Flight to check potential wood cutting area

Things have been pleasantly hectic for the last month. So much so that I was unable to record most of it in this blog. Now that every one has departed for home, I have only my own fertile mind left to amuse me and fill the days. I have caught up on my chores, still haven't run out of rats however. The weed whacker and my brush hog, operated by Sam, next door, have gotten the weeds under control somewhat. Ezra, the resident horse, has not had to eat any hay for at least a month and a half.

This was taken at the beginning of the fly-in the last week of May. I assure you that the Cheat Grass has gotten much much taller in the meantime. He is nice and shiny, and full of  P&V. He was all excited to see John Hauck taxi his airplane in to the tie down area.

We had set the fly in back by at least two weeks, and it wasn't enough. Of course every year isn't that way, but it is just now getting to the point that the winds and weather are beginning to be a bit nicer. I haven't flown much this year, it just hasn't been worth the effort. I did take a short flight to check the water conditions yesterday. I am getting a bit impatient to go fishing, but the water is still really high. Its going to take a bit yet. Yesterday evening was beautiful. Silky smooth, but I couldn't resist a beer for dinner, so I decided to put my next flight off until today.

This winter was so long and the cold seemed to drag on forever, that I burned all my firewood except for three sticks. That also means that I had to use my alternate source of heating, the radiant floors. I don't like that at all. I bought Juniper firewood last year from a man in Burns, and although it was a good price, I am used to getting my own firewood. There is only one problem, there isn't any thing much closer than 100 miles to cut. Last year while on a flight to Burns I noticed that the BLM was cutting Juniper in the foothills of the Steen's. Juniper is an invasive species that has taken over much of the desert lands. The root system is spread out over the top of the ground so as to capture as much of the available water as it can. The growth of Juniper has been known to dry up historical springs. It has become a practice of the BLM to reduce the tracts of Juniper where they can. If you are interested here is a link to understanding the Juniper.

 http://www.oregon.gov/ODF/AGENCY_AFFAIRS/Juniper_Story.shtml

On my flight I noticed that they were in the process of clearing a water run off area, and perhaps a lightning strike burn. I am not sure which, since it is hard to tell from the air. I did know the way in there however and I decided to check it this year to see if it would be possible to have a "close" wood supply. Of course close is only relevant. less than 100 miles one way is close.

The weather for today was supposed to hit the high 80's and winds were in the 5 to 7 MPH range. When I woke this morning it was 51 degrees which is my lower limit for a long trip. I hurried through my chores after I got out of the hot tub, ( mornings are better after a soak, especially when you are a bit creaky) did my preflight and headed out with my first cup of coffee on the floor of the plane within easy reach.

The video shows up a bit on the red side. That is mostly due to the fact that the Cheat Grass is maturing and it turns a dark ?red? color. Some of it is also due to the video camera that I am using. This early in the morning the Sun brings out the red as well. Even though the camera does not record in HD it still takes about an hour to upload onto You Tube so that I can show it to you. Perhaps someday I will get an Internet connection fast enough to make it worth while to have an HD camera. There is no sound track with this video due to the hassle of copy write laws. Hum a little flute music if you miss the music as much as I do.

The neighbors are at Cow Camp now to finish branding the rest of the young stuff for the year. Everyone except a skeleton crew goes up for the branding. The link below will explain what "Rodear" really is.

http://owyheeflyer.blogspot.com/2010/06/rodear.html

The winds aloft were out of the North West at about 8 MPH, but the flight was mostly very smooth, due to the early hour. As you notice I did find some promising possibilities for wood cutting. Now I only have to wait for it to dry out and then check with the BLM and see if they will give me a permit to cut in that area.

The roads there are full of water. You couldn't even get a Quad into there now. It was nice to be able to fly this morning and what would have taken me all day and a tow truck to check out, only took 1.5 hours. The link below will take you to the You Tube video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UAwbAEqTwak

Day trip!

John and I flew this morning to Three forks, primarily to simply take advantage of some decent weather. It started out as dense fog, at 64 degrees. It finally burned off here at the house, so we fueled up and took off to do some more checks on my shortened and improved radio antenna in my plane. I had made it too long, and my range was shortened. I was still able to reach the house at 24 miles, but it was substantially worse than John's radio. We cut it to 23 .5 inches and it appeared to be better, but Karen's test was for me to fly to Rome, where she knew how it sounded, so that she could compare. Since Rome is at a lower altitude, radio transmissions are somewhat blocked by the terrain. The improvement to my radio was much better.

It was a bit bumpy, but tolerable. We dropped in to the bowl that is Rome and the fog layer had only risen to about 200 feet above the ground. We flew through the area, by staying below the fog. We decided that it was probably only local, so we headed out to the SE to check Three Forks. I had to climb up above the fog by flying through a fog bank that was more cloud than fog. I could barely see the ground for quite a while. It finally cleared as we left the bowl that Rome sits in. We bumped our way to Three Forks and my radio was still strong at 35 miles. We turned back and landed at the house. I flew 91 miles total burning 5 gallons of fuel.

