Spear Grass

Needle-and-thread grass is native to the western third of the United States and is particularly suited to semi-arid regions.   This particular bunchgrass thrives in regions receiving 7-16 inches of precipitation annually.  Moreover, needle-and-thread grass is not particularly finicky about elevation.  You may find it anywhere between 1000 and 8500 feet and you will find it establishing early in areas of disturbed ground. 

The kids in my hometown of East Helena, Montana, called needle-and thread grass “spear grass.”   Once the spears began curing under the summer sun, my friends and I would pluck the miniature weapons from the tufts of grass and ambush each other.

As a weapon, the grass spears proved surprisingly effective.  A proper throw saw them readily sticking into clothing.  At close range, the sharp seedheads would penetrate and stick in open skin.

On a drive along our country road, I suddenly announced: “I need to show you something, Desiree.”   I stopped the car and dashed out to grab three spears from a swath of needle-and-thread grass wavering along the berm of the roadway.  Once back inside the car, I threw the spears at Desiree’s legs.  Two stuck to the fabric of her jeans.

“Oh, wow!” Desiree exclaimed.

“Spear grass,” I told her.  “It’s good stuff.”

Spear Grass

Desiree “Speared”

—Mitchell Hegman

Driving Lessons

Desiree has almost zero experience in driving an automobile.  In the last few weeks, I have been easing her into both the thought and practice of driving.  The other day, for example, I stopped my truck on the open road less than a mile from our house and had her drive home from there.

I also share tips about driving as we book around town.

On our last trip to town, we found ourselves at a four-way stop.  “Four-way stops can be tricky,” I told Desiree.  “The car arriving first gains the right-of-way.  If two cars arrive at the same time, the car on the right goes first.  If the cars are opposite each other when they arrive at the same time, the car going straight through goes first.  If four cars all happen to arrive at once, you just start swearing at each other.”

Desiree Driving the Truck

—Mitchell Hegman

The Paper Chase

Desiree and I spent considerable time over the last couple weeks putting together documents for attaining a permanent residence (green) card for her.  In all, we are submitting a packet with some 20 documents to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).

Two of the required forms—the I-864 and the I-485—are extremely dense.   Put together, these forms comprise 28 pages of required information about the petitioner (me) and the beneficiary (Desiree).

Last night, we finalized our work on the green card petition and sealed everything inside a giant envelope for submission by mail.

A strange mix of unease and hope overcame both of us as we sealed our work in the envelope.  There exists plenty of room for error on our part.  And, as near as we can tell, another six to eight months will be required to complete the process.

Posted is a photograph of what people look like only moments before they stuff green card application documents inside an envelope.

 

The “Green Card” Look

—Mitchell Hegman

The Lakeshore

If I could uninvent only one thing, I would choose wakeboats.  These craft, and the monster waves they purposely generate, chew-up the lakeshore and wreak havoc on boats moored to docks. 

On Saturday, I dropped my pontoon boat into the lake for a bit of cruising around.  I left the boat in overnight and secured it to my dock at all four corners.  Yesterday for the first time of the year, the lake filled with wakeboarders and a roving crosshatch of huge waves.

By midday, battering waves had snapped one of the ropes securing my boat and allowed the boat to repeatedly slam against my dock.  Before we could pull my boat from the water, Desiree and I were forced to dig something of a ramp into a steep ledge carved (by the repeated assault of waves) into a thick mat of grass and roots growing across my boat ramp.

Normally, I don’t put my boat on the weekends due to the annoying swarm of wakeboarders and wakeboats.

Lesson relearned.

Desiree at Work

Desiree After Pulling the Boat from the Water

—Mitchell Hegman

Another Filipino Gathering

A group of a dozen or so Filipino women came out to the house for a late afternoon dinner.  This is the third time Desiree and I have gathered with this group of Filipinos.  The food is always great and there is no such thing as an awkward silence or dull moment with these girls.

