Road Canyon

Last year, we were chased out of Road Canyon by the darkness.  It didn't bother me so much, but I guess Valerie felt as though we had unfinished business.  So, this week, we went back.  Instead of clouds and rain like last year, we had bright sunshine.  We made it to the bottom of the canyon by noon.

It is my belief, and I am still searching for conclusive proof, that the trail we used to enter the canyon was originally built by the Mormon pioneers of the San Juan Mission (AKA, the Hole-in-the-Rock party).  The reason I think this is that it had several dugways like the one they built to climb to climb San Juan Hill.  In addition, Road Canyon is in a direct line from "The Twist," which is a famous part of the HITR trail, and the bottom of Comb Wash, which the pioneers followed all the way to the San Juan River.  Finally, the place is called "ROAD" Canyon.  Duh.  Why else would it be called that?

In any case, the canyon itself was (as you might have guessed) spectacular, and the access was so poor as to keep out most of the tourists.  There were a few older tracks, but we had the whole canyon to ourselves this week.  We found a few old Anasazi graneries, a few potsherds, and some tool-making sites.  We climbed on rocks, ate our lunch, and wandered upstream and down.  And, best of all, we made it back to the truck before dark.

Pictures HERE.

Montezuma Canyon

Eight hundred or twelve hundred years ago, many people lived in Montezuma Canyon, perhaps thousands of people.  When we visited yesterday, there was no one living there, (although we did pass one party driving a Subaru).  In their absence, we looked at some of their stuff.  We looked at their crockery; we looked at their rock art; we looked at their graneries.  We even climbed down into one of their kivas—this kiva has been rebuilt by the BLM.

Christmas Eve

For Christmas Eve I skied up Dry Canyon.  The girls were busy with church, and we weren't due at Grandma and Grandpa's until the morning.  I'd hiked up a little earlier to see how the light would be, but returned too late in the day.  It was only 3p, but the sun was gone down low and the only action in the canyon came from a couple of guys with semi-automatic rifles.  I figured I would ski longer than they could shoot, and I was right.  They were gone by 3:45p, but I slogged upward through 18 inches of sugary snow with a crust on top.

I chased the sun for about ninety minutes.  At every curve of the canyon I thought I might break out into its brilliance, but it was setting faster than I could ski.  I finally gave up and scrambled up the canyon wall.  Unfortunately, the thing that makes for a good ski boot makes for poor contact with the rough side of 5.4 off-width crack.  So, I stuck mostly to the brush filled gullies and wallowed up until I had, at least, a view of the setting sun.  I sat there and let the sweat dry and munched a few dry crackers.  I tried the camera, but knew that it would struggle with the division between dark and light.  It was time to give up and go down.

I glissaded off the ridge on a field of loose scree, my camera and tripod flopping.  I skidded down into the darkness of the canyon bottom and onto my skis.  It was around 5p—still, silent, and cold.  This is when time stands still—or I wish it would—alone, on skis, in the mountains, in the growing dusk.  I fell once, hard, when my skis hit a rock and I tried to save the camera.  Where the shooters had been there was now a small herd of deer and they watched as I stopped to look at the casings—a .22 and a .223.  In the dark, I put my skis in the car and drove home.

Cutting a Christmas Tree

When you buy a Christmas tree cutting permit from the Forest Service, it comes with instructions on what you can cut.  Around here, the Dixie National Forest issues the permit, and they only allow cutting of pinyon pine, juniper, and the true firs (white and subalpine).  You may not cut any other pines (pondo, limber, bristlecone); you may not cut any spruces (blue, Engelmann); you may not cut Douglas fir; etc.  It always makes me laugh.  Do they really expect the average schmo from Vegas to know the difference?  Heck, I'm a professional and I sometimes can't tell the difference without a good look at the leaves and cones.  (To give the Dixie credit, this year's permit came with a page of photographs of each different species.)

Sure enough, when we went out to cut a tree for Grandma and Grandpa, the first likely patch of conifer saplings we encountered had been heavily cut for Christmas trees.  They were, of course, very nice looking blue spruces.  Being mostly law abiding at Rural Ways, and not having ignorance for an excuse, we pressed on up the canyon in pursuit of a pinyon or a white fir.  We examined a couple of nice round pinyons, but discovered that their roundness was due to multiple stems.  Finally, along the banks of Center Creek, under a heavy canopy, we found a small, reasonably well-shaped white fir.  Let the Christmas season commence.

Early Christmas Gift

Someone in Parowan knows what Rural Ways likes for Christmas.  We found two bundles of seasoned hardwood on our front porch.  It was such a good gift that we tossed it straight into the fire.  With current outside temperatures in the low teens, our hearts have been, er, warmed by such generosity.  Thanks, Tiger.

The Great State of Mississippi, Pappy O'Daniel, Governor

Actually, I don't know whether Pappy is still the governor or not, but I do know that Mississippi comes top in a number of key measures.  According to the Census Bureau, Mississippi is leading the way in poverty and obesity.  With a day off from the woods of Alabama, I figured this was something I needed to see.  Plus, Keith, one of our frequent contributors, went to college and grad school at Mississippi State, so I thought it might be good to check their accreditation.

It takes somewhat less than two hours to drive from Tuscaloosa to Starkville (which, from what I understand, is pronounced "Star-vool," the second syllable rhyming with "wool.")  I arrived to find a ghost town.  The semester had evidently ended without my being notified.  So, I parked and wandered through the quiet campus.  It was very nicely landscaped and, despite being built to handle 19,000 students, it had a small college feel.  After looking into a few academic buildings and peering through the fence to see where the bulldogs play, I eventually found my way off the campus and into The Little Dooey.

