June 28, 2007

• ack

  I must remember not to take an unopened pack of camera batteries out in the field without a knife to open them.   Jagged plastic makes painful cuts.  First thing I did after I got the new batteries in the camera was to document what I’d done to my thumb.

  

   I took some pictures this morning to illustrate what I was saying a few days ago about what bark beetles do to spruce trees.  In the shot above there are several healthy young trees with their conical shape and pointy tops, from the center to the right edge.  The two tallest trees, on the left , illustrate the way they look after being infested with beetles:  tall, skinny, with short branches and heavy topknots full of seed cones.  The skinny black things are spruces already killed by the beetles.  The next shot is zoomed in on the top of the tallest tree there.

  

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  While I was out there, I checked up on the progress of the decomposing moose parts in the turnaround.  There are a number of rocks there that weren’t there before, and from the way part of the ribcage is broken, it looks as if someone was throwing rocks at it.  See the dark channel between the two ribs right of center?  Something has chewed the meat out of that intercostal space.  I’m thinking it was a rodent.  I’d like to have watched that.

  

  So much of the calf’s hide is gone now that many of its bones are visible.  The person who dumped the stuff there had taken the cow’s hind legs and left both of her forelegs.  On this trip, I only saw one of her legs, so something or someone has dragged the other one away.

  

  Her ear is still standing up, apparently untouched.

  Enough of that.  Now go look at the pretty flowers in my photo strip.

  

  • 10:44 pm
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