Welcome to my burned up work world. Yes, it's the land of ugliness but filled with rebirth (and ash grey undies). Pant legs become filled with oils from the sticky and pungent bear clover, stickers from an ever-present plant that has seeds that cling to almost everything and the ash/dust combination that penetrates and sticks to our perspiration-coated legs. In some areas, trees were literally incinerated, leaving needleless snags and sterilized soils. In other areas, the fire benefitted the forest, killing off smaller trees that really didn't belong there in the first place, due to decades of fire suppression. Many streams have renewed flows, because the overstocked stands of trees that depleted ground water now have much fewer to zero trees taking up water.

It IS important that we reduce large amounts of these dead trees, to prevent the inevitable future fires from sterilizing soils, causing significant erosion and allowing brush species to dominate for decades. Careful planning is only allowing about 50% of this medium-sized to be salvage logged. Snag patches are set aside for wildlife, such as black-backed woodpeckers and flickers to thrive on. Long-neglected roads are being fixed so that they don't erode and supply sediment to already impacted streams and rivers. Many good things are being done with the dollars generated from the timber off this project.

It certainly is a challenge for me to balance the issues and impacts and I am doing my best to serve the American public. I definitely try and distance myself from the timber industry's wants and demands. It's a fine line between "restoration" and "opportunism".

These first three pictures were taken from nearly the same spot, at Budd Lake in the Cathedral Range in the Yosemite High Sierra. It's just a few short miles from Tuolumne Meadows and the Tioga Pass road and always a great place to go when the Valley is crowded and hot.

This picture was taken on the way up, as I took a little cross-country detour from the main trail. I usually try to go and take pictures where other photographers don't go. If you want a closer look, click on the picture and you'll see a larger version. Enjoy!

PS My Fire Salvage project has started up and will be taking up oodles of my time. I did, however, take some cool logging photos and as soon as I can upload them off my government camera, I'll post some of them here.

Pickle Suit

Yep, I've never worn this in public yet but, I guess this kind of counts....lol. Sometimes they will be wanting me to work in this get-up. Yeah, it'll look nice with a few different colors of timbermarking paint, some coffee, some ash and plenty of dirt (at least there won't be any chewing tobacco spewage). Mom will be soooo proud!

Scenic pics from across the country

I tend to think that most people want to see scenic pictures instead of work pictures. The good thing is that I often take scenic pictures while I am working! Our National Forests are full of scenic places so, without much further ado, here's a few from places across the country where I have worked.

Actually, I didn't really "work" here in Zion National Park but, it was a working vacation. Somehow, I hit Zion at THE perfect time in the winter, when it was sunny and not at all hot there. I did have some troubles with the sun being so low in the sky at that time of year but, ya takes what Mother Nature gives ya.

I didn't actually work here either, but I did work in the Black Hills and had an hour to kill before my flight out of Rapid City. This natural rock formation is an irresistable picture magnet and I, like soooooo many other tourists, snapped this one. I rather like the diagonal motif and the intense black of the shadow.

OK, I actually WAS working in South Carolina when I took this picture of a nice beech tree. They generally don't have the bright colors of a cherry or a maple but it did turn out quite nice with the backlighting. Fall on the Sumter National Forest was VERY enjoyable.

The woods of Arkansas in the Ouachita (pronounced Wa-shi-tah) National Forest were awfully thick with hardwood trees. Somehow, this picture exudes mystery, making you wonder what is just out of sight. This is a rather young stand with mixed shortleaf pine and hardwood trees. My Mom told me that my grandfather used to come down here from their home in Illinois to go hunting and that the family almost ended up moving here, at one point.

While surveying for sensitive goshawks (a inner forest hawk and a "species of concern" for the Forest Service) in the Black Hills, I happened upon a doe with newly born twin fawns. It looks like they had just been cleaned by mama after their birth and could barely even stand. The standing one tried to take a step but, it was too much and eventually both laid together, waiting for me to leave and for mama to come back.

Most people haven't seen a forest fire up close and personal. So, I'm here to give you a glimpse as to what it looks like when the fire chases you out of the forest and into a "safety zone". We had been going to "burn out" along a dozer line when the flames came roaring upon us. Those flames are about 120 feet tall and you could feel the heat at that distance. Firefighting is very hard work and you develop a very close bonds with your fellow firefighters once you've spent a long, hot summer night in the trenches, knocking down the flames. You often do not know what is going on around the rest of the fire, knowing only that your portion of the line has held.

