Tracking on the Nooksack with the Gray Wolf Pups

On a cold and cloudy Saturday morning, the Gray Wolf Pups met up for their final outing of the fall season at Cascades Montessori. With a bit of goofing off at drop off, the mentors rallied everyone for an opening circle to discuss the day. Reflecting on our seasonal focus of Tracking and Bird Language we front-loaded our opportunity to get out on the Nooksack River to test our skills. Before we could head out, the mentors had the boys help with our bus safety check; popping the hood, monitoring fluids, checking tire pressure, and more. With our maintenance walk-through finished, it was time to load up, buckle in, and hit the road.

Crossing a side channel to get to the main river

Playing on the bouncy log

Jelly Fungus aka Witches Butter growing on some driftwood

Cruising out along Mt Baker Highway we traveled beside the mighty Nooksack, following it upstream as we pushed east towards its headwaters. With the Deming Homestead Eagle Preserve offering limited river access due to an impassible swollen side channel, we pushed further east finding a promising pull out that offered quick access to the river. Unloading, we gathered up our gear and made our way across a smaller side stream in search of the main channel of the Nooksack. Pushing through patches of young Willow and Alder we broke through the brush to a bend in the river offering expansive views of the surrounding landscape and a backdrop of foothills dusted in snow. With a chilly breeze nipping at us to keep moving we spread out and explored the area in search of tracks, but ultimately finding a bouncy log and some good sticks to play with. 

After some solid exploration, we gathered to focus on our tracking skills. Today we had a great opportunity to delve into the world of plaster casting. Despite the scarcity of fresh animal tracks, we decided we didn’t need any animals to leave tracks when we could make our very own! Spreading out on the landscape we broke into small groups that created unique tracks ranging from a Gray Wolf tracks, to beaver tracks, to giant chicken tracks! Even though we didn’t get to delve into the intricacies of trailing wild animals, we had a lot of fun and got to flex our creativity muscles.

Learning about plaster casting

Putting our new knowledge to the test

Mixing plaster with water to a "pancake batter" consistency

Finishing up the day, we cleaned up our plaster casting materials, ate some food, and rallied together to play a few rounds of games like Hungry, Hungry Martin and Incoming. Despite the change in location, lack of fresh animal tracks, and the chilly weather, the Gray Wolf Pups showed adaptability and a playful spirit to make the best of the day. We learned a bit about tracking and the basics of plaster casting, but most of all we were out in a wild place. The Nooksack River boasts a multitude of wildlife and sheer grandeur that is just simply hard to find in town. Getting the Gray Wolf Pups out onto a wild landscape just felt right. Watching as the Explorers scampered over log jams of Cedar and Doug Fir, snow-dusted foothills setting the backdrop and the sunshine breaking through the cloud cover, it warmed the mentor’s hearts to know the Gary Wolf Pups were exactly where they needed to be that day. As always, this outing left us all eager to count down the days until the next time this group reunites this winter for whatever adventures our next outing has in store.

Make sure to check out the rest of the photos from our outing here!

Gray Wolf Pups tread lightly at the Stimpson Family Nature Preserve 10/2/16

The Boys Explorers Club has a slate of mottos that capture and hold our culture…our values. Prominent among them is the simple proposition that when people truly connect with their natural world they’re more likely to take action to protect it (motto - Connect and Protect). No better example of that principle can be found around here than the Stimpson Family Nature Preserve, our location for the Grey Wolf Pups’ Sunday outing. According to the Whatcom Land Trust (WLT) site, “In the fall of 2000, seven Stimpson siblings donated 116 beautiful acres in the Lake Whatcom Watershed to Whatcom Land Trust. This act of generosity became the catalyst for a community partnership that created the Nature Reserve – a partnership of the Stimpson family, Whatcom Land Trust, Whatcom County, Western Washington University, and the State Department of Natural Resources.” Over the next few years, with adjoining properties acquired through the efforts of WLC, WWU and the state’s Department of Natural Resources, the project grew to the 350 acre site we explored on Sunday (BEC motto - Collaborate and Compromise).

So much to take in! Whatcom County manages the Reserve. Their page describes it this way - “The forest is largely undisturbed and displays characteristics of an old-growth forest, including Douglas Fir trees over 400 years old, a wide diversity of tree species, snags and decaying logs, and a complex architecture of canopy, understory, shrub layer, and tapestry of the forest floor. Two ponds and additional wetland areas support a wide variety of plants and animals, including beaver. Deer, cougar, and smaller mammals frequent the park.”

The Gray Wolf Pups’ skill for this season is The Art of Tracking and Bird Language. As we hiked along the established trail, we learned that birds have velcro-like feathers that create a continuous surface that, with oil from glands, acts as a raincoat. In fact, according to Cornell University’s Bird Academy, “…how feathers function is intricately connected to how they’re structured, and how they grow is closely linked to how they evolved.” 

We spent much of our time listening for birds and tracking evidence that birds were all about. Ask your Explorer about other interesting bird knowledge he gained on Sunday. Here's an example...

 The Pileated Woodpecker makes unique rectangular holes 

 that provide shelter to many species including swifts, owls, ducks, bats, and pine martens. Another example of how everything is connected.

Well, they said we couldn't go off trail; they didn't say anything about those tempting logs.

Good friends sharing their love of the outdoors.

Fall rains bring mushrooms....lots of mushrooms!

