Some plants reacted according to my expectations, but I’m puzzled with my okra. Every source says okra will die with frost, but the plants look rather spunky and two plants have shot out beautiful blooms. Also, my Reisentraube tomatoes look quite perky. The thai large pumpkin, though resistant to powdery mildew, wilted immediately after the frost. I pulled out the rest of my Pennsylvania Dutch, and also the serranos (since they were already frozen solid, I stuck them directly in the freezer).

And this was during homecoming weekend, with Gretchen staying here from down South, and KC coming out to visit too!

Since we were under a tornado watch yesterday morning until 2pm (with the NWS issuing us a second one until 10pm), I figured it was going to rain, so I planted okra and carrots, scallions, and radishes yesterday. Didn’t expect such a deluge, and I hope my seeds didn’t wash away. All my seeds this year, except for fodder radish for cover, and turnips, are from last year. The radishes I planted yesterday were the leftover White Hailstones from last year. There are a few volunteer radishes, hot! in tasted, and a few volunteer scallions, which taste a bit like hot peppers though they weren’t near those last year, and the usual volunteer dill and mustard. And one or two volunteer carrots that I’ve tried not to disturb as I create the other beds, but they’re so fragile that they’ve tended to disappear.

Whether or not it’s a good planting practice, I enjoy throwing a lot of species in one bed, making sure of course that i don’t plant varieties that dislike each other. I’m not sure that I’ll be here come harvest time again, and I’m a bit annoyed. But I’m planting it nonetheless. Just not going to plant anything that will cause a weedy mess. There was a warning written on the buckwheat package to harvest it or mow it down instead of letting it go to seed, because it would cause a weedy mess. Two days before I left for north carolina last year, I realized that buckwheat is the same species as bindweed (Buckwheat post). And of course, it went to seed after I left because I didn’t take it down. And there’s a ton of bindweedy-looking plants in the back half of the garden. Joy. And tansy! Has invaded the vegetable garden. What fun.

Rain prevented me from going out in the garden today, but no matter. The weeds will continue to grow and will provide a suitable cover until I can get the rest of the seeds planted. I just have to make sure that I mow them before they go to seed, right? Lessons learned…

Vegetable Plan, 2008

But back to the title. Stumping.

Last summer, I tried to eliminate a stubborn tree from the wildflower garden, by cutting off all the shoots and leaving it under a black plastic garbage bag all summer. Guess who’s back. Well, this year, after learning everything that I learned while with the NCC, I took out the gosh darn stump. Not the stubborn one yet, but the stump of the same kind of tree that WAS in the front of the garden. That was a nice little work out last evening. Though the climate is humid here, I barely broke a sweat. And I had so much fun with the pick mattock, half axe, axe, saw, spade, and clippers. I did realize though, this morning, that from May 2 – May 14, when I was getting a lot of cardiovascular exercise and using my legs a lot, that my upper back strength waned a bit. But between gardening and painting, the muscles will stick around.

Speaking of the (vegetable) garden, I’m dumbfounded at the amount of lambs quarters aka pigweed (Chenopodium album L) that has taken root. A green carpet of lambs quarters. At least the stuff is edible (and in the same family as spinach). I don’t really have to buy any salad greens at the grocery store. The entire garden is covered with the green fuzzies. Although I usually let a patch grow, I have a huge task in front of me. The garden is about 30′ x 50′. I am surprised that the mustard didn’t come back though. A few onions came back, but that’s about it. I’m waiting to see if the buckwheat crossed with the bindweed, and what sort of disaster that will be…

The Mojave Green (Crotalus scutulatus) is the most poisonous rattlesnake in the Mojave, and as with all young rattlesnakes, the young one is the most dangerous. Adults have learned to control the release of venom on a strike to conserve it for hunting, but the youth have not realized this, so when they attack, they release it all. Adam showed us a young mojave green he came quite close to—he had been weeding on the other side of the bush for a half hour before he noticed it—and once again reminded us not to wear both of our headphones if we choose to listen to IPods, Zunes, or other music devices while working. (Note: Adam doesn’t, but many of use do.) Later, Melody saw a 2nd (huge this time) rattler. (Perhaps the small rattler was not quite as young as we assumed; apparently the young are born in July and August…)