Several women brought gifts for Desiree.  I found one the gifts, three grocery bags filled with outdoor plants, in the shade under our linden tree.  I snapped a photograph of the bags with my smarter-than-me-phone.  I showed Desiree the photo on my phone.  “Look, Des,” I teased, “someone delivered groceries for the deer, too.” 

The Girls Arriving

Groceries for the Deer

—Mitchell Hegman

Further Decline

Nighthawk populations in North America are in decline.  At one time, beginning somewhere in June and extending through summer, I would see dozens of them in caroming, acrobatic flights around my house in the evenings.  Their veering flights (while chasing after winged insects) and booming dives often drew me outside as a spectator. 

I see them only rarely now.

Nighthawks prefer open spaces and they nest on open ground.  They thrive by snatching insects from midair.  The decline in nighthawk populations is partially attributed to loss of habitat thanks to human development and changes in land use.  And, because they thrive by eating insects, the widespread use of pesticides negatively impacts their numbers.

Sadly, the gravel country roads splayed across the countryside where I live offer a far more direct threat to nighthawks.  In the darkness, nighthawks will sometimes drop onto the bare earth on the roadways and fold their wings in rest.  Trucks and cars barreling down the road may either mow them down or strike them as they try to lift away against the headlights. 

Posted is a nighthawk I found dead on the road within sight of my house.

Me With the Nighthawk

Nighthawk Up Close

—Mitchell Hegman

Sunset, June 23, 2022

Yesterday evening, a few minutes before the sun slipped below the Rocky Mountains, my sister called and told me I needed to step outside and look at the clouds.

Phone in hand, I followed her advice.  Outside, I found long arms of clouds and UFOs stretched across much of the sky.  “All we need is some color,” I suggested.

A few minutes later, the setting sun breathed fire into the clouds.  Big color!  Posted today are three photographs I captured as the sun fell away.

—Mitchell Hegman

Safety Fourth

Borrowing from Mike Rowe (of Dirty Jobs fame), I often use the phrase “safety third.”   In Mike Rowe’s way of thinking, your personal safety is not found in safety programs or safety gear.  Your personal safety is ultimately on you.

Safety third.

I think we can claim with some surety that most adults are aware of the hazards associated with electricity.  Shock hazards are the most obvious.  In addition to shock hazards, faulted circuits (short circuits and ground faults) can create arc-flash events: explosions in unadorned English.  Sometimes, breakers will spit fire or blow apart when subjected to the high current values created by faults.  This is why you will notice electricians standing off to one side of a panel when they switch breakers to the “on” position to energize a circuit.

Recently, while assessing a building’s electrical system with an electrical contractor, we opened the cover on an electrical breaker panel and found a circuit breaker with red tape applied across its handle.  The breaker was in the off position and someone had scrawled “direct short” across the length of tape.

This one qualifies as “safety fourth” in my estimation.

In a safety third world, the faulted circuit conductor would be permanently disconnected from the breaker and tagged internally within the panel.  Or a more ambitious craftsman might try to locate and repair the faulted portion of the circuit.

 

Safety Fourth

—Mitchell Hegman

My Biggest Failure

Rumbling and clattering along the roads near my house to find and empty my trash bin in the predawn darkness, the garbage truck sounds like the arrival of all-out war.   Having awakened only a minute before the arrival of the truck, I step outside and watch the truck—a mobile collection of unreasonably bright lights—thunder and strobe away though the scattered timber collected on the low hills surrounding me.  

Both here and at my cabin, I strove to maintain a quiet presence.  This is my biggest failure in that.

—Mitchell Hegman

The First Day of Summer

Today is the first official day of summer.  Here in Montana, the season names should be accompanied with an asterisk.  A note applied to the asterisk would read: “In name only.”

In Montana, our weather (especially the temperature) regularly entertains wild swings that defy season norms.  We actually hold a world record for the most extreme temperature swing in 24 hours.  In 1972, at Loma, Montana, the temperature rose 103 degrees, from -54 degrees Fahrenheit to 49 degrees.