After lunch and a nap, John and I loaded up to check out some reported "Calvary graffiti" that was reportedly cut into the rim rock on Crooked Creek a bit further towards the Owyhee. A friend told us of its general location, but she hadn't been there in the last 20 years, and it was fading even then. Apparently a troop on patrol camped there and some of the men carved their names and date on the Rhyolite cliff face.

The Rim Rocks are always very interesting to walk. This year the rain fall has really kicked the grass and weeds into overdrive. I took my Camera along just in case, and I am glad that I did. We didn't find any signatures, but it didn't matter, we found lots of new things to see and enjoy.

Crooked Creek flows along this face and under the road to continue its journey to the Owyhee through the canyon in the distance.

This is the view to the South East. The old wagon road is in that direction.

The Lark Spur is blooming and makes a pretty relief to the harsh aspects of the landscape.

Flowers are in rare and plentiful profusion all over the landscape. Some are fading, while others have  yet to mature.

While it is not unusual for the Rhyolite to have deposits and rocks buried in them, this does not appear to be the normal type of deposit.

There was a line of them in this rock lying out all by itself.

An old barb wire fence keeps the range cattle out of the hay fields. The range here is "Open Range" meaning that you are required to fence your property to keep livestock out, rather than in. A difficult concept for most city dwellers to comprehend.

Some of the formations are interesting indeed.

John is inspecting a Swallows nest under an overhang.

A colony has taken advantage of a large overhang to keep their houses intact.

There were Brush Bunnies here as the terrain favored their survival. The Jacks prefer more open country.

As I was climbing out I walked into a hidden little depression that these Antelope were using to stay out of sight.

Although John and I didn't find the names written in the 1800's, we still felt as though it was a good outing, and enjoyed the exercise very much. A walk taken with all these views and distractions is much more enjoyable than merely exercise.

Fly-in @ Rockhouse.

We are hosting a fly-in for some of our pilot friends here at the Rockhouse. It is a very good place to fly, weather permitting. However this year the weather hasn't permitted very much of anything other than naps. The lawn has had so much water on it that it is getting drowned. So far we are told that we have had 700 percent of normal rainfall. One of the guy's suggested That the old homesteads that are scattered around the remote areas were established during wet years such as we are having now. They might have done well while it lasted, but when it returned to normal, they starved out. I do know that there are some old homesteads in places that are remote to the extreme.

Our mainstay pilot is of course John Hauck from Alabama. Mike M from New Mexico, Gary H from Texas, Toby P from Coastal Oregon, Roger H came over from the west side of Oregon as well. Boyd Y who drove in from Utah, filled out the list of Pilots. Karen's Sister Pat, and niece Mici L came in on the train to complete our group. Another builder from Washington came down for one night.

I had asked every one to delay the gathering until the first week of June, hoping that the weather would moderate. Well it was better, but nothing to brag about. Some of the days were a bit windy, but we still got a lot of flying in. We flew as much as we could, and then retired to the big screen TV to look at each others photo's. below is one of the movies that I did of one of our flights. Unfortunately You Tube is being very strict about copy rights so there is not sound track with it. Feel free to either make motor noises or hum along with it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tT2TQh7H31M

Ben the Hanger Rat, end of the line.

As you are aware I had put out the traps in the hanger for the Packrat that was using my bench, but nothing ever got into them. I switched to fruit for bait, and while I was catching Rats outside of the hanger, I never got any in the hanger itself. For a bit, I thought that he was going out of the hanger to eat, and that I had gotten him. I even built a water trap that consisted of a bucket with about 5 inches of water in it. A pop can that spanned the top that had a wire running through it so that it would turn if anything stepped on it. I had a board leading up to the top and had smeared Peanut butter and strawberry jelly on it. The mice jump onto the can and the can dumps them into the water. All it has caught so far is two mice. Oh well, any less mice at all is a bunch better.

The steel leg hold trap with the Kiwi on it was still set on my bench and was getting no action at all. The Victor rat trap with a small piece of onion on it had been sitting there all along and was getting no action either. The paper plate with the Oatmeal in it was getting hit each night.  I still had a rat living on top of the fuel tank under the Motor home, so I switched to a slice of Fuji Apple in the live trap that I had set under it.

This morning when it got light enough to see, the apple slice had proved too much for the Motor home rat.

What a relief to catch this guy. They are so distructive it is unbelievable. They can reduce wiring to its basic elements in a short time.

Well, that made my day. I went on to do my morning chores. I put the hawks out and went in to the hanger to check the traps, mostly out of habit. When I went into the hanger its self, I was struck by the Packrat stink that seemed to permeate the entire hanger. I looked on the work bench and the Victor trap was missing. Josie and I started looking around and finally found the rat and the trap back by the plane. The surprising part was that the rat wasn't dead.They are tough critters. That Victor doesn't mess around, but it wasn't enough to kill him even with a direct hit to the neck.

That was just fine with Josie, no body asked the Rat what he thought. All in all it was a good day. Josie got two rats to play with and I have two less Rats to deal with. Josie is coming right along with the program. She was one year old yesterday, and maturing more and more. One of the rats bit her on the lip, but she never flinched. She just yipped and changed her hold. She is beginning to look for them now. She is the one that clued me in to the one living under the Motor home.

That makes 10 Rats to date, and the summer is young.