An ongoing drama was whether the pickup truck in the foreground was going to get burned, or not. One of the first firefighters on the scene parked his truck in the meadow, well away from the original fire. Unfortunately, he took his keys with him and no matter what we did, we couldn't move the truck farther from the oncoming flames. The paint did get a little blistered before the flames died down that night. I worked on this fire for a 30 hour shift but, it wasn't all that intense, compared to bigger fires. This one was fun

Here's what I see everyday in my current assignment as a Timber Sale Administrator. It's up to me to monitor the loggers and make sure they follow the stringent laws, rules and policies in the complex timber sale contract and to protect invaluable natural resources. In this project near Jackson, California, I'm salvaging burned timber from last year's Power Fire.

In the above picture, the timber faller has just felled this tree alongside a road and his skill has made this tree fall up the hill and not on the road. The most dangerous job in America is felling trees, far more dangerous than a policeman or fire fighter (not even in the top ten).

This machine is used for "decking" logs and loading them on log trucks. He's having to sort out these logs into different sizes and bring some order into this "log landing", a flat place on a road that logs out in the woods are "skidded" to.

And, finally, this work is quite physical and has taken its toll on a co-worker of mine. I just couldn't resist snapping a few pictures of Brian catching a catnap at the end of our lunch break. Anyone wanna work for us?!?

More pictures

This blog is mostly about pictures so I'll post some more. These all came from a late spring trip to Yosemite Valley when all the waterfalls were gushing, bigtime. Sentinel and Ribbon Falls were both as active as I have ever seen them. Yosemite Falls were just awesome in its power and majesty. Hopefully, I'll figure out how to post a video I took on that day.

Upper Yosemite Falls was roaring that day and I couldn't have picked a better day to go to the Valley and play with my camera.

Bridalveil Falls is always a favorite because it's the first falls you see as you enter the valley.

Sentinel Falls is often missed by the average tourist and even non-existent in dry years. Someday, I'll climb up there and get some closer shots but, on that day, I was taking advantage of my 10x optical zoom.

Public Servitude

Yes, I AM a public servant and I anticipate that I may have to go to Mississippi to help deal with the hurricane damage. That would probably come next spring when the authorities figure out how much of the National Forests down there are impacted by blowndown trees. Yep, and there'll be plenty of snakes as we crawl over and measure the valuable timber that is piled up everywhere. I have worked in Arkansas, Oklahoma and South Carolina in their forests and I had to dredge up my 25 year old Dendrology knowledge, somehow lurking in my brain after all these years. Can you say "Quercus pagoda"?? (Cherrybark oak) Sure ya can.

Yesterday, I exposed my co-worker to the world of profesional timber fallers. (BTW, a faller is a feller with his tree on the ground). We're supposed to monitor these guys as they cut down HUGE trees within the burned area of our timber salvage project. It's quite dangerous and my experience tells me where I should stand to watch and whre I shouldn't stand. The skill of these guys is amazing, how they can put giant trees right where they want them to go (and right where I want them to go, with a minimum of breakage on steep and uneven slopes). My co-worker was very afraid and watched from even a further distance away. We watched one poor guy who hung a tree up in another standing tree, trying to fall other trees into the hangup, to finally get it on the ground.

The above picture was taken in Arkansas. I've got my snake chaps, cruisers vest, hardhat and snake stick. If I remember correctly, that day was filled with briars.....lots of briars.....lol

Number one posting

This is my first official blog posting but, I am no stranger to an ancient form of blogging known as USENET. I've been "blogging" on alt.forestry for 8 years now and I hope I've made a difference in how people view the environment.

I will be posting pictures I take in my travels and commenting about them. I hope you will enjoy both my camera eye and my observations about our natural world.

Here's a pic from my latest collection of Yosemite photos. If you look REALLY hard (or click on the pic), you can see the teeny tiny climber approaching the top. John Muir first climbed and named it Cathedral Peak, because it was the first time he had been in church in California (grin) .

Enjoy!