Chattermarks

It’s hard to imagine a more inspiring place than the blooming, alpine meadows of the North Cascades to take a wildflower photography class, or a better instructor than Mark Turner, co-author of the Wildflowers of the Pacific Northwest handbook.

On July 19-21^st with 15 photographers under his wing Mark embarked on a 3-day wildflower photography workshop. On day 1 we did class work (ie: learning your camera and some tips and techniques) and on days 2-3 we undertook amazing hikes and field excursions to implement what we learned.

» Continue reading Wildflower photography with Mark Turner

As spring slowly transitions to summer in North Cascades National Park, reminders of the adventures that await North Cascades Wild (NC Wild) participants are everywhere in the landscape. But before embarking on the 12-day backcountry journeys, these students must be  prepared.

Thanks to the third and final day trip of the 2010 spring season, eleven of the 54 high school youth that will be participating in this year’s NC Wild trips are now better prepared in both canoeing and service work.

On Saturday, May 22nd, participants from Skagit and Whatcom counties traveled to the North Cascades Institute’s Environmental Learning Center on Diablo Lake to spend a day with NC Wild instructors Amy Brown, Kelsi Franzen, Mike Parelskin and Corey White, and North Cascades National Park Volunteer Coordinator, Mike Brondi.

» Continue reading NC Wild pulls weeds & plants seeds of excitement

All over Washington, the earth is reawakening. Can you see it?

In a period of only a few weeks, spring has come – a monumental paintbrush caressing the landscape, stirring it back to consciousness. Dabs of bright white, pink and yellow compliment deeper streaks of lavender, red and orange, all placed upon a backdrop of fresh green. Buds change to blooms on wildflowers and the hardier of the tree species sport new-growth fuzz.

I always feel so fortunate to stand witness to this spectacle, this miracle of life. From the western Washington’s Salish Sea shores to the contouring curves of eastern Washington’s Palouse Hills, I have made an attempt to capture the most current evidence of spring in our state’s many ecosystems.

Below is a detailed photographic guide to the spring blossoms of three distinct Washington ecosystems – western Washington’s Ebey’s Landing National Historical Reserve on Whidbey Island, eastern Washington’s Kamiak Butte in the Palouse Hills and the North Cascade Institute‘s Environmental Learning Center in North Cascades National Park. If you do not have enough time to read it all through, just glance through the photos and see if you can’t spot these beautiful spring colors in your own home ecosystems!

» Continue reading Painting a Washington spring portrait

North Cascades Highway is nearly open. The snowmobiles are put away, the traps are closed for the season and the wolverine crew has moved on to other endeavors. A few camera stations wait to be collected—hopefully holding a few late-season wolverine pictures on the memory cards. Yet there is one last aspect of the 2010 season that we all wait on.

Somewhere on a shelf in the office are vials with dates and GPS coordinates carefully recorded. Inside is blue desiccant and wolverine hair. In a drying box outside the office door is a collection of wolverine scat. This is the culmination of yet another aspect of the wolverine study in the North Cascades—following wolverine tracks to collect hair and scat.

To this end, members of the crew took several trips into the backcountry in search of the elusive wolverine. Multi-night trips. Backcountry skis and sunblock. Other people do this sort of thing for fun, but this was for science. Someone had to do it, right? In our defense, it is a bit of work. Heavy packs and cold nights. And a lot of GPS work. Everything had to be recorded—the exact route followed, any tracks encountered, and a plethora of details of weather and snow conditions. Not your usual backcountry trip in search of slopes of deep powder. A scientific expedition in search of wolverine tracks. But hopefully a few good turns in the process.

(Title) In search of wolverine tracks on the east side of the Pasayten Wilderness (Above) Brandon and Adam begin their search on the way to Sawtooth Crest

» Continue reading The magic of wolverine tracking

Spring’s presence is not the only thing that North Cascades Institute is welcoming at the Environmental Learning Center this season.

As the season continues to reveal itself more each day, whether it be through the scent of black cottonwood blossoms dancing on a wind from Diablo Lake or the more frequent blue skies serving as a backdrop for the steep, snow-coated hillsides of Pyramid and Colonial Peaks, an even newer welcoming has taken place in the North Cascades.

On March 16th, for the spring staff retreat, a plethora of Institute staff from both up river and down valley gathered on the shores of Diablo Lake to welcome the Institute’s newest family member—the big, BIG canoe. This 36-foot canoe—made by Clipper Canoe in Abbotsford, British Columbia—holds up to 18 paddlers on any given excursion. Its black exterior, red interior and wolf-like decorative bow are indicative of the traditional design and coloration of canoes in the Coast Salish culture.

(Title) The graduate students travel in the new big canoe, Photo by Saul Weisberg (Above) The new canoe tests the waters of Diablo Lake, Photo by Christian Martin

» Continue reading Welcoming the new canoe

Harbinger—a presage, a foreshadow, to announce. Something that precedes and indicates the approach of something.

We all experience the wildness of the North Cascades differently. Each of us, in our own way, notices subtle details of the seasons changing in this ecosystem that others may miss completely. In order to tell a more beautiful story, paint a more vivid portrait, we must combine our individual details to articulate the true forms that nature takes in the beginning of spring.

Perhaps it is the calls and presence of varied thrushes in the neighboring forests. Maybe it is the emerging blossoms on cherry trees amidst farmland. Or perhaps it is a detailing so slight, understated, almost unnoticeable, that its mystery is its draw.

