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mistressofmuses) wrote2024-08-06 08:46 pm
mistressofmuses) wrote2024-08-06 08:46 pm
Monday, July 29: Baby Bear Lake
We didn't do much of anything this "weekend," but we did last weekend!
Last Monday we went up to Pine Valley Ranch, which is a county open space park. We call it "Baby Bear Lake," because the first (and only other) time we went there, Alex saw a baby bear running along the hill. I did not see the bear cub, as I was looking at a crayfish at the time. (Of course.) Turned out the bear cub had been separated from the mother bear, who was very loudly searching for the cub for quite some time (we did not see her, but did hear her. A park ranger came along and warned us about it, but I think they were eventually reunited.)
It's a pretty area. It was very hot, but there were still a fair number of people out. Fortunately it wasn't too difficult to get mostly away from the other groups.
My favorite thing we saw: leopard frogs! They were all quite small, about two inches long, maybe. And nearly metallic!
I adore leopard frogs; when I was a little kid, I raised a leopard frog tadpole up through adulthood, and that was one of my favorite pets ever. We don't always get to see leopard frogs; as much as I do also like seeing bullfrogs, they've pretty much outcompeted a lot of our other frogs.
And we did have Bella with us, and she is sometimes very cute.
Something I remembered from the last time we went: raspberries! Not a ton, and most were small, but a few canes along the lake path. (And they were so good.)
A very small crayfish! There were several very small ones, though I didn't see any larger this time.
My other favorite that we saw: a very nice garter snake hanging out in the water.
Not as excited to see us as I was to see it! (Though it turned around and came back to shore pretty quickly.)
Another leopard frog!
There were dozens of these little black butterflies in clouds around the wildflowers, though they scattered the instant you got close.
A sweet little (very little!) bumblebee, with bright pollen saddlebags.
Unfortunately, the heat started to bother Alex. It usually doesn't, so I don't know if it was because we were up at higher elevation, or just a quirk of the day. We took a seat in one of the shaded picnic areas at the far end of the lake and let him rest for a while.
We might have spent some more time going on a little side trail or something if he'd been feeling better, but he was pretty tired, so we decided to head back on the other side of the loop. We did also have Bella with us, and while she was doing okay and had plenty of water, we also didn't want to overdo it for her.
A bit down the trail, there was a chunk of broken ceramic sticking up out of the trail. It was super buried, but the part sticking up looked like it could have been an issue for a person or a dog that stepped on it, so I decided to try and get it out of the trail. I of course sliced the shit out of one of my fingers on it when I got it out. Just... skinned off a big chunk of my middle finger along the side of the last knuckle. Fucking ow. (It has since healed up pretty well.) The ceramic looked like part of a buried plate. Left in a previous flood of the river, unburied by erosion on the trail would be my guess.
Tiny butterfly!
Mushrooms!
Back toward the start, we went and sat in the (rebuilt) historical gazebo that's over by the river. It was a slightly cooler spot, well shaded and near the moving water, so a nice spot to sit for a while before we headed home.
There were several of these weird caterpillars in the gazebo. They're really neat looking!
Unfortunately, I'm fairly certain this is a Douglas fir tussock moth caterpillar, and they are generally considered a pretty damaging pest species. :( Though there didn't seem to be enough of them to represent a major, damaging outbreak, so hopefully they're at an acceptable number this year.
It's Bella! I like the light shining through her silly ears.
Minus me slicing my finger up, it was a really nice day! Glad we got to go out, even though it was a very hot day.
This was later, and once we were back in town, but this is the smoke from the Alexander Mountain fire, which had started earlier in the day.
Last Monday we went up to Pine Valley Ranch, which is a county open space park. We call it "Baby Bear Lake," because the first (and only other) time we went there, Alex saw a baby bear running along the hill. I did not see the bear cub, as I was looking at a crayfish at the time. (Of course.) Turned out the bear cub had been separated from the mother bear, who was very loudly searching for the cub for quite some time (we did not see her, but did hear her. A park ranger came along and warned us about it, but I think they were eventually reunited.)
It's a pretty area. It was very hot, but there were still a fair number of people out. Fortunately it wasn't too difficult to get mostly away from the other groups.
My favorite thing we saw: leopard frogs! They were all quite small, about two inches long, maybe. And nearly metallic!
I adore leopard frogs; when I was a little kid, I raised a leopard frog tadpole up through adulthood, and that was one of my favorite pets ever. We don't always get to see leopard frogs; as much as I do also like seeing bullfrogs, they've pretty much outcompeted a lot of our other frogs.
And we did have Bella with us, and she is sometimes very cute.
Something I remembered from the last time we went: raspberries! Not a ton, and most were small, but a few canes along the lake path. (And they were so good.)
A very small crayfish! There were several very small ones, though I didn't see any larger this time.
My other favorite that we saw: a very nice garter snake hanging out in the water.
Not as excited to see us as I was to see it! (Though it turned around and came back to shore pretty quickly.)
Another leopard frog!
There were dozens of these little black butterflies in clouds around the wildflowers, though they scattered the instant you got close.
A sweet little (very little!) bumblebee, with bright pollen saddlebags.
Unfortunately, the heat started to bother Alex. It usually doesn't, so I don't know if it was because we were up at higher elevation, or just a quirk of the day. We took a seat in one of the shaded picnic areas at the far end of the lake and let him rest for a while.
We might have spent some more time going on a little side trail or something if he'd been feeling better, but he was pretty tired, so we decided to head back on the other side of the loop. We did also have Bella with us, and while she was doing okay and had plenty of water, we also didn't want to overdo it for her.
A bit down the trail, there was a chunk of broken ceramic sticking up out of the trail. It was super buried, but the part sticking up looked like it could have been an issue for a person or a dog that stepped on it, so I decided to try and get it out of the trail. I of course sliced the shit out of one of my fingers on it when I got it out. Just... skinned off a big chunk of my middle finger along the side of the last knuckle. Fucking ow. (It has since healed up pretty well.) The ceramic looked like part of a buried plate. Left in a previous flood of the river, unburied by erosion on the trail would be my guess.
Tiny butterfly!
Mushrooms!
Back toward the start, we went and sat in the (rebuilt) historical gazebo that's over by the river. It was a slightly cooler spot, well shaded and near the moving water, so a nice spot to sit for a while before we headed home.
There were several of these weird caterpillars in the gazebo. They're really neat looking!
Unfortunately, I'm fairly certain this is a Douglas fir tussock moth caterpillar, and they are generally considered a pretty damaging pest species. :( Though there didn't seem to be enough of them to represent a major, damaging outbreak, so hopefully they're at an acceptable number this year.
It's Bella! I like the light shining through her silly ears.
Minus me slicing my finger up, it was a really nice day! Glad we got to go out, even though it was a very hot day.
This was later, and once we were back in town, but this is the smoke from the Alexander Mountain fire, which had started earlier in the day.
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Too bad about the heat, and the pottery shard. I hope that smoke isn't messing up your air quality.
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And Bella's glamour shots, lol.
That damn chunk of pottery! So rude!
We've had a few days of very bad air, but it's been improving. We've gotten some rain, and the fires are getting better containment. (I know a few of the cities north of us have been right in the path of the big fire's smoke though, and it's been far worse there.)
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Maybe we should call it "Irony Lake", haha.
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That One Time I Cut My Hand Lake is a bit long. *g*
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Bella is a very pretty dog... as long as you aren't trying to take conformation pictures, haha. But she's so darn cute.
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Nope, can't relate.
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