Most of our goofy temperatures, however, are drops to unexpected lows at the wrong time of year.   I have personally seen snow fall on every month of the year here at my house in the valley.  Just yesterday, on the last day of spring, my vehicle registered only 41 degrees as I crested Flesher Pass during a rain storm.  I am pretty sure I saw a few flakes of snow flitting about amidst the raindrops.   

Today, as I said at the opening of this blog, is the first day of summer.  But if you are planning a trip here in Montana, make sure you bring along a coat.

—Mitchell Hegman

Deadeye Des

Desiree and I spent Friday and Saturday night at the cabin.  On Saturday afternoon, the Wedll Family drove up to overnight in a tent alongside us.  Last year, on a similar stay, the two oldest Wedll kids (Carolyn and Jack) brought along their Red Ryder air rifles.  I spent hours plinking down aluminum cans with them.  Recognizing how much I enjoyed shooting the air rifle, the Wedll’s gave me an official Red Ryder for Christmas.

Naturally, I brought my Red Ryder air rifle with me for our weekend stay at the cabin.  Not only did Carolyn and Jack bring along their Red Ryder rifles; they also brought with them a suspiciously long and narrow gift-wrapped box.  “This is a gift for Desiree from the kids,” Becky Jo said, handing the box to Desiree.

I laughed.  “I think I have a pretty good idea what that is.”  Desiree carefully peeled away the wrapping after being presented the box.  Sure enough, the kids had given her a Red Ryder of her own.  Another Montana-style welcome.

“I guess I need to set up a few cans so we can try our hand a target shooting,” I suggested after capturing an image of the kids and Desiree on my smarter-than-me-phone.”

Weird thing.  Desiree turned out to be an excellent marksman.  She soon began plinking down can after can.  Plastic bottles, too.  Within an hour, she earned the name “Deadeye Des.”

Jack, Carolyn, and Desiree

Deadeye Des

—Mitchell Hegman 

Sweeping Hailstones Inside the Cabin

While Desiree and I were sitting inside the cabin drinking a midafternoon cup of coffee, a storm darkened the skies above our notch-like mountain valley.  A casual rain eventually pattered against the cabin.  “Look,” I told Desiree, “There is a little hail in that.”

Desiree has never witnessed a hailstorm.  She saw grapple falling not long after her arrival here, but not righteous hail.  As we peered out, hail began falling with greater and greater intensity.  The stones ranged from the size of a marble down to the size of a pea.  The inside of my cabin soon roared with the report of hailstones against the metal roof.

Hoping for Desiree to experience the storm with all senses, I did what any other semi-normal person would do.  I opened the cabin door and told her grab her smartphone so she could record the event.  As Desiree and I filmed the storm, hail glanced off the outside step and bounced inside the cabin.

The storm lasted for only a few minutes, but deposited enough hail inside the cabin, we had to sweep it up into a dustpan.  Given that, I guess we shall call Desiree’s first hailstorm a success.

Photo of Desiree Sweeping Up Hail

Sweeping Video

Hailstorm Video

—Mitchell Hegman

Future Huckleberries

Huckleberries have been in bloom, begging first at lower elevations, for a couple weeks now.  If all goes well and the blossoms are properly pollinated, the blossoms will be berries in the future.

The nature of huckleberry blossoms impacts the mechanics of pollination.  Whereas most flowers are easily accessible and freely expose their pollen on open anthers (male reproductive organs), the pollen of the huckleberry flower is hidden away.  For pollination to occur either a small insect will need to climb up inside the bell or a larger insect may be required to “buzz pollinate” the flower.

Buzz pollination (sometimes called sonication) is fairly rare.  Only about 9% of the flowers in the world rely on this form of pollination.  Buzz pollination requires an insect to clasp the flower, or parts of the flower, and vibrate to release pollen.  Oddly enough, honeybees are not capable of performing buzz pollination.  Many bumblebees, seeking to free some pollen for their lunch, are very efficient at this form of pollination.