The staff and graduate students of North Cascades Institute’s harbingers below announce the presence of spring in the North Cascades and Skagit Valley in a way that draws upon the communal knowledge of having lived in this place for decades to only several months. Each perspective is important to paint that vivid portrait, articulate that poetic story of spring.

(Title) A rainbow across Ross Dam signals the coming of spring in the mountains (Above) Red alder leaves reach out from beneath bud casings at the Learning Center

» Continue reading An Institute ode to spring

You would think it wouldn’t work.

First of all, the wolverine is an elusive creature. It inhabits the untrammeled heights of mountain ranges and is rarely seen or documented. So far this season, with ten traps open every day, we’ve captured just one wolverine. We’ve seen few tracks. But still, this winter we’re trying something new—getting photographs of the chests of wolverines. It is an idea only recently pioneered by Audrey Magoun, a wolverine researcher in southeast Alaska. And it is a brilliant idea.

Wolverines, it seems, have variable markings of light fur on their throats and chests. So variable, in fact, that each wolverine, if looked at closely, has a unique chest pattern. And therefore, with the right picture, we could tell them apart. A brilliant idea, truly, but in practice… It would seem that getting any picture of a wolverine would be a lucky convergence of circumstance, but to get a specific picture—a wolverine in a specific pose, well, it seems like wishful thinking. But then again, most great accomplishments start as silly dreams. The credit for the accomplishment of this silly dream lies to the north, with Magoun and her team of field people, who took an idea—getting pictures of wolverine chests—and made it happen. We’ve just followed their lead. But it is still exciting.

» Continue reading Capturing the Cascades wolverine

North Cascades National Park archaeologist, and long-time Institute field instructor and former board member, Bob Mierendorf is prominently featured in an excellent new article just published in Washington State Magazine, published by Washington State University. In “Of Time and Wildness in the North Cascades,” Mierendorf interprets his important work in documenting native presence in the higher elevations of the North Cascades:

Mierendorf has spent the last couple of decades trying to convince the archaeological establishment that pre-contact Northwest Indians did not confine themselves to the lowlands, but lived in the North Cascades and frequented the high country. When Mierendorf first started working at the park, Cascade Pass was one of 17 archaeological sites identified within it. Since then, he has identified nearly 300 more. Forty-five of those sites are located between 4,000 and 7,000 feet.

Obviously, population densities in the mountains were nowhere near what they were along the more hospitable coastal lowlands. Mierendorf argues simply that lower density does not mean absence. An earlier assumption by archaeologists was that Indians actually avoided the mountains, and any contact between coastal and interior tribes was accomplished by traveling along the Columbia Gorge. Mountains were a barrier, not a destination. The idea that prehistoric people crossed the Cascades on foot was simply incomprehensible.

Such an assumption is certainly understandable. The North Cascades is tough country. Even though only two volcanic peaks are higher than 10,000 feet, the deep glacier-carved valleys create dramatic local relief, often as much as 6,000 feet between valley floor and peak.

Alexander Ross, a fur trader with the North West Company, made the first non-Indian crossing of the North Cascades in 1814, from east to west, guided by an Indian. “A more difficult route to travel never fell to man’s lot,” wrote Ross.

So why was the question of the Indians’ presence in the mountains such a mystery? Why didn’t archaeologists just ask the Indians?

This article is a significant contribution to the public’s understanding of the cultural history of the North Cascades, and the Institute is understandably very excited to share it widely. You can read the rest of the article here.

In the next week or so, we’ll be opening registration for our spring and summer programs in the North Cascades, including Mierendorf’s long-running, popular field excursion on Ross Lake that explores the region’s cultural history, from native uses through to miners, fire lookouts and the park service (see photo at top of post). “Ross Lake by Boat and Boot: People and Places of the Upper Skagit” takes place July 22-25, with Captain Gerry Cook piloting the Ross Mule, your floating classroom for this exciting learning adventure. (While we can’t offer registration quite yet, you can send an email to nci@ncascades.org and we’ll let you know as soon as it is open for sign-ups!)

» Continue reading Bob Mierendorf and the pre-history of Cascade Pass

Along the Skagit River, the month of December marks the beginning of an incredible display of interaction among two of western Washington’s most prominent species – eagles and salmon.

The Skagit, whose headwaters begin near Hope, British Columbia, travel by the North Cascades Environmental Learning Center, and end in the estuarine confluence of Skagit Bay southwest of Mt. Vernon, is the Puget Sound’s largest river and second in size only to the Columbia in Washington. All 5 Pacific salmon runs, including sockeye, chum, chinook, pink and coho, reach up along various locations of the Skagit.

With an especially high pink salmon run, an estimated 1.2 million salmon by Washington state fish biologists, along with a current chum spawning run, this season could make for some surprising eagle sights.

» Continue reading In the presence of eagles

Tell me about a path less traveled and I will take it.

In the North Cascades National Park, there is such a plethora of paths to choose from when planning an adventure that it seems so many can become overlooked. On cold winter days, when light is little, I aim to try out these less-traveled paths.

Stetattle Creek trail is one of those paths. Perched on the edge of the Skagit River’s Seattle City Light town of Diablo, it is a short drive from the North Cascades Environmental Learning Center. More often than not, it is bypassed by adventurers in summer aiming to conquer the feat of Sourdough Mountain, the trailheads less than a mile apart from one another. But when snow is heavy on the summits of the tall peaks, Stetattle Creek is a great late fall and early winter jaunt.

» Continue reading A saunter up Stetattle Creek