As mentioned earlier, off-trail activity is expressly forbidden at Stimpson Family Nature Preserve. Good thing mentor Tim knows how to get past the reserve boundary for an epic game of Spider's Web.

Spider's Web gives us insight into what it means to risk it all for food, rewarding stealth and patience. Your Explorer just might be able to tell you what our eyes are designed to notice (motion) and how that affects their Spider's Web strategy.

A few years ago you might have fit, but now......?!?

The Gray Wolf Pups didn't only connect with the land on Sunday, they also connected with each other. And, true to the BEC motto - "Widen the circle" - they welcomed both visitors making up for missed outings and a new group member. This open, welcoming attitude is a sign of high self-worth and an ability to focus on the benefit of others. And it made for a fun, interesting outing on a beautiful day.

We have more pictures!

We next roll up our sleeves to work on restoring our service site at Connelly Creek. Sunday, October 30. See you there.

Gray Wolf Pups Delve Into Tracking and Bird Language

The Gray Wolf Pups kicked off their fall season with a classic Boys Explorers Club outing to Clayton Beach. With a few members not returning from last season, we had the privilege of welcoming a few new faces to our group. Of course we will miss our past exploring companions, but the opportunity to foster new friendships and exploration buddies made it a bitter sweet day. In fact, all of our new members already knew at least one other Gray Wolf Pup so we jumped right into things without skipping a beat. After our opening circle we navigated the hazards of Chuckanut Drive and slipped down into a forested ravine to begin our explorations. 

In the ravine the mentors took some time to review our earth skills focus for the season; Tracking and Bird Language. Clayton beach provided the perfect opportunity to not only listen to the birds in the forest, but the sandy beach offers excellent tracking substrate. With our current location of the forest we figured we would jump right into learning about bird language before playing any games. Ask your Explorer if they remember the five types of bird calls (song, companion calling, alarm, aggression, and juvenile begging). A silent sit spot where everyone took some solo time to listen to the birds seemed like a good idea, but right as we got out to our spots a thunderous bird of steel decided to fly right overhead. A big Coast Guard rescue helicopter flew by multiple times over the tree tops before stopping to hover over the beach at the bottom of the ravine! With so much commotion and the thwap-thwap-thwap of the helicopter’s rotors there was no chance of hearing any birds. Calling everyone back in we ate some lunch and drank some water before finally getting a break of silence to tune into the birds who were alarming for obvious reasons. 

Transitioning from exploration and honing our natural history skills we managed to get a game of Spiders Web together before the helicopter returned for another round of hovering (it turned out to be a Search and Rescue practice session and not a real emergency thankfully!). Playing with the atrociously loud helicopter overhead added a new layer to the game. Usually the Spider and the Flies have to be careful not to make too much noise but, with the helicopter, this made noise a non-factor. The Spider was able to tromp around all over while Flies scampered through the underbrush much quicker than usual. After a back and forth game, the Flies managed to secure the food source and return it to the web for a victory. With our game over we had just enough time to make it down to the beach for a quick introduction to tracking.

Arriving at the beach we were met with a high tide and little sand to actually track on. Thanks to a fellow beach-goers dog we had plenty of tracks to analyze. Before looking at any prints in the sand, we discussed how to begin analyzing the big picture before getting into the minutia of the track. Taking into consideration where we are in the world, the country, what bioregion, what ecosystem, what time of year, what time of day, weather patterns, terrain, and a myriad of other variables, we can begin piecing together a story of who made this track, why they were there, where they were going, and what they were doing. With this in mind we found some canine tracks that we could clearly connect to the dog on the beach, however, if we did not see the dog, we could have clued into the human tracks freshly imprinted beside the canine tracks with similar aging to piece things together. The four toes, and clearly imprinted claw marks gave away the canine aspect, while the deeply dug in front toes and claws with chunks of sand pushed back toward the rear of the track indicated this dog was pushing off hard, digging for traction in the sand, and likely running along the water’s edge only a few minutes earlier. There is so much to learn from tracks and their infinite amounts of clues they convey that we can piece together to tell a story. But with waning attention spans, dunes and rocks to climb and play on it was time to get out and play on the beach.

Wrapping up our free play on the beach we regrouped for our closing circle. Reflecting on the day we reviewed what we learned about bird language and tracking. The mentors took some time to highlight the importance of understanding tracking as a skill that permeates throughout one’s life and into many facets of our day to day. Noticing clues here or there and sewing them together to tell a story goes beyond a print in the sand and a dog on the beach. As we tune into our surroundings, the people in our lives, the places we live, even our own behaviors and actions, we can begin realizing all that comes with a heightened awareness. Whether tracking that you get grumpy when you’re hungry, or that a loved one hasn’t quite been themselves lately, we can begin applying what we learn from tracking to make ourselves better individuals, better friends, better family members, and even better community members. Once we track someone is extra quiet today we can check in and make sure everything is alright. When we feel like everyone is being extra annoying and feel like a grouch, we can take a moment to eat some food, drink some water, and take a few breaths before we begin lashing out at others unnecessarily. 

All in all, there is so much more that we can learn, but in the end we also sometimes just need to remember that spending time outdoors, tracking, listening to the birds, and just getting lost in the present is more than enough to revitalize our spirits and bring a smile to our faces. Even if that is all that these boys took away from the day, it would be difficult not to call that a successful outing. Luckily for us this was just the first of many more to come and we can’t wait to get back out exploring and learning about the natural world. 

Make sure to check out the rest of our photos from this outing here!