A recent study conducted by researchers from the Montana State University documented insects visiting globe huckleberry flowers in May and June.  Some 47% of the visitors were bumblebees.  Wasps made up another 23% of the visitors.  Ants comprised 10% of the insects accessing the flowers.  An assortment of other leggy little critters comprised the rest. 

If nothing else, this study will make me go easier on wasps in the future.

I am in favor of anyone working to produce more huckleberries.

Pink Huckleberry Blossom

A Pair of Blossoms

—Mitchell Hegman

Finding an Arrowhead

Yesterday, while walking through a forest at some seven-thousand feet in elevation within the Big Belt Mountains, I glanced down and spotted a partial arrowhead made from flint.  Over the years, I have found a half-dozen arrowheads or partial arrowheads while wandering about my home state of Montana.  I found another one something near ten years ago while walking the prairie near my house.

Such finds always thrill me.  At the same time, a swath of questions rush through me:

How old?   How did the arrowhead find this place?  Did the arrowhead bring down a deer?  An elk?  What did these mountains look like when the arrow flew?  What luck brought me to find the arrowhead in such a remote setting?

I have posted a picture of the arrowhead I found.

—Mitchell Hegman

406 (A Tell)

If you see a “406” bumper sticker on a vehicle, you can be certain the owner of the car is from Montana.  It’s a tell.  Montana’s statewide area code is 406.  The sticker celebrates the notion that Montanans see the entire state as a single community connected by long streets.   It’s rare for a native Montanan to travel to any town in the state and not have some manner of personal connection with at least one person in the town.    

Filipinos have a distinct tell of a much different nature.  This tell applies to Filipinos living abroad.  In this case, you can tell when a Filipino is living in a home if you find a walis-tingting broom at the home.  The brooms are made from the thin midribs of palm leaves bound together on one end.

One of the first online purchases Desiree wanted to make after her arrival here was a walis-tingting broom.

Walis-Tingting Broom on My Deck

—Mitchell Hegman

Deer Resistant Flowers

A few of Desiree’s outside flowers encountered their first run-in with our local deer population.

Outcome?

Deer: 14   Flowers: 0   

I have had limited success with planting “deer resistant species” in the past.  As a wildlife biologist once told me when I groused about this: “There is always that one deer who doesn’t know they’re not supposed to eat that plant.”

At Desiree’s urging, we stopped by the lawn and garden section of a big box store to see about purchasing a few flowers that might escape the jaws of death (mule deer).  We found most of the store’s remaining planting flowers stuffed inside a large outdoor tent.  I approached the first store employee I saw.  “What do you have that deer don’t eat?” I asked her.

She glanced at a few nearby plants and then engaged me again.  “Chain link fence,” she suggested.

—Mitchell Hegman

Spinystar Cactus (In Less Than Two Hours)

Spinystar Cactus does not suffer from a lack of names.  It is known by several common names, including spinystar, viviparous foxtail cactus, pincushion cactus and ball cactus.

As good fortune has it, my house rests on the fringe of the spinystar’s range of growth in our valley.  I feel particularly blessed having this cactus growing on my property when they are in bloom.  They and bitterroot present the most vivid of all flowers.  Their blossoms are colored as if electrified.

Desiree and I have been monitoring the cactus near our house for days in anticipation of their showy displays of flowers.  Late yesterday afternoon—as if someone flicked on a switch to energize the spinystars—most of the specimens on my property blossomed all at once.

The flowers remained closed for most of the overcast day.  At 2:30ish in the afternoon, on a walk down to the lake, Desiree and I stopped to examine a ten-inch-wide clump of spinystar just off the road.   “Man, look at that!  That thing is going to be spectacular when it opens up.”  I fished my smarter-than-me-phone from my pocket and captured an image just for fun.

Less than two hours later, on our way back up the hill, the same cactus dazzled us with a bright showing of flowers.  In that short time, under the first full sun of the day, the cactus bloomed in full.

Desiree and I captured a series of images with our phones.

