insight pared

KNOWLEDGE SHARED

outdoor bold

To access Roland's weblog and column archives

 

 

Tip o' the Day

During all the years I guided hundreds of other folks to adventure amid some of the wildest lands in all the Northern Rockies, we drank freely of the water flowing from the slopes of those mountains. I still remember one gentleman, an orthodontist from the California Bay Area, who smiled politely at my offers of cocktails in the evening, orange juice in the morning, or a beer at high noon. We were on a week's flyfishing trip, drift fishing down a river that rises and flows through one of greatest Wilderness areas in America. Our guest declined coffee and tea, also, and I finally figured out that his religion forebade many of the liquids we offered. Instead, Kent drank the water, dipping cup after cup from the cold, clear river. And he laughed at my offers of anything else.

"Roland," he finally said, "we can't get water like this where I live. Why would anyone want to drink anything else?"

Later, Kent told me confidentially, "This water is no good."

"Huh?"

"It has no body to it -- a man can drink and drink it and never get enough!" Then I saw he was smiling.

During all those two decades of guiding adventures, and all those people, only three contacted giardiasis, the intestinal disorder causing chronic intermittent diarrhea. Oddly, one of those three was a doctor, and another a doctor's wife. In all cases, thrice daily doses of the drug Flagyl affected a cure.

We always dipped coffee water from the river, added grounds, then brought the water to a boil over an open campfire. I've since been told water must be boiled 20 minutes in order to purify it. Ours might have boiled 30 seconds.

There are other little squigglies occasionally found in drinking water. Historically, some have been for more dangerous than giardia. That's why the U.S. Government issued Halazone tablets to its military personnel. Two drops of iodine or chlorine is supposed to make a quart of water safe for usage.

So, of course, is the aforementioned boiling for twenty minutes. But boiled water, even when cooled overnight, tastes "flat." So here's the secret about how to put taste back into boiled water: pour it back and forth between containers to aerate it.

Here's another tip on making water usable: Once, Jane and I were backpacking with friends in the Canyonlands of Utah. There'd been a big rain and all the streams were too muddy to successfully filter. We learned, though, to boil the water in the evening to settle the mud. Then the following morning, if we were careful not to stir the bottom mud, we could filter clear water from the top.

 

Roland Cheek is terrific. He's another Tom Bodett * Phil Jensen / Hood River, OR

Your anecdotes and dry humor are of the insightful variety, and the resourceful suggestions find me taking notes. Useful outdoor information isn't something I expect from the broadcast media and yours is welcome * Tom Connor / Great Falls, MT

Love your program. Great way to start a day * Nancy Lak / Hornell, NY

I listen to you each morning and you start my day with a positive attitude * Bob Brotherton / Sheridan, WY

I enjoy listening to your program while getting ready for work * Pat Yongue / Orangeburg, SC

We enjoy hearing about your guiding experiences. Keep up the good stories. Love it * Elsie Wagoner / Summerville, OR

I first heard your program driving across mid-Washington a little over a year ago. Was so amazed you live so close to my home in Lakeside. I've since located you on a local station. Thanks much * Darrell Marshall / Lakeside, MT

I enjoy listening to your program on WTYS in Marianna, FL * James Gray Braxton / Cottondale, FL

I listen to you each morning on my way to work. It is very enjoyable and kind of picks me up mentally * Kim Walden / Colville, WA

I just heard your program. Nice! * Grace DeSaye / Prescott, AZ

I like your program very much. So much in fact that I have trouble getting going in the mornings because I hang around the radio waiting for it to come on * Donald Kilgrow / Monticello, UT

I enjoy listening to your show in the mornings * Carol Bentz / Andover, NY

Thanks to KMTX Helena, I take a shower with you almost every morning and thoroughly enjoy your program * Richard Stafford / East Helena, MT

I just talked to your wife on the phone. Very nice lady. I told her my oldest brother Herman, Paul Harvey and you are alike. A man has to allow for some windage sometimes. But that's okay. I still tune in each morning. * Gerry Pearson / Salmon, ID

I listen and enjoy your program over radio station WLBK in DeKalb * Bob Wildenradt / Sycamore, IL

My shop radio is turned to KDMA. We sure enjoy lisening to your show. To me, I like the elk call first -- then we stop to listen * Dave Schaltz / Montevideo, MN

I enjoy your program on the Belle Fourch radio station * Blayne Pummel / Spearfish, SD

Sure enjoy your radio progam on KODL You make radio worth listening to * Larry Thompson / The Dalles, OR

I enjoy your radio show on KBBS, especially your horse and dog stories * Mary Schell / Buffalo, WY

I enjoy your stories, sense of humor and your soothing tone of voice. It's like listening to relatives story telling. Each time it's told, the stories get better! * Margery Hudson / Billings, MT

WHITE CANES AND RATTLESNAKES

A white cane is recognized world wide as a symbol of visual impairment for its carrier. Most of us have watched and admired the deftness in the ways those canes are used by unfortunate people who haven't the same sense of sight as most of us. What's especially remarkable is the way they've adapted the sense of feel to compensate for their impaired vision. "Tap, tap, tap." Correct direction upon sliding against a wall, or tapping from the sidewalk into grass. Pause at a curb. There's something wells up inside at the willingness of passersby to assist white cane carriers across streets; in the way drivers stop on busy thoroughfares until the white cane carrier reaches the far side.

