Flat tires, broken windows and bears

Poor Joyce.  Last week the border patrol checked her out twice while she was doing census work.  And she saw a large bear bear.

This week her luck wasn't so good:

• She saw a mother black bear with cubs wandering down her road,
  
  
• Heard stories about grizzly bears wandering around the people's houses recently,
  
  
• Monday got a flat tire from the rough North Fork road.  Fortunately a guy eventually drove by and helped her change her tire.  One would think that when the County bladed the road it would be better.  Not really true with this rough road.  "Blading" is half ripping the road up by the road grader in order to have some gravel/rock to blade.
  
  
• Tuesday she locked her car keys in her car.  She found someone with a working phone and called me in the afternoon.  From the quality of the call I thought she was calling from some remote area in the other part of the world.
  
  I had to drive to Bigfork to meet with the rest of my team so I couldn't drive up the North Fork to bring her spare car key.  She asked me if some trick with a tennis ball would pop her car lock open but I had never heard of that idea.
  
  Instead Joyce ended up breaking a small window in her car and reaching in to unlock the door. At least her car had a small window as many cars today do not.
  

Where Joyce is doing census work is over 40 miles from 'civilization' (Columbia Fall, MT).  I am not slighting Polebridge, as other than the Mercantile and the Northern Lights Saloon, nothing is there.  All while Joyce was working ten to twelve hours a day on the census.

At least Joyce didn't get into trouble that eventually involved the sheriff department like another census worker in the Valley did recently.  There is a crazy story in that, but one I'm not going to share as it didn't involve any members of my team, and I heard it second hand.

Census work near the border

Earlier this week one of my census workers was canvasing the part of my district up in the North Fork that borders Canada.  She parked her car near the long (since the early 1990s) closed border crossing in order to do census paper work.

She wasn't parked there very long when suddenly a border patrol agent appeared and asked her if she needed help.

She explained she was working on the census and asked if she should move her car.  The agent said no, she was fine, and then he left.

She said it wasn't 15 minutes later when another border patrol agent suddenly appeared and asked if she needed help.

"No.  Should I move my car?  You're the second agent to talk to me.  I am just working on my census forms."

No.  He told her she was fine.

"Then why the interest in me?"

He told her she was parking at a known smuggling drop point near the border.

She asked where the agents were located as they seemed to come out of nowhere and she couldn't tell where they were.  She was told, "We have our hiding places."

I do know the border patrol takes their job seriously.  Last year when I hiked to Mt Hefty I saw the hoof prints from a number of horses on and near the faint hiking trail to Mt Hefty.  Mt Hefty straddles the border with the U.S. and Canada.  This Spring I happened to deliver a census questionnaire to the Kalispell residence of one of the border patrol agents (he was in uniform when he answered the door).  We had an interesting conversation on the areas he patrols along the border, etc.  He was one of the people who patrol on horseback and we compared the time when I saw the hoof prints and when he was patrolling the area.

Also on Joyce's first day as a census worker she saw the largest black bear she had ever seen.  The bear was walking down the road she was driving on and in no hurry.

Less multi-tasking?

Other than swimming in the river I have been spraying weeds in my north pasture. I have over a quarter of the pasture sprayed. In areas that I thought were mostly weed free now from the spraying I had done last year I found lots of barely above ground knapweed. In these areas the cattle seemed to take a liking to them and ate them down to the ground. So, a bad news / good new thing. The young knapweed looks so innocent as it tries to blend in with numerous dandelions in the same situation. But I know better.

No more painting although I got around to cleaning the paint brushes used with the red paint. The bristles are now pink after much cleaning.

I tried to weed more of my strawberry patch but even with Thursday night's quarter inch of rain the ground is dry and hard. (The neighbors' hay is finally baled - but not yet gathered from the field). I ran a sprinkler on part of the strawberry patch for a few hours to wet the area and loosen the soil. But I haven't had time since to dig and pull grass and weeds.

I noticed tonight when watering my garden deer tracks in the garden soil. So the deer killed by a vehicle wasn't one or the only one raiding my garden.

The deer carcass I moved away from the road is now in two large pieces and disappearing rapidly as the carrion eaters are more comfortable away from the road and traffic.

Now that the fields have been cut the owls have returned. They are screeching and hooting nightly for much of the night. As long as they get the mice I am happy.

I still pick up apples from the ground every day and feed them to my cattle. They developed a taste for the apples and tonight they lined up along the fence when they saw me in the fruit tree and garden area. These cattle are not dumb and catch on quickly.

I should have gotten my camera as the herd was pretty cute all lined up along the fence with many having their heads over the top of the fence and trying to look as sweet and innocent as possible in order to guilt me into giving them apples. It worked. I'm such a sucker. I even pulled a few smaller apples from the trees to give them more.

The herd still has their ninja magic. The other night they were moving about in the NW part of the hayfield. I went in the house for a minute to get something and when I came out the whole herd was gone. If they were going to the river I thought I would have seen a line of them walking that way.

Well, they were at the river as I later saw them all coming back from there.

Jim and Debbie told me a story about my cattle when they were in their pasture. Usually my cattle are well behaved but one evening near sundown they decided to play "king of the hill" on the large dirt pile in their pasture. Only one could stand at the top with the others all around on the sides. Soon there was jostling for others to be the "king". Shortly thereafter the whole herd got into a fight and everyone was fighting with everyone and dust was everywhere. Four or five took their fight way beyond the dirt mound and for quite a while according to Debbie. I missed it all. They seemed to have gotten over it as I haven't seen them fight for a long time now.

Sometimes the cattle aren't too smart. Usually they go to the pasture to take their siesta under the pine trees. This afternoon under the hot sun they laid under one transmission tower out in the hayfield. No real shade from that structure.

With the cattle in the hayfield I brought in my pocket gopher traps. Saturday night when talking with Jim and Debbie they mentioned their dirt mounds and what a pain it made mowing their lawn. Sunday I put five traps out to catch their pocket gophers. I noticed the other neighbor had fresh dirt mounds and Jerry was happy to have me put a trap in his yard. Now to catch them all.

One of Jerry's sons got married this weekend and family was all here. Now his grandson from his next door daughter is getting married in Hawaii this week and nine members of the family flew today to Hawaii for the wedding. Jerry stayed behind to watch their three dogs.

Joyce and Edley had their 50th wedding anniversary party Sunday afternoon. I stopped by, had some cake and ice cream and met family members I hadn't met yet. This afternoon with the neighbors, gophers, etc. the time slipped by and I almost missed the party as I arrived only during the last half hour of it.

Easter meal

Joyce's daughter and boyfriend invited me to join them and part of Joyce's family for Easter dinner at their place. Generations ranged from great grandkids to great grandmas (depending on how you look at it). The kids were well behaved. I noticed all the teenagers had a cell phone. I guess that is standard now.

Lots of food to eat as a number of the wives, daughters, etc. brought food. Of course everything was homemade and delicious. Soup in a bread bowl, turkey rolls, ham, salad, and three or four different deserts. Even I was full by the end.

They like to play games and I learned how to play Upwords and Boggle. I had beginners luck with the first Upwords game but finished last by a few points in the second game. In Boggle I did horribly and only managed 7 points over three games - nowhere close to anyone else. I just couldn't find many words, much less unique words. Though for some reason I was the only person to find the word "lewd" in one game.

I spent all afternoon there eating, talking and playing games. When I left I was sent home with food. It was a fun time.

It was good to take a relaxing day off as I am nursing what I believe are bruised ribs on my right side from a fall while snowshoeing last week on a mountain. More about that fall once I get time to write up that adventure.