Author: keely

HARNESS THE RIVER

I woke up thinking about water.  I was remembering two places in Wyoming we had stopped at to watch water thunder down in its rocky prison and shoot out across a edge, making a waterfall.  One was here, this picture above, which is probably a common stop in Yellowstone National Park (the North Rim of the Upper Falls), and the other below was a less common stop, somewhere just outside the Beartooth Mountain range northeast of Yellowstone.

In both places, I was impressed with the amount of force the rivers were generating on their fierce downward path.  I had a passing thought of wondering how that power could be harnessed, as a form of natural energy.  But I didn’t finish the thought in terms of what would happen to the river then, to these awe-inspiring views.

 

Lately I have been reading this book, Making a Difference, by Amy Irvine.  It is essentially short stories about various environmental projects sponsored by the Outdoor Alliance, and their subsequent outcomes. I think everyone should read this book, because it inspires you to be aware of what is around you, and how one person really can make a difference in this world.  It also is a primer on some of the environmental issues of our times.

Some of the stories center on water, on prevention of dams being built that would allow energy providers to harness the water as a source of energy.  To harness the river would also prevent it from reaching those it actually does give energy to – the animals and plants that depend on it to fill a niche in their habitat.  At the same time, though, we will need to look for cleaner, renewable energy sources.  So is there a way to provide power in which both humanity and nature are the winners?  Or at least where there are no losers?

Underwater wind turbines may be part of that answer.  There are some other new low-impact answers out there as well, such as “power pontoons” and making the turbines in the dam more effective.  From what I can tell from googling answers on the internet, it appears that the Department of Energy and the major players and innovators are trying to come up with solutions that keep in mind the environment while maximizing energy.

I’ve been saying for a while that the next major war will be fought not over land, or oil rights, or weapons of mass destruction, but over water rights.   Only time will tell if my prediction is correct, or if humanity can find our way to balance the demand to sustain human life against the demand to support others in the ecosystem without fighting each other over it in the meantime.

Travelogues: Montana, GCNKHO – Custer’s Back Roads

Back to the story of past travels:

Last year in June (’10), we were making our “maiden voyage” together, driving 5000 miles across America.  I have told the story in past entries of making our way across Texas, spending the night in Palo Duro State Park, checking out the Cadillac Ranch, driving through New Mexico and into Colorado, some of the our favorite caches in Colorado.  After spending a night in Colorado Springs, Rocky Mountain National Park, and then Fort Collins, we were finally able to make our way into Montana. Pics of RMNP forthcoming….

Ah, but first we had to get through Wyoming.  Why, oming?  Why you so boring?  It was a long day of travel before we got near the former Indian lands near and north of Custer’s Last Stand.  We actually STOPPED by the scene of this famous battle, and it was mildly interesting, but our favorite stop was by the cache whose title is that of this entry.

We were not far from the highway, but it felt like we were in the middle of nowhere, and the last people on earth.  As I opened the truck door to find the geocache, I spooked some antelope, which bounded off into the distance.  It was so peaceful here, and no sound except us.  It is a place in my mind I will go to time and again, a little memory treasure.

Houston Audobon Society: Edith L Moore Nature Sanctuary

440 Wilchester Blvd, Houston, TX 77079

I visited this nature sanctuary location for the second time today.  We wanted to go check on a geocache we hid in there together about sixteen months ago.  When we hid our cache, it was the only one in this little wooded oasis of 17.5 acres in West Houston, in the Memorial area.  Now there are three more, and we found those other three today while out there.

We also brought our new field guide for birds, and tried to identify the ones we saw.  Even though our field manual (National Wildlife Federation’s “Field Guide to Birds of North America”, 2008 version) is broken up into bird family sections and has great pictures, it is hard to use it to identify on the fly.  I was trying to flip through quickly to find the one we had in the sights with the binoculars.

We spent about an hour or two walking around out there, looking down for caches and up for birds.  On the way out, we picked up some literature at the cabin, some that had upcoming events on it and one that listed the common birds found at the park.  This last one helped confirm some of our sightings.

Species seen at park today:  Blue Jay, Northern Cardinal, Tufted Titmouse, Carolina Chickadee.  Possibly Inca or Mourning Doves, since that is what the sheet lists as residents of the sanctuary, although both J and I feel, after comparing our field guide pictures to what we saw, that the doves we saw by our geocache were Eurasian Collared Doves.

The trail that leads to our particular cache was actually closed, although the trails leading to the other three are actively open.  This trail, and pretty much the whole back part of the park, is closed mainly due to dead trees from this year’s drought.

This history of this little nature sanctuary is interesting.  The property was purchased in 1926 by Edith Moore and her husband.  They hand built the cabin and structures on the property, and raised pigs there.  When Edith, now a widow, was close to the end of her life in 1974, she did not want the family farm to be swallowed by the city, as everything else around had been.  So she willed the property to the Aubodon Society, with the promise that they would retain the original structures and allow nature to live freely there.

More information on the Houston Aubodon, special programs, and the sanctuary can be found here:  http://www.houstonaudubon.org

I Spy

Last week at work, I saw an unusual bird hanging out in the mid-foliage range in our little mini-forest that borders one side of the property.  It was striking in appearance, and of course I wanted to solve the mystery of what it was, since birds have been on my brain lately.  Without a field manual, I was reduced to googling bird websites and images until I found a bird that looked like what I saw.  

The image that matched the most was for a prothonotary warbler.  However, the websites I was reading about this bird on suggests that our area is not within the typical range for this one.  So I started to think I was chasing another “zebra” and investigating other similar looking warblers.

However, I did learn something interesting about this bird while I was snooping around online.  This little bird was central in a House of Un-American Activities trial as evidence of Alger Hiss being a spy.  Also, it helped a certain junior senator named Richard Nixon climb his way up the political ladder.

Apparently what needed to happen in the trial to help convict Alger Hiss was to link him to a man named Whittaker Chambers.  Nixon and his team were trying to prove a link between Hiss and the Communist Party.  Chambers had fingered Hiss as a spy for the Communist Party, but Hiss denied any involvement and any knowledge of Chambers.  Finally, after some days of back and forth involving cars and pseudonyms and whatnot, it was Hiss’s quick admission of his seeing the prothonotary warbler, and Chambers telling Nixon about the sighting the day before, that helped link them together.

After a second day review of birding websites, I found one that had an interactive map for different species with sightings colored in in various parts of the world.  For this species, there was a clear band of sightings going from Sugarland to Pasadena, of which my work is right in the middle, so I think after all, I too might have had an unusual sighting of this bird.

Maybe I shouldn’t run off and tell everyone about it, though.  After all, that evidence could be used against me in a court of law. 😉