Rambunctious Ravens

Friday June 8 2012

From a mile away, I hear them Raising Cain: rowdy raucous ravens rambunctiously renting the air with their Rawking and hollering.

I cross the sagebrush flats and head directly for the noise echoing off the red cliff wall. Bright whitewash dribbles down from a black hole indicating where the Raven nest was.

These 4 siblings have already fledged, bright black and brashly bold, commanding the red cliffs and lone juniper tree 

and in fact the whole Owyhee world. Perhaps it's not a wise strategy, attracting attention to their young, vulnerable, delectable selves from miles away - but then any predator might well be intimidated by the damage these 4 birds can inflict by sheer brashness and by volume alone.

Irreverently, they yell their emphatic opinions as I approach closer: Intruder! Predator! What the hell is that! Danger! Go away! Dare you to come closer! What the HELL is that!

And when I speak: "Hi Ravens!" - the Ravens shush. We stare at each other in a face-off. They study me, heads tilting and eyes blinking to size me up better, and they begin to whisper amongst themselves, What the hell IS that!, and then pretend to ignore me, picking up sticks and carrying them around, scratching their ears, turning their backs to me (while eyeing me over their shoulders), deliberating my intentions, muttering back and forth under their breaths.

As I climb the hill closer to the Raven Tree, one undaunted bird flies onto a boulder above me and yells Intruder!

"Hi Raven!" I say. He stares imperiously down on me from his safe perch. 

My boulder! 

"Hi pretty Ravens!" 

Our canyon! 

"You Ravens are noisy!" 

Very noisy! 

"And beautiful!" 

Yes! 

"And bold!" 

Yes!

The siblings get vocal again.

Bold!

Beautiful

Our canyon!

Rawk! Shriek! Yell!

Boldest Raven dares to leave his boulder and fly low in a circle over my head, staring down at me, before flying off to another perch.

"Bye Ravens!" I say, as I continue climbing up the hill, away from their Raven Tree, but already they are ignoring me, picking up their Raven conversations where they left off: 

My canyon! My tree! Look at my stick! Get that bug! I'm hungry! Where's mom and dad! My Kingdom! I'm beautiful! I'm bold!

They are rulers of their roost, these beautiful Ravens, ready to take on the world, but hanging around the home castle, just in case Mom and Dad might come back and feed them some more. 

Fat chance of that, with these brazen boisterous youths. Mom and Dad fled the coop to be rid of them!

Owyhee Fandango Recap

Nick and his beloved Don at a 100-mile vet check!

Tuesday June 5 2012

It didn't turn out quite as it was planned… but what ever does?

The "F" Team, the Tres Fabulosas, started as me, Connie, and Carol, riding Jose, Finneas and August in the 100 miler, ultimately ended with Connie and Finneas, Carol and August, and Nance and Jasbo successfully crossing the 100-mile finish line around 1 AM Monday morning.

But, as were all Fabulously Flexible Fabulosas, it all turned out good.

I ended up riding Jose on a 50 on Day 2. On Day 3, Steph started out as a Fabulosa with Connie and Carol; she entered Batman in the 80 miler (which started at the same time, 6 AM), and would decide after 80 miles if she wanted to elevate to the 100 miler and continue onward with Connie and Carol.

She decided Batman had done enough at 80 miles, so it was down to Dos Fabulosas Connie and Carol to finish the 100, until Nance and Jasbo joined the group leaving camp at 10 PM or so in the dark, following glowsticks that John had just put out by ATV.

Connie and Finneas at a 100-mile vet check

13 of 17 riders completed the 100, including Kathleen Edman, riding a beautiful Rocky Mountain horse Pierce the Veil, who elevated from the 80 to the 100. At the Awards Monday morning, Connie, still in her pajamas, gave a speech (kinda like the Oscars) about the completion of her and Finneas' first 100-mile ride. She promises to write a story about it for this blog, which should be as hugely entertaining as her speech, for which Steph threatened to have her dragged off stage for its length.

That was it for another year of the Owyhee Fandango - rather poorly attended this year, but great fun for all involved.

Here's the video I took and made of Day 2 on Jose:

You can watch all 6 videos I made of the ride, including Sunday's Fabulosa 100-mile ride (camera worn by Steph on Batman! - it's a bit wobbly because of the helmet cam harness Steph wore… hence a lot of still shots in the video!) on the Owyhee Fandango ride page on Endurance.net:

http://www.endurance.net/international/USA/2012Fandango/

Snake River Ferruginous Hawks

Saturday June 2 2012

It was more ridiculous cuteness - a hawk banding day with the BLM on the Snake River Birds of Prey National Conservation Area, just like the screech owls in May.

