Field Notes

I have the greatest opportunity to observe the phenology of the ever-present white-tailed deer. White-tailed deer are delightful to watch as they graze in the meadow in spring and summer, gather around a fallen spruce to munch on sweet lichens, or leap over fallen logs, their white fluffy tails waving like flags.

I looked up into the starry night and a flood of emotions came over me as I thought about my T̓at̓áyaqn (Bitterroot Salish) ancestors who hunted this way for thousands of years. All of a sudden, snčlčlép (coyotes) began howling and I felt this strong connection to my ancestors and the bison. This hunt helped me realize the sacred significance of bison to my people and I wanted to find out more about these glorious animals.

Tail feathers, and tails in general, provide a variety of functions for different animal species. The prehensile tails of monkeys in Central and South America are the ultimate fifth appendage. These tails can be used for grasping and hanging from branches and manipulating objects. Curiously, while African monkey species often have similar tails, none have grasping prehensile tails.

Visitors to Montana’s Jim Girard Memorial Tamaracks Grove near Seeley Lake have differing reactions when viewing Gus for the first time. I was awed by the 163-foot height, craning my neck to see the very tippy top and then tilting back even further to view the additional 10 feet of dead tree top.

The beach in question is characteristic of beaches everywhere there have been glaciers: covered in well-sorted, multi-hued pebbles. There’s a rock on this beach for every personality.

They’re in my yard, in a yard two blocks away, or on someone’s front porch chewing pumpkins. It’s rare that I take my daily four-mile trek without seeing these white-tailed wonders, often grazing near the sidewalk, seemingly unafraid.

There I was, calmly taking a shower, when I realized I was not alone. Sitting on top of a bottle of shampoo waving its antennae and staring at me with its red eyes was a Boisea trivittata. Despite their scientific label, there is nothing trivial about these ubiquitous pests known to us by their common name: boxelder bugs.

As we entered a conifer thicket, we happened upon an animal I was not expecting on dry land – a snail – creeping along the curved trunk of a young fir tree.

For millennia mosses have been used as insulation, diapers, and in many other ways that require absorption. I had to know more.

Their height and orange-brown bark, scaly and large-patterned, drew me to them, but I knew little else about them.