Natural history encounter #2

So here's the other thing I've been meaning to tell you about.

I was out working in the garden and had stopped to straighten my back and enjoy the view, when I noticed a strange, solid, football-sized shape in a chokecherry bush in our field. I had a hunch what it was, but I wanted to be sure . . . .

Yup, I thought so.

Here; let's get a little closer.

So, honeybees are awesome in so many ways. Without them we basically wouldn't have agriculture. Well, I guess if we wanted to limit our diets to lentils and wheat, but you like apples and nectarines and zucchini - stuff like that, right? Gotta have bees.

Honey's good, too.

So I called local bee keeper and all-around-great guy, Dave Sabold, and asked him what these bees would do if left alone. He said they'd either find a hollow tree to move into, or the walls of our house. Repeat: the walls of our house. I told him to come on over with a hive box and get them.

Dave's supplies - those are gloves.

By the time Dave arrived, Frank and I were already feeling kind of attached to the little buzzers, so we asked about leaving the bee hive (after they move into the box) on our property. I mean, we have apple trees and a garden and an enormous alfalfa field next door. Well, Dave explained that bears love nothing more than a bee hive - we knew that, right - and we'd have to put it inside a sturdy fence or on top of a flat roof. No flat roof here, and the only fence is my now-looking-very-small garden, so we decided to let Dave take them.

Dave is excited to get wild bees because they've survived the Methow winter without added food, so they should be more cold-hardy and resilient than imported bees. He would like to get a "Methow strain" going - pretty cool, huh?

Dave suiting up. Swarm in chokecherry bush. Hive box at his feet.

Dave pruned the branches around the swarm and removed the mass by hand.

Gently lowering the branch and bees onto the hive box.

The bees are now entering their new home.

Dave put a lid on the box and left them for a couple of days to make sure that the whole hive moved in. He came and carried them away at dusk when he knew they all would be tucked in to bed for the night.

The bees are now part of Dave and Marilyn's home honey and skin salve business, Gardner Gardens.

MVSTA thanks its workforce

As with all Methow Valley potlucks, the spread was plentiful and delicious.

Methow Valley Sport Trails Association held a volunteer appreciation barbecue at the Mazama Community Center on Sunday afternoon (June 5). Around 75 volunteers were fêted at the celebration, along with board members, ski trail grooming staff, and ski patrol. MVSTA Events Director, Mike Pruett, said the barbecue was a way for the organization to “reach out and show our appreciation to various members and ambassadors. It’s also a chance for them to meet each other.”

Mike Pruett serves up brats.

Pruett took a break from his barbecue grill duties to recognize the MVSTA workforce. He stressed the importance of member/ambassadors who interact with visitors at events and on the trails and “share their passion for living in the Methow.”

According to Pruett, around 175 members are involved in the currently-at-capacity trail pass program, which awards an annual trail pass to enrolled volunteers who work 20 hours over the course of the year. Bridge building, trail maintenance, racecourse marshal, and trailhead ambassador are among the various duties performed by volunteer workers who also support eight to ten events per year, from running and ski races to the annual Sports Swap.

Don Portman, MVSTA board president, awarded  Michael Prichard a lifetime trail pass for his years of dedication to the organization and for starting the ski patrol program.

Associate director, Danica Kaufman, reported that MVSTA is now the largest cross-country ski area in the nation, with 190 kilometers of groomed ski trails. She lauded the past year as having the second-best trail pass sales as well as the best lifetime pass sales ever, despite the continued economic downturn.

Midge Cross, Kristen Smith and Mike Real

John Owen, Sam Owen and Michael Caldwell

Natural history encounter #1

We live closer to nature here in the Methow than most people do in most places.

This fact becomes obvious at times, and rarely more so than during this last week. (Spoken in slow country twang.)  We have had us some nature, folks: up close and personal.

On Saturday morning, our nearest neighbor Joanne phoned and said that she was watching a doe with two newborn fawns under her willow tree. I sneaked over there with my new Nikon and the following photos depict some of the morning's adventure. (Keep reading . . . .)

If you look carefully, you can see #2 fawn's ears on left.

#1 is up and ready to go.

Bath time.

Mom and baby #1 have now moved to the opposite side of the big willow tree from baby #2. I'm wondering if baby #2 is going to stand up.

So I go over to where baby #2 is lying very still.

 It responds to my presence, as you can see.

From here, the photos end. You see, baby #2 rises from the ground and decides to imprint on my legs. It sticks right next to me, wobblingly following me as I move slowly toward mom, who is around 100 feet away. As baby #2 and I walk out of the shade of large willow, I make soft deer sounds (yes, they call to their babes). Mom figures out what's going on and doesn't like it ONE BIT. She charges me; I have at my disposal a fist, a brand-new camera, and neighbor Joanne - hero of the day - who distracts the doe from across the yard. I am able to exit the scene; doe runs frantically between her two babies; eventually the family is reunited. I don't have pictures of that part because my hands were shaking.

