I apologize for waiting over a month to post. Life has been busy, but is finally starting to settle down. Wow, lets see. Well first off I switched to Avery as my field technician. He did a splendid job and now has a graduate position with our lab. I think he will make a fine student. I ended up with 3 broods and a number of predated nests. Poor birdies. And I'm not even sure that my "late nester" actually has chicks. To inform you a little bit about sage-grouse, they typically lay about 6-9 eggs. And in my area they normally hatch by mid-June. This hen laid only 3 eggs (making me think that she had a previous nest predated) and hatched July 7th. Also, they do not typically move more than a few hundred meters for the first couple of weeks. She moved a kilometer from Friday until today (3 days). I will probably need to spotlight her in order to determine if she truly has chicks or not.
Okay, now on to non-work activities. Karen and Jay tied the knot over July 4th weekend. The weekend was filled with activities ranging from brewery tours to 8am jogs around the lake to the wedding, of course. I always thought that Karen and I had similar qualities in the fact that we are both "planners," or have at least been told that in the past. Once you meet her family, which consists of people who decide to meet at the lake at 8am with bibs on the day of the wedding, you understand where she comes from! It's a good thing KP! I promise! It was also nice to see my old Estes gang, and I hope to see more of them next weekend as I return for Lindsay and Griff's wedding. It's a summer of weddings! (not to forget Matt and Katie's wedding in August in Wisco).
Leighton and I have also managed to hit up City of Rocks, a popular climbing spot about 40 minutes north of my field site. Some may say my field site is "remote" and I agree, but it's fun to watch all the other grad students migrate out here for some rock climbing fun during the winter. We also made it up to Sun Valley this weekend. It's SO gorgeous up there! I LOVE the sawtooth mountains! If I ever had the cash flow to purchase property, it would be in Idaho. That state, from Sun Valley north is BEAUTIFUL. Oh, and have I mentioned that I got 2 kittens? We've been having severe rodent problems out here. Seriously, I leave the hoods up overnight and have critters in the vehicles by the next morning. Unfortunately I am too nice to the kitties and provide them with cat food. I need to lay off and have them live solely off of rodents. They love playing and I looked up how to teach them to "mouse," but I guess they just have to learn on their own.
On our way to Sun Valley we stopped by some Lava Caves. Now I was a bit skeptical about this side trip. I'd seen the signs before, but you never know what you'll run into in the middle of nowhere Idaho. Well, we made the quick detour and stumbled upon a few buildings built with pure wagon wheel lumber and nails for the siding. As we entered, we were greeted by a gentleman seated behind a table full of lanterns. We said "$8 each, there's a museum and caves." He paid him with all the cash we had, $15.90, and headed in. As we entered the "museum" we noticed 3 concentric circles which were lined with all sorts of stuffed (taxidermy-wise) animals, from giraffes to cranes. I had inquired about where these specimens had been acquired before entering the museum. The museum-guard mentioned that he had killed most of these animals and said that he followed protocol for getting them into the US from foreign (and domestic) locations. The degree of taxidermy skill definitely varied from specimen to specimen. But I was highly impressed with the variety of animals and artifacts this gentleman had collected. Then, we slowly made our way into the lava caves. We lit our propane lanterns and followed the path. It was definitely a decent size cave and I wish we could have gone farther (the tunnel definitely went further, but a sign prohibited our exploration beyond a certain point). When we returned to the front desk, I asked the gentleman about how far the cave went. He said "well, I stuck some dynamite down a hole where I thought we could go, but it just made it unstable." Haha. Yes, dynamite can do that! But I know plenty of cavers who I'm sure wouldn't mind exploring the area further. Maybe some day. Now I better go teach these kittens to fetch their dinner!
