Programs and Other Excitement

Yesterday I had an animal program at Dayton State Park and I had six people! For Dayton, that's pretty good... I talked a little about the Great Basin and the Carson River Watershed, read an excerpt from Adventures of a Nature Guide by Enos Mills about woodpeckers building their nest, showed my Northern Flicker nest, and some pictures of wildlife from Dayton, Washoe Lake, and Fort Churchill. We also took a short walk down to the Carson River to look for wildlife and signs of wildlife.

The Fremont cottonwoods along the river are at the peak of their fall colors right now!

We talked about bat boxes and cottonwood galleries.

Today I had a guided hike scheduled for 10 a.m. The route I chose was to the gazebo above Deadman's Creek, and then into the hills above, in the Virginia Range. The hike is 2.6 miles long, with an elevation gain of approximately 620 feet. 

I was in the office getting ready for the hike, about to leave, when a visitor came to the office at 9:30 saying the dump station was clogged and he wanted to use it...I'm thinking Of course the dump station is clogged right now. I followed him down, unclogged it, and made it to the parking lot (meeting location) with 15 minutes to spare! Is it weird that I'm proud of myself when I get it unclogged and ready for people to use? (hahaha)

There was a person already waiting to use the dump station when I showed up and he asked me questions about the park the whole time I was trying to get it open. It was a little distracting, but today the clog wasn't that bad so it wasn't hard to answer questions while working on it. Sometimes that's not the case....the first time I had to work on it this year, my allergies were killing me, hornets were swarming around the water, and both my supervisor and a park visitor were watching me, waiting for it to be open. After 20 minutes or so I had to give up and we ended up calling our maintenance specialist on his day off to come work on it. The visitor had to go somewhere else for her RV. 

Our maintenance specialist, Dave, told me I probably did not have enough upper body strength to use the hand snake to unclog the dump station...and that's all it took! I was determined to not have to call him on his day off (or anyone else) to do it for me. It worked...the next few times it was clogged, I was able to get it back open! I even had our volunteer tell me it's not my job and that I should call him, but it really is my job--especially when I work alone on Sundays and that's the busiest day for it. People are heading home from camping and come into the park to use the dump station before they make the drive. I figure it uses less gas because their vehicle is lighter afterwards!

This time of year it clogs more than normal because there is a cottonwood tree in the island beside it. The leaves get washed down and build up. We think...know...there is something blocking the pipe between the main hole and the leach field. There is at least one power snake "head" down there and maybe a cap or something from the RV hoses. We have baskets installed now to prevent more from going down there--the dump station at Dayton State Park had to be dug up and cleared out because someone put a plastic "red cup" down there full of rocks, which succeeded in blocking and clogging the whole thing! The plan is to dig ours up this spring and see why it has been clogging so much and fix the problem. I'm definitely in favor of that plan!!

The guided hike went well. There were three people willing to do a "strenuous" hike in November. The weather has been perfect lately. Today I think we had a high of 60 or so. (Yesterday my husband and I drove to Reno after work and there was a convertible with the top down--it was 75 degrees!) My supervisor and I debated whether to call the hike "moderate" or "strenuous" because it's not really a strenuous hike, but I know that people have very different definitions of strenuous. I had a guided hike to the gazebo this spring, a wildflower walk, and had people who were unable to finish the hike (turned around early), and some who did do the whole thing complained that they thought it was going to be an easy walk instead of a hard hike. I decided that the more description I could give, the better, so I used my Strava app on my phone to measure the distance and elevation gain this time, so I could be exact in the hike description. I think it worked this time. I only worried about one person, a man who showed up with a large energy drink can instead of water, but he didn't seem to have any problems on the hike at all.

We saw a lot of deer from a distance, and this guy showed up as we were heading back to the parking lot. It's a Jerusalem cricket but I have also heard them called "potato bugs." I got to point out a couple of long-eared owl nests along the way. The visitors were interested in seeing the wild horses, but they didn't show up today.