There are other means utilized by the blind to compensate. Another that's obvious is enhanced hearing. Have you noticed, at the sense of danger, the alertness that comes on the face of someone who's visually impaired? Perhaps there's an enhanced sense of smell, too, as well as the distinct probability of a sixth sense that is often discussed, but never wholly identified.

I had a blind aunt who felt my face to get a sense of what I looked like. I was ten years old at the time, and was frightened enough to bolt had not my mother held my arm in her steely grasp. Her sister's fingers were as light as feathers as they swept over my nose and ears and cheeks and lips and chin and shoulders and ribs. "Skinny isn't he?" she said to my mother. (`Quit tickling,' is what I wanted to say.) "Prominent cheekbones, too. Is that why his name is Cheek?" My mother chuckled. "His hair is fine -- I'll bet he's a cottontop, right?" (How'd she know?)

"Well, Annie, you've been right so far," my mother said.

"Strong chin, too. I'll bet he's stubborn." (Around my mother? Ha!)

As have you, I've known other folks with other sensory losses. There's one friend with whom one must turn one's face toward in conversation because my friend depends on lip reading to flesh out woefully weak hearing. Another friend is undergoing treatment for a serious illness and has lost her taste. The loss means she's disinterested in eating and is losing weight because of it. Where does smell come in? Individuals who smoke (or smoked) know that habit as an activity that dulls one's sense of smell.

Where I'm going with this is that many folks encumbered with one deficient sense can sometimes utilize other senses to compensate. The lady without an appetite discovered she can compensate by increased social activity -- sitting at a dining table with friends leads to increased food intake merely because others are doing so. One of the many reasons I stopped smoking was because I wanted to smell (literally) the roses.

Where I'm really going with this is that unbeknownst to many of us, we all begin the compensation process the minute we begin the ageing process. Let me explain:

I don't know when I first begin losing the ability to hear a rattlesnake's whirr. But I clearly remember when I discovered it. A friend owns a large ranch near the Missouri River, in central Montana. He, in turn, has a friend who's a schoolteacher in everyday life, but who snares rattlesnakes as a hobby. My friend's friend is known as . . . well . . . "the snakeman." The snakeman catches snakes live, sometimes shipping them to university research centers, sometimes using their skins in his schoolroom classes for students to make wallets, hatbands, coin purses, etc. Sometimes he keeps the snakes for a while, then takes them back to where he caught them, for release. Though I don't fully understand it, I know he knows snakes.

One time our family was visiting my friend's ranch when the snakeman turned up. He caught a couple of rattlesnakes that day, and my wife, daughter, daughter's husband, son, and grandson were all fascinated to hear what the man had to say as he expounded on his experiences. In truth, I wasn't too bored.

We learned, for instance, that the University of Scotland in Edinburgh is one of the leading herpitological research centers in the world, and that the snake guy we were talking to shipped many of his captured snakes there. We learned, too, that research has apparently discovered rattlesnakes are regressing evolutionarily -- that their brains seem to be growing smaller. Fascinating! I said to myself while listening from the outside of our circle. Then the snakeman seem to stare into each of our eyes while saying "As a matter of fact, I haven't given my snakes a bath for a long time, would you folks like to come to my home this evening and watch me do it?"

As you might expect, I was voted down. And evening saw us walking from the snakeman's garage across a backyard lawn. The first thing we saw as we left the garage was what looked like a pile of boxes covered with a canvas tarp. The covered stack was probably sixty feet away. We'd only begun our approach when our daughter exclaimed, "Wow! Listen to that!"

Jane said, "They're mad, aren't they?" The grandson's step faltered and our son and son-in-law began edging around the boxes as far as the yard fence would permit. Dumb me, I kept striding on.

"Don't you hear them, Dad?"

"Hear what?"

"The rattlesnakes."

I stopped abruptly. "Where?"

"Under the tarp ahead of you. They must feel our ground vibrations."

I eased ahead. Finally, at three feet, I heard what the others had heard upon leaving the garage -- 56 rattlesnakes shake, rattle and rolling!

The result? I'm compensating; taste and feel is out, and if the ears are gone that only leaves sight and smell. Surprisingly, snakes, at least in that kind of quantity, do give off a certain odor. But I'll put my stock on my eyes. Since that rattlesnake bath day, when I'm recreating in snake country, the old peepers are working overtime.

Next week: More on "The Snakeman."

 

Roland Cheek wrote a syndicated outdoors column (Wild Trails and Tall Tales) for 21 years. The column was carried in 17 daily and weekly newspapers in two states. In addition, he scripted and broadcast a daily radio show (Trails to Outdoor Adventure) that aired on 75 stations from the Atlantic seaboard to the Pacific Ocean. He's also written upwards of 200 magazine articles and 12 fiction and nonfiction books. For more on Roland, visit:

www.rolandcheek.com

Comments

Trails To Outdoor Adventure is, or soon will be, playing on a radio station available to you. If you wish to send an email to learn more about the program, where and when it's airing

 

Click Here

 

Click Here

for detailed info about each of Roland's books

Read Reviews

Read their first chapters

to send this weblog to a friend

to tell Roland what you think of his Campfire Culture weblog

Click Here