Late season field work

Last month I had the pleasure of conducting some late season fieldwork.  I was looking for potential contaminated sites along a proposed road route, but as often happens, I was asked to check on a couple other things for a co-worker.  She needed some information about this utilidor.  It's common for them to be above ground in the arctic.

One of the really fun things about doing work in the arctic is that the policies and procedures and methods were established for other places.  

Nope, I don't really see any environmental concerns here.  No dry cleaners or gas stations nearby.  No industrial activity of concern.  

Not even when I take a step back at the bigger picture.  It's equally fun to write grants.  Especially if you get someone reviewing it who has not been up here or who does not understand the area.  

Because Autumn Colors Never Gets Old

 Like most fellow Alaskans I know right now I am so exhausted from the crazy summer that I welcome Autumn.  Plus, it is a short season and snow will be here before I have my pre-snow list stuff all taken care of.  It always does.  It's even earlier in the arctic.  I was out in three villages a month ago, trying to find some amusement in conducting wetland delineations with withered plants.

Even the mundane work photos have moments of beauty.  I never thought a gravel pit could look interesting, but it's all about the perspective, like most of life.  Our regular cast of characters were all out of town for this trip so we had a different ride to the site.  He was an equipment operator.  From which you might make some assumptions.  But without the slower pace of the work and walking around the site you would miss the conversation.  And the discovery that he had been to Fairbanks and Anchorage each, for a year of university general requirements.  These conversations always leave me wanting to ask the questions there is no space for - like how did you end up back in this village when you have no family here and you prefer the city?

I have missed doing ecology work.  I didn't realize how much until I got to dig into the details.  Plant identification is just the tip of the iceberg.  Made all the more challenging by not only a lack of flowers or berries, but also a general lack of defining features.  You know, the features that the keys are based on....

Even a task as simple as trying to figure out where the water from the site flows and ultimately ends up is beautiful.  We had a different pilot than usual for one site.  Luckily he was experienced with the other crazy biologists in the region and he caught on quick to our mission.  Can't wait to see how much has changed in a month - I will be back out here in two days.

Packed

I haven't been out to the villages in a while, but I hear they are having the same kind of problems we are here in town - warm temperatures and not much snow.  The silver lining of the cloud is that I am finally organizing my pictures from the past several years.  I take lots of pictures when I travel because I think of things I want to share that I think other people might find interesting and that I don't want to forget having seen.  This is a classic picture from my seat on a small plane this past year.  Instead of seats you often find across the aisle is filled with mail, cargo, and groceries.  Floor to ceiling.  It's all strapped down, but sometimes that doesn't stop it from moving.  Which is bad.  Our load shifted as we started to taxi for this flight.  No one got real excited, we just let the pilot know so he could stop and adjust the load.  I must admit I would have been pretty pissed off to wake up dead because a case of pepsi shifted and caused the plane to crash.  Nothing against pepsi, just not worth my life.