Urban wildlife - on one hand, a beautiful grace note to living in Missoula, Montana. On the other hand, definitely a problem of increasing deer population that is not afraid of humans. These lovelies were un-alarmed by yakking Griz fans within twenty feet, walking from side-street parking near the University of Montana on Saturday, 9/2/2023. (Even more alarming are the two well-antlered bucks roving our neighborhood!)
Named for Spring Creek that runs - above AND below ground - through its 100 acres, this ranch north of Kalispell, Montana, was deeded into a conservation trust. Future generations (human, furry, fishy, fern-y, all and sundry...) benefit by protection from development that allows native wildlife and habitat to flourish. (The gateway fascinated…a portal for hopeful dreams…. )
Many thanks to Pat Richards for today’s view and musing fodder. Read more of her tales of true adventure here AND hard copy/Kindle compiled stories here.
“It was a transporting thing, that smile, as it had probably been all her long life, and I felt its power to fix you where you stood (or sat, or fell); it lifted her beyond age, in a way that the other women present, with their more effortful looks, were not lifted.” -The Poet’s House by Jean Thompson, p. 35
New life for old wine corks - a clever upcycle feature in this herb container garden Horticulture entry at Missoula’s Western Montana Fair. (Still plenty to see and do - and eat! - through Sunday 8/13!)
(Bonus material: Clean Cork jokes I found looking for cork puns - totally irrelevant to this post but they’re funny so who cares? Enjoy!)
Construction driving delays near Ronan, Montana, allows the fire-season (darker) version of “stop and smell the roses”…a rather strange dichotomous beauty in the flawless big sky span intersected by roiling wildfire smoke morphing into fluffy high cumulus clouds….
But the prayed-for rain is coming…
“…a smell … likened to vanilla or butterscotch exudes from the cracks between slabs of bark on the tree, creating a unique type of Rocky Mountain aromatherapy.” - Katherine Court in Field Notes: Ponderosa Pine Bark. (Learn a LOT more from the Montana Natural History Centre!)
