Early last week Nora and I spotted a mother deer and her two new fawns. They were munching on the alders around our house. The sight was enough to make me giddy. Their little legs were barely strong enough to hold up their weight but they kept on munching so they could grow stronger. These are the first fawns I’ve seen around here.
As a year of residential learning for one graduate cohort ends, another begins. For Cohort 8, it is hard to believe that it was a year ago that we started this journey. So much has happened and so much has been experienced, learned and mastered. For the new cohort, I’m sure it feels like a whirlwind of a start with classes, books, conversations and adventures like camping, hiking and canoeing.
The 2009 Spring Mountain School session has come to an end. For the members of Cohort 8 our days of teaching abiotic and biotic lessons in the North Cascades National Park are finished, thankfully only in the formal Mountain School sense. Microscope labs, web of life, silent hikes and glacier lessons are things of the past and the feeling is bitter sweet.
» Continue reading The end of the 2009 spring Mountain School
Friday, April 17th I tagged along with Amy Brown and Orlando Garcia, assisting with the Kulshan Creek Neighborhood Program. With the arrival of spring and the return of many migratory birds Amy had a wonderful afternoon planned, which included talking about our feathered friends and playing games. As we drove into the Kulshan Creek neighborhood the clouds that had been hanging around all day dissipated and the sun broke free.
» Continue reading Kulshan Creek kids migrate, mingle and munch
All around the learning center spring is in the air. Birds are chirping, blossoms blooming, mosquitoes buzzing. It’s a glorious change from the blanket of snow that has been on the ground throughout the last few months. Two weeks ago many of us grad students packed up some bags and left for a week of “spring break.” It felt odd at the time calling it such because the roads still had piles of snow on the sides, many trails were still covered, the air was still crisp with a touch of frost, and very few creatures were venturing out.
We returned to the learning center this week to find that our porches, which had been buried in snow from winter roofalanches, now had barely any remnants of snow. The trails no longer required waterproof shoes to keep your feet dry from the heaps of slush covering the paths. Birds have begun to sings and twitter about catching bugs and nesting. The most exciting part of it all however, is that the plants are beginning to blossom.