Dusk is falling, and the wind is strong. Given the two rattlers spotted today, I think any nighttime wanderings of mine will fall off for a bit. I have only my small LED light with me, because the one that Brendan lent me is a power-sucker. For the first time, I brought no tent on a tour but just my sleeping bag. The weather is colder than I expected, because of the chill from the wind and our elevation, but at least I brought both layers of my City Year coat. When I get home to Illinois, I want to rebuild the firepit in the garden, especially now that I know what I’m doing. The “campsite” I chose has a fire ring. I had decided to sleep next to it, but the wind is so stiff that I created a lean-to from a pallett I found next to the fire, leaning it against the cedar I’m sleeping under, and braced by a close-by yucca. Gotta watch that I don’t impale my head on a branch of the yucca when I lay my head on my pillow.

… All tucked in now. I forgot my hat, but the NCC sweatshirt is hooded. I think I’m facing NE, so I should get some good sun in the morning. Regardless, I’m setting my alarm. Now, the wind is changing directions a bit from my left to from the open area at my feet. Oh well, my bag is rated to 0 degrees.

Wednesday:

My sleeping pad blew away. I don’t want to buy another one this late in the six months and have to lug or ship it home when I go. Maybe I’ll just use the Big Timber (Slumberjack) as a pad though it is much heavier and bulkier to bring on a tour. I want to bring both my fleece blankets next tour—one to drape if need be for a wind block and one to sleep with. The ground isn’t as cold at night anymore, so sleeping without a pad may not be too uncomfortable, but the rocks would make it so.

I will miss the Nevada night sky and the lack of humidity to grey out the stars. Night falls, peace fills.

Thursday:

Melody figured out she is strong enough to lift me, and when we stopped to wash the trucks on the way back to the field station on Thursday, she and Megan attempted to throw me in a dumpster. I wriggled free. Later she said she wasn’t really going to toss me in, but I’m sure Megan would have. Ha, ha.

Yesterday night I just wanted to crash. Half of us had to go back and replace the temporary screens we had installed on the first days of the 4-day tour (Oct29-Nov1) with the tripis (treepees). I composed an acrostic yesterday, but I’m not sure I can recall it completely. Installing the tripis was rough enough as a go-along with the planting, but oddly enough, disturbed-by-water desert soil is just as cement-forming as Illinois clay soil is! I have a new cut on the side of my right pinky, so writing hurts.

Tripi
Rough
Intense
Painful
Intellectual

Intellectual because of figuring out HOW to insert it in rock. A tripi is a cone with three metal legs at least 9 inches long.

It sprinkled today. We seeded purple threeawn, globe mallow, a desert marigold, and chia. Apparently, a tablespoon of chia was enough to keep the Apaches alive when they were on the warpath. Good to know, if I could identify the plant and seeds. The BLM chose threeawn because the wild burros won’t eat it.

We finished at 11:30am today and went on an “educational” hike to Ice Box Canyon. The temperature in the Ice Box was a nice midwestern September/late August evening.

My pack doubles as a pillow, if I keep the top of it relatively empty except of spare clothes. I don’t bring many clothes – just my uniform and a change of clothes for around camp, and my pajamas, and of course rain gear. But the raingear stays in my daypack. What’s the use of bringing it if it’s stuck at camp when I’m in the field?

I’ve been thinking of bringing a fleece blanket to curl up in around the fire. That sentence did not flow right. I want to curl up in a fleece blanket while sitting at the campfire. The gold sweater doesn’t block the wind well enough for my comfort.

Nighttime slumber is much warmer in jeans than my pajama pants. That reminds me — I will also be packing long underwear, since it finally arrived with my Carhartts last Friday.

Two thoughts for tonight:

1. “I love my communte,” said Adam
2. Politics permeates everything and doesn’t wait for the rain.

