Catnip, Badger, and Rattlesnakes

06/04/2007

So it’s been far too long since I wrote… almost a whole ‘nother week. I’ve been busy… and having fun as well as working hard. Just for example, this morning I woke up at 4 am, and was hiking by headlamp to my first point at 4:30. That’s 7:30 am for you my east coast readers… I arrived at the point right on time at 5:40 am, 20 minutes after sunrise, and began my count. Then I hiked to my other four points, did a quick vegetation analysis of each site, and hiked back. I arrived at Badger cabin at 10:30 am. Then I napped, ate, entered data, and hung out for the rest of the day. Until now.
Let’s see, what highlights from last week? Well, I went into Lakeview on Friday. Called home and talked to Mom and Andrew. I also called Bri and Jan. Jan had arrived safely in WY and was getting ready to head out and stock up on supplies for the summer with her boss. It was good to hear everyone’s voices again. It’s kind of strange how I miss people more out here in the time span of 2 weeks, but while at college I didn’t. I think the realization of the distance is what makes it just seem a bit extreme.
The night before my day off we had a group barbeque at Badger. The food was excellent. A juicy cheeseburger (or 2) was exactly what I was craving. Ten Matt, Aaron, and Berti broke out their guitars, and Alex brought out the mandolin. We had a sing along/ jam session until it got dark and the blue moon began to rise and appear from behind the clouds. I slept in the next morning… 7:30 am. When the sun heated the tent up until it was uncomfortable. This is definitely a desert. Very cold at night… 20 degree mummy bag zipped up with all my clothes shoved in with me as wadding to take up airspace, but as soon as the sun rises it heats up. So you’re hot hiking and comfortable hanging around in a t-shirt and shorts. That’s the one blessing of having to get point counts done early. By the time I’m about finishing up the hurried hiking to get points done in 2 hours it’s just beginning to warm up.
This Saturday and Sunday Matt and I camped out at Catnip because we had 2 days of counts there. On Saturday when we were done for the day we drove to Catnip reservoir, ate lunch, and then I went for a dip with the ducks. Unfortunately they did not want to swim with me as much as I did with them.
Later that afternoon when I was sitting and reading Matt was out around the reservoir with his video camera. He’s planning on making a movie and submitting it to some film festivals. He’s already got some great footage. Anyways, what I was getting to was the fact that as Matt was looking for things to film and walking through the tall grass he almost stepped on a western diamondback rattler. He must have jumped about 2 feet in the air. He then of course began filming it. Later when we were driving to our camp for the night we spotted 2 horned larks mobbing another rattler. Maybe he was trying to get into their nest, who knows. So of course we stopped, Matt got out his camera, and began filming again. I got some great pictures as well. Matt even got a great shot of the snake striking the camera, & yawning so you could see its fangs. So add that to my list of wildlife seen so far.
That’s all for right now, so I’m signing off…
~me