In addition to nest boxes, now-retired BLM biologist John Doremus also put up nesting platforms on the grass prairies above the Snake River, which the ferruginous hawks favor. Here a baby is standing up on the nest as Jessica climbs the ladder. 

BSU students and raptor banders Jessica and Patrick had the honors of retrieving the babies from the platform nests and banding them while regaling us with Ferruginous Facts.

Here Jessica is removing babies from the nest. She uses one hand to distract their attention, then puts her other hand on the back of their neck, in effect pinning them down so they can't open their wings. Once she reached underneath to grab the feet, they didn't struggle.  

The female usually lays 2-4 eggs, sometimes up to 6. The first nest we visited had 5 young and the second nest had 2 young. Both adults incubate the eggs for 28-33 days, and then tend to the young; the young will fledge at 44-48 days.

Adults are white and rust colored - hence the name ferruginous, which derives from the Latin ferrugo, meaning rust. The legs are feathered down to the toes, but not underneath, which makes sense, so that the feathers don't get soiled.

They're a little larger than a red-tailed hawk; females are larger than males. You can see the difference here - female is on the right, male on the left (Patrick said this male is a little older than the female).

Main prey is the jackrabbit and ground squirrels, both of which are abundant in this area. The hawks also eat gophers, birds, reptiles, amphibians and insects. We found remains of ground squirrels in both nests.

The adults left the nest long before we got anywhere near it. The pair at the first nest were quite vocal and made some half-hearted dives at the first 3 people at the nest, though when the rest of us approached after the babies were down on the ground, the enraged pair flew high above screaming their contempt. At the second nest the adults were not so vocal nor aggressive.

These nestlings are panting because of the heat and stress, though once you get a hold of them out of the nest, they really relax and tend not to struggle, because they don't have those instincts yet - their instinct is to sit still and hunker down at this age. 

When we handled the birds we kept them shaded and handled them gently, just keeping hold of the feet. They aren't able to use their wings to flap or struggle yet, and they don't use their feet as weapons yet - and good thing, because look at the size of those claws and talons!

Here Patrick fits a silver band with a federal number on the baby's leg. All but one of the babies was banded, he was deemed a little too young (about 24 days), and his legs would probably grow a little larger. The other babies' (ranging from roughly 28-34 days) legs were already adult-size.

Notice this circular path in the cheat grass around this nest - it must be predators - coyotes? - circling the nest, eyeing the contents - it's a dog eat bird world out there, and chances of survival for the young are against them. With luck they will successfully fledge and learn to hunt and survive in the big world.

More ridiculously cute Ferruginous Hawk baby pictures.

I tried to slip one in my pocket to take home but those darn banders know how to count.

Ribbonmeister

Friday June 1 2012

Doing his part to help with the Owyhee Fandango, Stormy pulled ribbons from one of the trails after the ride.

He might not cover quite the mileage the endurance horses do, but he likes to put his two cents in, and he takes his job very seriously. (And he takes the dog for a walk at the same time.)


He may not be the easiest and most practical horse from which to pull ribbons, since he's the tallest one we have at 16.2 hands (so tall I have to climb off him to reach some of the low ribbons), but he's certainly the most beautiful ribbon puller!

Owyhee Fandango Day 2: Fabulously Flexible Fabulosas

Saturday May 26 2012

It was a cough that became the monkey wrench in the Tres Fabulosas original team plan of me, Carol, and Connie riding the Owyhee Fandango 100 miler together.

I'd heard Jose cough a couple of times before the Fandango, including one of our training rides. He never had a temperature, never felt less than fabulous, under saddle and with the herd, but it made me start to fret: a worry worm stuck in my craw.

I had Robert the head vet check Jose out on Thursday (Day 1 25 and 50 milers were Friday, Day 2 25 and 50 milers were Saturday, and Day 3 30/60/80/100 were on Sunday), and he couldn't find any congestion, and of course Jose didn't cough for him. But my worry and doubt remained unchanged. Judging by the way Jose looked and felt, and having no temperature, even if he had some remnants of a cold, I knew he could do a 50. But… a 100? There's a world of difference between a 50 mile ride and a 100 mile ride. It's not just the mileage that adds up, but the time in the saddle and the cumulative stress on the body; and if you are starting with something already compromised, well… I would just die if anything happened to Jose.