Call me a quick learner, but I have begun to discern that barbeque is an important lifestyle commitment in the southeastern United States, perhaps second only to college football.  Each town, village, or neighborhood has its own favorite barbeque and the debate over which one is best may sometimes rise to the level of whether the Crimson Tide deserves to play LSU next month.  (OK, so I'm exaggerating, nothing rises to the level of what the Crimson Tide deserves.)  In any case, The Little Dooey appears to be one of Starkville's favorites, and the pulled-pork I ordered was as warm and soft and sweet as anything I've tasted.

After stuffing myself, I decided that the only thing to do was nap for the rest of the day, so I got ready to head back to Alabama.  I had failed in my attempt to check Keith's credentials, and I had been unable to confirm any of the household income data, but I had learned one thing:  If every meal in Mississippi tasted like the one I'd just had, there is no doubt that Mississippi is the fattest state in the nation.

Speaking of Loblolly

We were out working by Gabe's Corner the other day, and Lonnie, from McAlpine Logging, had just finished cutting a 25 year old loblolly (Pinus taeda) plantation.  I can see why the loblolly is favored as a timber investment.  That is one productive tree.  The stump pictured below is 18 inches in diameter.  There were others in the plantation that were larger.  Some of the growth rings were an inch across.  On average, these trees made 3/4 of an inch of wood each year.  Easy money, huh?

Longleaf Pine

The longleaf pine (Pinus palustris)—named for its 15 inch needles—was once common across the southern United States, forming pine savannas along the coastal plain, among other places.  Like other fire adapted pine species, longleaf populations began to decline in the years following European settlement due to fire suppression and timber cutting.  Today, however, the longleaf is recognized as an important ecosystem component, and a critical part of the endangered red-cockaded woodpecker’s lifecycle.  As a result, longleaf pine restoration is a major objective of public forest management in places like Alabama.

The longleaf is a productive tree, often growing to 30 inches in diameter in around 100 years.  The one pictured got its start circa 1900 and reached 27 inches before being felled by the recent Tuscaloosa tornado.  While a mature longleaf pine looks like other yellow pines—like a ponderosa, for one—the seedlings and saplings are very different.

The seedlings, in fact, do not look like trees at all, but appear grass-like.  They grow in this “grass stage” for several years and, despite their apparent fragility, are not killed by the ground fires that kill other seedlings.  After a few years, the seedlings shoot up into skinny saplings, often reaching six feet in height before producing spindly branches.  At this stage, they look like green pom-poms on a stick—or like Dr. Seuss characters—with their long needles floating around them in a halo.

Longleaf pine currently covers just five percent of its former range.  It has been replaced, in many cases, with the somewhat faster growing loblolly and slash pines.  Longleaf seedlings are available for planting, however, and you can get 1000 plugs from the Meeks’ Nursery in Kite, Georgia for just $190.  At that price, I don’t know how you can afford not to plant them.  I wonder if they would grow well in southern Utah?

View From the Office

Earlier this year, the city of Tuscaloosa, Alabama suffered a direct hit from a tornado.  The storm also wiped out many acres of national forest timber.  So, this week we are working on tornado clean-up in Alabama.  The basic idea is that we get what wood we can from the trees that are on the ground, while preparing the site for a new forest of, hopefully, southern yellow pine, which is greatly favored.

The Talladega National Forest is more open, more hilly, and more piney than I expected.  I thought we would be working in a deep, dark swamp, but we're not.  It is a lot like the ponderosa pine forests of the west:  Many relatively open stands, maintained by fire, and full of big, pumpkin-colored pines.  Aside from the fact that I don't understand the language they speak here, it is a nice place to work during the winter.

Tilling the Garden

Each autumn at The Homestead, we like to rake up all the leaves from the yard and till them into the garden.  Last year, I turned the garden by hand, with a spade.  I worked at it little by little, and it took a couple of weeks.  This year, I didn't have the time to turn it myself.  For one thing, we had so much windy weather that the leaves kept blowing out of the garden and into the yard.  I was tired of raking.  But, I also had to travel for work, and wasn't going to be around.  So, I went and rented a rototiller from Home Depot.

This is a yearly issue.  How are we going to get the garden tilled?  For a couple of years we had our friend Mr. Free from Paragonah come over with his tractor.  He did a good job, but you need some space in the yard for him to turn around.  We have been planting trees and expanding the garden, so there is less and less space for a tractor.  Plus, despite his name, he doesn't work for nothing, so his cost needs to be compared to other costs.  My father-in-law has offered to kick in some cash to help us buy our own rototiller, but I'm loath to do it.  For one thing, the good ones start at five or six hundred dollars, but what I really dislike is needing to store it.  I mean, we only till the garden once or (at most) twice a year.  So, we'd need to have a tiller in the shed for 363 days of non-use every year.  Instead of doing that, I'd prefer to continue using a spade.  Unfortunately, with 150 square feet of garden, the spade takes more than one hour of labor, which was about all I had this year.

In any case, Home Depot rented me a Honda tiller for $52 for four hours.  I went over the garden about four times in one hour, sprayed the tiller clean with a hose, and returned it for them to keep in the store for me until next year.  I think it is a pretty good deal.  The price is comparable to what Mr. Free would charge, the garden looks great, and I don't have to trip over a rototiller in the shed all winter.