Got 'em!

Having stalked, found, and captured the rare and elusive "wild" asparagus, I arrive home: victorious!

News flash!

Some of you may know that I'm now proofreading and reporting for the Methow Valley News. It's a dubious honor perhaps, but the work makes me happy and keeps me off the streets. Except for when I'm Laurelle Walsh - girl reporter.

Proofreading can be a test of endurance some days; I show up at the news office Tuesdays at noon and stay until the paper is done - sometimes after 10 p.m. It's kind of funny when I arrive at the office, everyone seems to sit up and get busy. Sometimes I think they see me as their high school English teacher, or maybe my arrival just reminds them what time it is.

I am also the new Winthrop beat reporter. I've taken over for Carol Stull, who wrote the Winthrop news for years. This means that I attend the council meetings and the chamber meetings and anyone else who'll tolerate my presence at their meetings. I write stories about our little town, upcoming events, the state park, and . . . .

Here's a quote from Frank Vander Wall, who lovingly described my coworkers at the paper thusly: "A bunch of over-educated, smart ass weirdos. You fit right in." A greater compliment I could not have asked for!

The paper is published weekly, and the online version gets posted sometime on Wednesday. Look for it here: Methow Valley News

First harvest

A bucket full of 'chokes

Jerusalem artichokes, or sunchokes, are the first crop I can harvest in any year. I went out last weekend (March 26) and found that the ground was snow-free and ready to dig anywhere the 'chokes are in the earth.

I'm going to dig around with my hands here.

Sunchokes are in the sunflower family. They are the easiest things IN THE WORLD to grow. You basically dig a little hole, maybe double the depth of the tuber, throw the tuber in and cover it with dirt. I say dirt, because it really doesn't have to be soil, per se. They'd probably like to get some water now and again, but even that seems to be optional.

Really, that's all there is to it.

Stalks shoot up from the tubers and grow to around 7 or 8 feet high. They will be covered with little, 2 inch yellow flowers later in the summer. The deer will prune any that stick out from the fence.

I only put them in areas where they won't compete with anything else, and I ALWAYS dig the tubers every spring. One tuber creates quite a mass of offspring, so I don't know what would happen if I left all of them in the ground.

Slice 'em and eat 'em.

After soaking five minutes in water.

I read that the starches convert to sugar underground over the winter, and they do seem quite sweet, crunchy and slightly nutty. You could probably dig them in the late fall/early winter too, but sometimes the ground is frozen by then.

La Ultima Mexicatessen

First off, my understanding of some Spanish vocabulary was clarified. I had always understood that la ultima meant "the last" or "ultimate" in the final sense of the word. Apparently no, much as in English, la ultima has come to mean, in common parlance, "the best" or "ultimate" in the unsurpassed sense of the word. Bueno.

On to Okanogan County restaurant review, el segundo.

Street view

La Ultima Mexicatessen is your Tonasket lunch or dinner choice, as long as your need to eat occurs Monday through Friday, 11:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. Because it is entirely run by one family, they decided that to stay sane they needed to have weekends off. Understandable, and I hope it works out for them.


Located at 11 - West 4th, across from Lee Frank Mercantile (Ace Hardware), and two doors down from Tonasket Pizza and the Food Co-op, it sports both an unpresupposing facade and interior. In fact, the space is fairly plain, but they were playing some pleasant acoustic Mexican folk music while we were there.

We were greeted by the chatty owner, Michael, who wisely left the field of ESL teaching a couple years ago in order to go into the restaurant biz. Actually, I don't know, I think you have to be pretty nuts to go into either line of work, but who am I to talk . . . .?

Michael, the loquacious owner.

The food was good. They serve simple, good, reasonably-priced Mexican fare featuring daily specials after 2:00 every day. Check out the menu board in the photo.

Super pork torta

I had a super pork torta: kind of like a Mexican sloppy Joe with salad in a bun.

Frank had a super beef rice bowl. He eats a lot, so they super-sized it for him.

We also brought home six pork tamales. The family makes tamales and sells them at the Okanogan River Garlic Festival each year. Michael said they have a food cart of some sort that they haul to events like that. He's thinking about selling tamales at the Winthrop Sunday Market this summer; what do you think?

My sweetie with lunch.

Post script: Do you know/use the word, "unpresupposing"? It's not in any dictionary that I can find, yet I, and many other people, use the word.  Weird.