Thursday night, when the weather forecast looked dismal (to some people : ) with rain, rain, and rain and cool temperatures predicted, a new plan hatched. Steph had planned to ride Batman on a 50 on Day 1 with Amanda and her new moose of a Shagya, Breve. But Steph hates cold wet weather as much as I love it. So… Jose and I would ride with Amanda and Breve on the Day 1 50, and Steph would become a Fabulosa and ride the 80 miler along with Carol and August, and Connie and Finneas on the 100 (and possibly elevate to the 100; both distances would start at 6 AM).

But when Friday morning dawned cool, and seriously raining - who likes to saddle up in the rain and go out on a 50 mile ride, much less handle a horse new to endurance riding in the mud? Plans changed to me and Amanda riding the Day 2 50, and Steph and Connie and Carol would still ride the 80/100.


Day 2 arrived with heavy gray skies and a light rain, that lasted all day, but Amanda and I saddled up anyway. I think I can safely say, among the total 37 starters in both distances for the day, I was the only one grinning from ear to ear all day long, not just from riding a Fabulous horse, but riding him on a Fabulous wet and cool day in the desert.

Jose and Breve went great together. Amanda was thrilled with Breve's first 50. Jose felt Fit and Fysically Fenomenal and Fabulous all day. He did cough, once at 5 miles, once at 10 miles, and once at 15 miles… and that was it. He probably could have done a 100 just fine (physically he felt like a monster), but if he'd have coughed at 5 miles on the 100, I would have been worried for the next 95 miles.


I did love the rain, but the mud was something else. On the north side of the highway for loop 1, the sand footing was good. On the south side of the highway for loop 2, it got slick and sticky. Gumbo Mud, Shirley calls it. I have christened the Brown's Creek hill as SlickSnot Hill. Amanda thought she'd do her horse a favor and get off and walk up it. Bad idea. She had to stop and rest halfway up as she'd carried half the hill up on the bottom of her shoes. The clay mud cakes on like glue. She couldn't even lift up her leg for a photo.


That's when Jose started having boot trouble. He lost one Easyboot glove, and after I put it back on, it stayed on another 5 strides before coming off again. It weighed an extra 5 pounds, and I couldn't scrape the clay off. We weren't far from a water stop, and there I rinsed and scraped 2 1/2 pounds of clay off to where I got the boot back on. It stayed in place for another 2 miles or so, but it was so deep and goopy that Amanda, riding behind me, never saw it come off. Maybe Steph will find it when she unmarks trail after the ride, or we might find it sprouting flowers out of the inside next spring.

Jose lost a second glove after climbing the Hart Creek knife ridge. Amanda didn't see that one come off either. We were only 5 miles or so from camp, so we just travelled carefully over rocky sections. Tami Rougeau, following a half hour behind us, found one clay glove and carried the 5 pounder back to base camp. The horses handled the going well, adjusting their strides to the different depths and slickness and consistencies of the mud/clay/puddles.


There wasn't a single pull all day, and by the end of the day, I think everybody was finally smiling. It was another great day to ride in the desert, another 50 miles for Jose and The Raven!

Video from day 2 here!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YB-pIBiBuH4&feature=youtu.be

and many more videos and photos from the Owyhee Fandango here on Endurance.net!
http://www.endurance.net/international/USA/2012Fandango/


Next: Owyhee Fandango Day 3 and Team Flexible Fabulosas!

Owyhee Fandango Day 2: 50 Miles for Jose!

Saturday May 26 2012

Jose and I had another awesome 50 mile ride on Day 2 of the Owyhee Fandango. It was gray and wet and dreary and chilly - just the kind of weather I love. So sue me! The second loop was getting pretty mucky and slippery though, I didn't love the mud. But the horses did great.

I'm pointing out our Bates Creek eagle nest.

Amanda's shooting this from Breve's back.

In Hart Creek.

Amanda thought she'd be nice to her horse and walk on foot up this slick-snot muddy-clay-y hill... and she about couldn't walk for the 6 inches of mud/clay stuck to the bottom of her boots. I told her to lift her foot up so I could get a good picture, but she couldn't lift it up any higher than this!

More stories and photos, much more coming, and follow the ride on twitter - EnduranceNet, or at

http://www.endurance.net/international/USA/2012Fandango/

Change of Plans

Saturday May 26 2012

Change of plans and change and change...

I'm riding Jose today, Day 2, on a 50! Details later, stories, videos, etc.

Here's a video from Thursday, day before the ride started:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=gb2XuOoIs04

Follow the Fandango on Twitter, EnduranceNet or on the ride page:

http://www.endurance.net/international/USA/2012Fandango/