Washington (DC) has given a lot ($12 million) to the rehabilitation effort out here in the form of a 3-year grant that started 3 years ago. The Mojave, as the driest desert in North America, hasn’t gotten enough rain for seeds planted in the beginning of the grant to germinate. From January to September 2007, the USGS rainguage totaled 0.6″. They (the USGS) are really excited about the plants we’re putting out because they have been grown in by their partners since 2005 and they (the USGS) will actually have some results to show in the desert ground, other than just that the seeds haven’t germinated yet.

Adam (my supe) made the comment about the commute on the way to our last plot of the day as we were bouncing all over in 4-low gear. I also love the ride. I laugh.

I saw my first scorpion today — about half as long as my thumb and just as wide. He came out with a pile of dirt that I pulled from a hole with my bare hand. Eeek! Then when walking to the next plot, I did not know that I had a huge ant with a stinger contraption inside my shirt, and got bitten three times as it tried to escape getting smushed by my backpack. The first time it bit me, when I first slung on my pack, I thought I had gotten a cactus spine stuck somewhere. I didn’t realize I had a bug in my shirt until I got to the next plot and was investigating why the supposed spine traveled up my spine.

I think it is rather unfortunate that I don’t like hot dry weather, because desert ecology is so fascinating. More specifically, Mojave Desert ecology is fascinating. Something like 40% of the species that live here are endemic, meaning that they are ONLY here and nowhere else.

I remember thinking I’d write five more pages tonight, but I’m tired. We worked the Fork and Tramp burn areas today.

I’m writing by headlamp @ 6:30pm, tucked away in my tent listening to the ongoing/ending chess match down in the kitchen. We’ve tailgated these last 2 days and tomorrow night as well, because we forgot to pack tables. I actually prefer not having tables but am outnumbered 9 to 1.

Hackeysack is big with our partnering crew and is quite fun. Hopefully I will find people at my next job who like to play. The word “airsoft” gets no response here.

We’re in the Gold Butte backcountry on the Nevada/Arizona line, and quite near Utah as well. Our job is the same as it was last week — fire rehabilitation, but just in a different area. My palms are raw once again, and unless the forecast for tomorrow has changed since the weekend, there is a chance for storms. The wind wakes me up in the early mornings (typically around 4am); my mind hears small animals trying to dig their way into my tent.

I took a bandana bath this afternoon after we got ‘back’ from the field. The last three plots we planted were in close proximity to our campsite. (I just heard the call for Scrabble go out; chess must be over.) We’re planting with the same process that we were last week — 8 different possibilities — so that the USGS can track which method works best for re-growing burned-out native Mojave desert plants. I am not sure if they plan to use the same method in the Sonoran and/or Great Basin Deserts. The crew members seem to always leave the same method for last, that being the Zeba plantings. Zeba is a hydrophillic starch polymer. How’s your chemistry knowledge?

I chose to plant Zeba all day yesterday, instead of helping finish it at the end of each plot and had a nightmare last night. We’ve marked Zeba by orange flags in the plots, and in my dream, we were planting poisonous orange baby snakes. I dropped mine, and it came and attacked me, only I couldn’t see where it was. I was yelling for help, and woke myself up yelling and pawing around in my sleeping bag trying to find it. I doubt anyone actually heard me, because we were very spread out, and no one mentioned hearing me yell.

So I took a break from it today.

We’re plant pros, now. Our first couple of days last week found us finishing 5 or 6 plots a day. Today, admist a few delays and no more plants to plant an hour before normal stopping time, we had knocked off 10 plots. Tomorrow we are scheduled to complete 10 more and on Thursday, five, before heading back down to Red Rocks and Good Springs to finish the plots out there. Our crew talked about wanting to finish 12 plots tomorrow so that we could have more free time on Thursday; we’re not scheduled to plant anything on travel-day-Thursday — just set up camp.

I think I’ve never seen so many stars — the Milky Way is visible as are all sorts of stars that fade in the distant light of Bloomington/Vegas/(insert city name). My Eureka AlpineLite 2XT tent has vents on the top and though I forgot to open them last night, they are open now. Today was the perfect summer day, although I would have enjoyed more clouds. I’m not sure of the temperature, but it felt around a midwestern 85-90 degrees. I am enjoying the cold nights. Apparently, temperatures begin reaching up into the 85-90 degree range in the end of March, with tips reaching into the low 100s by early May! (Arghhh!)