 

Spinystar at 2:30 PM

Spinystar at 3:50 PM

Focus on Flowers

—Mitchell Hegman

Big Green

Desiree and I found ourselves in an area of the forest charred by wildfire last year.  For the few months following a fire, such landscapes are otherworldly and seemingly derived almost entirely from India ink.  But provided with moisture from winter’s snow and spring rain, green returns to the scorched landscape.

In some places, the green emerges in fits and starts.  Maybe a flag of green will appear here and a tuft of something there.  But in other places, the green blares forth in a bigger way.

I am posting photographs of patch of false hellebore we encounter while exploring a section of the fire-darkened forest.       

Big Green, that.

Desiree Walking Through the Blackened Landscape

False Hellebore

False Hellebore

—Mitchell Hegman

Branding Day at the 4-R

The 4-R Ranch & Cattle Company (owned and operated by the Russ family) branded their new calves yesterday.   As in years past, I pitched in as best I could.  My job yesterday entailed directing calves down the narrow run from the holding pen and then urging them into the branding squeeze chute.

Three items to note regarding my branding station for the day:

First, I needed a little on-the-job training.  Directing calves is a little like herding giant, furry marbles.  They tend to scatter in all directions when you get near them.  Second, holding two or three calve in place inside the run proved the real work.  Calves are surprisingly squirmy and strong.  And some of them like to throw a random kick now and then.  Finally, the entire branding process, thanks to a steady rain, turned into a mud bath.

Fortunately, I don’t mind being kicked at now and then, and I harbor no immediate fear of mud.  In the end, we pushed a couple dozen calves through the branding process.

Branding a Calf

Me Waving from My Work Station

Mud is Good Stuff

Mommas and Calves Waiting to Reunite

—Mitchell Hegman

Dirt Conversion Kit

Another of my country neighbors had a dirt conversion kit dropped off at his property.  A dirt conversion kit consists of bundles posts and poles for fencing in a few acres.

My neighbor intends to fence in a small part of his property and toss a couple horses inside. 

Ours is a dry and fragile landscape consisting of shortgrass prairie with occasional patches of bunchgrass.  Digging down, you find a thin layer of soil overtop sand and stone.

“This ain’t horse country,” anyone from my hometown of East Helena will inform you.

Horses, if confined to paddock here, will require no more than a few days to graze every thread of grass down to bare dirt.

I drive by several such squares of bare ground (populated with hay-fed horses) on my way home from town.  Soon, I will have a patch of bare dirt next to me.       

—Mitchell Hegman

The Rocky Mountain Front

Yesterday, I promised Desiree a life-altering experience.  “We are going to drive along the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains,” I told her.  “I heard the wildflowers are peaking in many areas right now.  If they are anything like normal this year, you will see oceans of wildflowers.”

The arrowleaf balsamroot did not disappoint.  We encountered enormous colonies of balsamroot blooming across the flanks of mountains and throughout the adjacent foothills.  

According to a blog I read at naturesseed.com: “Arrowleaf balsamroot can get up to two feet tall and forms a taproot that can reach depths of six feet. This makes it a very drought tolerant plant and a great addition to water-wise landscapes. The taproot itself has a very pleasant balsam-like odor, giving the wildflower its name. On top of its drought tolerance, arrowleaf balsamroot is very winter-hardy and able to handle part-shade. It does take a while to fully establish and mature, often requiring three or four years to produce flowers.”

After several hours of touring the foothills of the Rockies, we diverted into Sun River Canyon and drove partway back through the mountains and overthrusts of the Sawtooth Range.  This is a part of our landscape still under construction.  There is no clear balance between, running water, timber, and solid stone.  If you appreciate massive cliffs and blockish, abrupt mountains, this is a place for you.   

Before the road once again trickled out from the foothills and onto the open plains, Desiree saw her first ever bear.  We saw three, actually: a sow and two tiny cubs.  We saw the bears for only a few seconds before they scrambled away into some thick timber.  I am pretty sure they were grizzlies.

