To access Roland's weblog and column archives

 

Tip o' the Day

When looking for wildlife, there are key fundamentals one should bear in mind:

1. Location

There's no profit in searching for antelope in a forest, or mountain goats in a swamp. But that same swamp offers survival food for bears emerging from hibernation in the spring. In summer and late fall, however, those same bears can be found feeding on mountainside berries.

2. Patience

Wild creatures are usually alert to movement. If you don't believe it, try sneaking up on a rockslide used by pikas, the little alpine rock rabbits. It'll be a barren landscape. Be patient, though. Sit down (I've even gone to sleep). Without movement, the creatures will soon be running all over the rocks.

3. Good optics

There's no substitute for good optics. I do my initial scanning with binoculars, then set up a spotting scope to zero in. I also employ my secret tool -- a wife who's a wonder at spotting animals.

You'll note I listed those fundamentals in their order of importance. One can have the patience of Job and it will do him no good if he's in the wrong location. Similarly, one can carry the best optics made, but without patience and location, his efforts and expense will come to naught.

There's another point to be made here: of the above fundamentals, only one can be obtained with money. Those most important can only be accessed with the coin of our own efforts.

In case I've not made it clear, I have little regard for those who expect to buy their way to outdoors expertise by relying on ever more sophisticated -- and expensive --gadgetry.

BUM THOUGHTS FOR BAD WEATHER

Late season hunting in mountain country can turn tough, particularly while traipsing peaks in pursuit of monster mule deer bucks or six-point elk. Storms can -- and usually do -- strike without warning, carrying driving rain or blowing, drifting snow. Temperatures can plummet. Hunters who ignore the possibility do so at their peril. As I did . . . more than once.

It was in late November, back in 1976. We'd left camp before daylight, riding a seldom-used trail into godawful broken country where we planned to ambush unwary elk along a series of steep sidehill meadows. Snow was in short supply because of unseasonably warm and dry weather. As a result, hunting was tough, but strolling around the wilderness amid balmy breezes was proving pleasant and beguling. I wore a pair of denim trousrs, a light flannel shirt and a worn and faded single-layer denim jacket. Both hunters were more heavily clad, but not much.

When good daylight struck, we bushwhacked our way up an overgrown trail, chopping fallen saplings from the path. A light rain started to fall. Stupidly, none of us immediately donned the raingear strapped behind our saddle -- it was such a soft drizzle, and the morning was unseasonably warm.

An hour later we were thoroughly soaked. That was when the temperature took a nose-dive and the rain turned to heavy, wet snow. We decided to don our raingear which, of course, was much too late for its benefit.

The temperature continued to plummit and a strong northerly wind began sweeping through the canyons, driving wads of wet snow from evergreens down the necks of we miserbly hunkered riders. I held a hurried consultation with my hunters. My points were:

1. I don't think elk are going to be out in the meadows during this storm.

2. Snow has already wiped out the tracks of any animals that might have been here earlier.

3. Visibility is so poor as to be near-impossible for us to hunt effectively.

4. Any other reason I could conjure for us to change plans.

Though their teeth chattered so that neither could reply, their heads bobbed like corks in a washing machine and we started back. More saplings hung over the trail on our return, pushed down from their loads of snow. I dismounted and wallowed ahead to shake them free of snow or chop them from our path.

Halfway to camp, I spied what I hoped was what we guides called a "root wad" -- the pitch-filled roots of an overturned tree that had mostly rotted from the decay of decades. I swept the root clump free of snow and tested the remaining roots with my axe. Yep, pine. Lodgepole or whitebarked, it made no difference -- that stump was rich with pitch.

Kindling the fire was tough, but one of the hunters shielded my shavings with his spread raincoat and the other blocked the keening wind with his hat. A shaving flared, then caught. So did another. Small pieces of pitch-filled roots were added, then more. The root wad caught.

As a footnote, it snowed 16-inches that day, and the temperature dropped to five degrees below zero. After taking on warmth and smoke and hope for us dopes, drying our clothes a little and stoking our spirits a bunch, we dried out and warmed up sufficiently to eat our lunch, then beat a hasty retreat to camp.

Survival may have been more tenuous that day than I'm willing to admit. Obviously we did several things wrong: dressed too lightly; failing to don rainclothes at the drizzle's outset. But we did a couple of things right, too, especially by building the warming fire. Without that fire, frostbite could easily have been present by the time we reached camp. Without that warming fire enabling us to rest, eat our lunch and recharge weary bodies, exhaustion (especially for the guide, who'd cooked breakfast, washed dishes, saddled horses, and cleared trail) might've been a very real secondary danger.

 

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 delivered 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

Cheek combines his vast outdoor experiences as an outfitter in Montana with solid research to provide a thoroughly readable and enjoyable book. It reminded me of two other books, John McPhee's Coming Into the Country about Alaska, and Sebastian Junger's Perfect Storm

* Franklin Marchman in an amazon.com review

I picked up your book My Best Work Is Done at the Office and I was reading it until 2:00 in the morning. I haven't touched my other books since.

* H. Robert Krear / Estes Park, CO

Dance On the Wild Side is terrific reading, part true life adventure, part inspiration, and part blueprint for a life worth living.

* The Midwest Book Review

A self-made naturalist, Cheek has a thing about grizzly bears that some people feel defies understanding. Readers can thrill to a mesmerizing tale of grizzly bears and humans who, in chilling detail, morph into a lethal mix

* Outdoors Unlimited

I just finished reading The Phantom Ghost of Harriet Lou and it touched my soul. You've illustrated everything I embrace about hunting and elk hunting to be more specific

* Mitch Ratigan email

Montana's Bob Marshall Wilderness

9 X 12 Coffeetable size 97 full-color photos

KNOWLEDGE SHARED

outdoor bold

insight pared

 

For interested educators, this weblog is especially applicable for use in history, environmental, and safety education classes, as well as for journalism students.

Roland, of course, visits schools. For more information on his program alternatives, go to:

www.rolandcheek.com

source links for additional info

www.mtsky.com