My supervisor (sup) grew up in Vegas and does not one bit like the sprawly mess that is Vegas. I was quietly tickled when he ranted about the development and mentioned that he was waiting for the natural disaster risks to come to fruitition and wipe out the growth. Since I wish for tornadoes in the Bloomington-Normal and into Towanda area to do the same, it was nice to hear that someone else feels the same about their hometown.

I can’t believe how many people smoke on the crews! But smoke they do. How annoying. I’m quite vocal about down- and up- wind concerning smoking, and most people on the crews are considerate.

Oh, I forgot. I was going to write about our campsite, but tangoed around on a tangent. They call it a ‘town’ where we’re staying, on a back road into the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. It used to house multiple mine entrances, but most are now blocked or fenced off. All the same, we were warned about too much wandering around after dusk. Rusty metal litters the pathways, but BLM considers it archeological in nature and we were warned about moving it around. One of the fences is wood and cardons off 2 grave markers: Arthur Coleman and William H. Garnett. Both are new-looking, and Garnett’s has a flower. Coleman died in the 50s and Garnett in the 60s.

This week (Mon – Thurs), we rehabilitated about 900 acres in Red Rock Canyon National Preservation Conservation area. The USGS partnered with the BLM to create an experiment/study to determine the best method for re-establishing native plants which can take up to 50 – 2000 (estimated based on past data) years to take stock again after a fire (black brush in particular), so we had 8 varieties of planting tasks.

Since the wild burros and horses will munch the plants to nothing if given the chance, as will the jack rabbits, kangaroo rats, desert tortoises, and other critters, we caged the little guys after planting them. On Monday, the BLM/USGS partners announced the cages were on their way from Arkansas and should arrive shortly. Needless to say, they arrived Thursday morning. Damn Arkansonians! =) Between Mon and Thurs, the partners built small screen tents from scrap screen that were very sharp on the edges for us to put around the seedlings.

The BLM fire department helped us today by providing a truck and water hose up to each plot so that we didn’t have to trek with watering cans (or water cannons, as I have consistently called them today for an unknown reason except perhaps exhaustion). I thought of my cousin Will a lot on Thursday since he works for the fire/rescue department up near Lake Arrowhead in CA and was working against the fires up there last week.

Since Red Rocks is in such a public eye, there was a Las Vegas Review Journal reporter out there with us on Tuesday and a TV crew on Wednesday. The reporter’s father played football for Illinois Wesleyan! Anyway, there’s a picture of a coworker and me planting a plant on the front page of the B section. (The photog missed the plant! Imagine that.) The article is good (except for him explaining that one of the plants we planted, ephedra, is used in meth production. Last thing we want is koo-koos running around pulling up our plants…)

As if it wasn’t stressful enough on my humidity-loving body to adjust to 3-15% humidity! I love planting and gardening, and access to water, but my hands….! Planting…mix water with dirt to make mud. Get hands wet. Hands dry in the wind and the soil. Hands get wet. Hands air dry…4 days of that, and 8 next week… Think of a very fine sandpaper and run it across your face, your arms, and try to put on clothes….Ick! The NCC issued us personal protection equipment (PPE): a helmet, safety glasses, and gloves. I don’t wear the gloves at all when planting; most of my crewmembers put them on after the water is done to push dry dirt onto the plant and create burms to hold the water. That’s too labourious in my mind; I just push the dirt with my hands. Needless to say, in the desert when a cactus dies, it returns to the soil and its spines blend in with the soil.

Heh, I just found the story online so y’all could read it, and it had a correction that was published: ephedra was found in a 2001 study to not be related to meth production. hee hee
http://www.lvrj.com/news/1​0911281.html (no longer available) [7 May 2008 I found the article on Scribd.]

Coyotes that ran around our campsite at night… they ran with one of the supervisor’s boots about 100 feet as he found when he went for it in the morning, and they were cavorting around my supervisor’s and a team member’s tent area at night. So far I haven’t seen any snakes or scorpions. Perhaps next week.