and put things on their flag or mess around a little with their gear without getting caught. In the evenings there was often an organized activity such as stalking up on some people (the instructors in character) around a fire, get as much info about them as we could, grab some "booty bags" stashed around the area and not get caught. For me, those types of events were probably the most fun. I don't remember ever being so creaped out (in recent history anyway) and keeping on being bold(ish) anyway. Definitely an edge stretching experience. It was also fun to see how many times people would walk by when I was motionless in plain view 10 feet away. It wasn't too surprising when it happened when it was dark out, but it happened a couple of times in broad daylight. I probably did the same kind of thing at times and it really makes me think about how often I probably walk by wildlife without noticing it there.

Next week will be a 4 day survival trip in which we are only allowed to bring our clothes, no knives, lighters, etc. allowed. Should be quite an experience, but I hope it dries up a little before hand.

East side

We recently took an overnight trip to the east side (east side of the cascades) near the Columbia gorge. We spent most of our time just exploring the landscape. We saw some very cool things. An owl sitting on its nest, a coyote den, petrified wood, lots of pretty flowers, the site of an attack on a porcupine and more.

The first day we explored along the edge of a canyon with a nearby stream winding between some small sand dunes.

I'm not sure what kind of flowers these are and unfortunately do not have a good plant guide for that side of the mountains, but it looks like it is in the pea family.

I don't know what these tracks are either. I would guess a medium sized rodent as they wandered through the sand often ending in holes a couple of inches across.

That evening I harvested a mullein stalk and got an aspen branch and with a little help got my first coal on a hand drill kit that had been wild gathered that day. That was fun, but it is still a different challenge over here on the west side. I think I could do it if I found a downed big leaf maple of the right size (though maybe not if it had been wet a lot recently), but that is not a given.

The next day we spent in a smaller canyon with its own set of interesting things. There were hawks nesting, more flowers and tons (literally) of beaver sign.

All the fallen trees were done in by beavers. I wonder how much longer the stand will last around there at the rate they seem to be going through them.

A small group of us hiked up to the canyon rim and explored around. While digging a lily bulb we turned up this Jerusalem Cricket. Apparently they eat bulbs - maybe we stole the meal out of his mouth.

I had a great time on the trip, it was a good reminder of how fun it can be to get out with a group of people and how much more can be seen with that many eyes spread out over the landscape.

Knotweed

Japanese Knotweed is an invasive plant that grows in large patches in our region. When I was a kid we called it bamboo (it bears some similarity to bamboo, including large chambered stems). When young it looks a bit like asparagus and the shoots are edible until they become too fibrous (around two feet tall they begin to get too tough to bother with) and taste quite similar to rhubarb.

The Friday after the knotweed expedition mentioned in the previous post we went out for more. This time the four of us harvested around 40 pounds of it. That made for a busy day of processing on Saturday. With the addition of a couple of extra cooks, we ended up making 10 different knotweed dishes - most of them more or less invented on the spot. We made sweet sauce, two savory sauces, juice, stir fry, custard, a tart, a quiche-like fold over, a fruit and granola mixture, and steamed some. I was pleased with the outcome in almost all cases.

Over the course of that Saturday I ended up consuming a lot of knotweed. It is possibly worth noting that, even when still young, knotweed has a lot of fiber which may or may not be a welcome contributor to your digestive system when taken in large quantities. Let's just say I had no trouble with "regularity" that Sunday. (Though I've had knotweed many times in many forms in the past, this was the first time it had such an effect on me.)

Springing out of Winter

It's nice to be moving out of the introspection of winter. Introspection is good but so is action. There were some fun activities the last couple weeks of the winter term. We burned bowls out of logs and purified water in them, had a sensory awareness day spent blindfolded (read more about it on Rees's blog), among others. Then over spring break I went on a vision quest. I had high hopes and high fears for my vision quest. The reality was below such expectations in both cases. In most ways it wasn't as hard or boring as I thought it would be, however I ended up feeling fairly sick the last half of the 4 day fast which really challenged me. I ended up sticking it out, but didn't feel like I recieved much insight during the time. Of the 11 people questing at the same time, my experience seemed fairly unique both in feeling so sick and not experiencing much insight. Fortunately over the following couple of days I had a couple of important insights, which I can't directly link to the quest, but seem likely to have stemmed from that time. I did have some cool nature experiences while sitting out there, including a barred owl flying in during the evening light and perching briefly in two different trees within 10 feet of where I was sitting.

Anyhow... To spring!

The day after the vision quest wrapped up I went out with some friends and took a leasurely expedition to harvest knotweed which we used to make custard, sauce, juice and stir fry. Yesterday a couple of us harvested nettles to make nettle "chips" and today I harvested dock, nettle, and dandelions to put in a stir fry. There are several wild flowers now in bloom as well, including coltsfoot, violet, huckleberry, and trillium.

Tomorrow I'm planning on looking for fish.