Since we failed to capture an image of the bears, I am offering flowers and mountains for today.

Arrowleaf Balsamroot

Desiree Amid the Flowers

Sun River Canyon

Diversion Lake

—Mitchell Hegman

Challenged (A Big Deal)

A lot of things in this life challenge me.  Reaching the highest shelf is a challenge for me.  Both parallel and back-in parking are problematic.  For a long time, properly pronouncing the word “photovoltaic” proved difficult.  I am still working through my own personal spelling bee.

Last night, both Desiree and I discovered we are—as a couple—challenged by posting an event notification on Facebook.  I will you spare you the details, but I can tell you that between my computer and Desiree’s smartphone we pecked away at keyboards for nearly an hour navigating Facebook’s menus and layers.  We also placed a few phone call queries.  

Desiree and I were trying to post an invitation notification for a celebration of our union in matrimony.   We will be celebrating at our lakeshore on the 4^th of July between 1:00 and 6:00 in the afternoon.  We selected Independence Day to celebrate because we want to be part of a big deal.  We want our yearly anniversary celebrations filled with fanfare and fireworks.

After much giggling, squinting, poking, and a couple bad words said aloud, we managed to get our event posted.  If we can get through a Facebook posting as a couple, I figure we can get through anything.

—Mitchell Hegman

Our Morel Mushroom Patch

Mushrooms are as weird as anything else in the world.   They thrive in the craziest locations and live in outlandish conditions.  A friend of mine told me his best spot for hunting and harvesting shaggy mane mushrooms was the old garbage dump in East Helena, Montana.     

Morel mushrooms are another case in point.  They flourish like nobody’s business in areas devastated by wildfires.  In our region of the Rockies, mushroom pickers swarm the charred landscapes during the first two spring seasons following fires.  On a good day, an ambitious mushroom hunter can fill grocery bags with the highly regarded fungus in the fire blackened backwoods.

And, of course, morels will occasionally pop up in random and unexpected places.   Last week, while mowing the smallish patch of grass I tend at my lakefront, I ran across four smallish morels.  Desiree had never seen a morel.  We picked them and she later sautéed them in butter and ate them.

Yesterday we found two more four-inch-tall morels near the same spot in my lawn.  “I want those,” Desiree announced.  “I want to eat them.”

I managed a photograph of the morels before they were whisked off to the frying pan.

Our Morel Mushrooms

—Mitchell Hegman

Charles M. Bair Family Museum

Charles M. Bair came to Montana from Paris, Ohio.  Shortly after his arrival in 1883, he worked as a train conductor.  Charles also ran a small sheep operation in Central and Southeast Montana.  Bair later made a considerable fortune by investing in a ground-thawing device used during the Alaskan Gold Rush.  He used his earnings to further invest in oil, mining, banking, and real estate.

Charles Bair turned one of his investments—a ranch he purchased in Martinsdale—into one of the largest sheep ranches in the world.  For a time, he ran 300,000 head of sheep on his ranch.  The Bair’s constructed a mansion there alongside the Musselshell River.

Charles and his wife, Mary, collected antiques, artwork, and Native American clothing and relics.  The Bair’s raised two girls: Marguerite and Alberta.  Following the death of Charles and Mary, the two girls traveled extensively and continued amassing artwork and fine furnishings from Europe. 

By the 1960s, the girls envisioned and began planning to turn their lavish Montana ranch home into a museum.  The last surviving girl, Alberta, passed in 1993 at the age of 97.  Not long after Alberta’s death, the property became the museum she long envisioned.

On our Sunday drive home from Red Lodge, Desiree stopped to tour the museum.  The museum offers too much for proper description.  I encourage anyone able to visit there to do so.  I am posting a few photographs from our tour to offer some idea of what you will find.

  

View From the New Museum Building

The Two of Us Enjoying the Grounds

The Office

A Bedroom

Fancy Bath

Modern Kitchen

—Mitchell Hegman