Well, a lot's happened since my last post. Matthew and I celebrated our 1st wedding anniversary on June 24. To mark the occasion, we spent a weekend camping in Rocky Mountain National Park, which was just beautiful. My favorite part was walking in the tundra and seeing all the tiny precious tundra plants in bloom. We also saw tons of elk and beautiful scenery. I will post some pictures soon (they are saved on Matthew's computer, which I don't have with me).

My parents came to visit last Sunday and stayed for 4th of July week. We went and watched the fireworks from a hill overlooking Boulder and the Front Range. It was the most spectacular display I've seen, because we had such a wonderful view. We could see several different fireworks displays occurring simultaneously, from Denver to Longmont and every town in between. I also did a lot of hiking and outdoor activities with my parents when they were here (I got Wednesday through Friday off work). We visited Rocky Mountain National Park as well as several nearby state parks. We also checked out the public pool at Eldorado Springs, and my dad made a splash on the waterslide. I wish I had taken a picture, but I didn't think to at the time.

Here I am standing with my mom in a cave at Eldorado Canyon State Park. Oooh, look at all the ghostly spectra floating around us. Ok, maybe it's just dust on my camera lens.

Here my dad and I are getting a kick out of the stream flowing through the canyon.

That rock is heavy!

A beautiful butterfly in the state park.

My mom has a ball watching a street performer in downtown Boulder.

And now, I leave you with an adorable wildlife photo: a baby golden-manteled ground squirrel that Deanna, Christian and I came across one day in the field. Say it with me now: Awwwww!

I saw the coolest thing in the woods last week. I was in a sunny aspen grove, surveying birds early in the morning, when I happened upon this scene (look in the very center of the photo):

Can't tell what it is? Here's a closer look at this animal (I didn't take this photo; it's from the Animal Diversity Web):

It's a male blue grouse, displaying to impress a female. They fan out their tails and lift feathers on their necks to display yellow skin patches underneath. In the following picture, you can vaguely make out the female to the far right (she's brown). She's facing away from the male, and she's all, "as if" (say in Alicia Silverstone voice). I wish I had better pictures of the pair, but I didn't want to get too close and interrupt their date. I will have to get a telephoto lens at some point.

Here's the same picture, zoomed in a little. The male's on the far left, the female's on the far right:

Lotsa lovely scenery

I realized I have all these pictures of mountain vistas that I just keep taking, because the scenery is so picturesque here and the novelty hasn't worn off yet. I thought I'd just post a sampling from the past couple of weeks.

And I'll leave you with this image of Matthew and I, pondering the question of how two people living in a 1000 square foot apartment can accumulate so much crap (the moving-in process is still ongoing!):

Baby! Baby! Foxes! Foxes!

So, Christian and I were driving along one day, minding our own business, when we look over and see this scruffy-looking fox sitting in someone's front yard:

Cool, we think, it's not often you see a fox just hanging out in broad daylight. The homeowners must have been feeding it. We snap a few pictures and we're on our merry way. But on the way back. . . .

BAAAYBEE FOXES!! These out-of-focus pictures don't do them justice; I squealed with delight and just about died of a cuteness attack. There were two of them, living under somebody's porch. Sigh. Why can't that be MY porch??

Wildlife!

Yesterday we were doing bird surveys and I saw the first elk I've seen since I've been out here. They were really skittish, quickly running away when they saw us. I managed to snap this picture first:

No moose yet, but plenty of signs. Here is a moose track. It's 6 inches long by 4.5 inches wide, which is how I know it's a moose (elk tracks are about 4 X 4 inches).

I also found these bones which are too big to be from anything but a moose.

I've also seen some more beautiful wildflowers lately. These lovely calypso orchids (called fairy slippers) grow in moist places (the first picture is sideways):

We also found some wild white violets:

Ok, these are not wild, but beautiful and interesting nonetheless. They are from the yucca that Matthew and I dug out from the front of our house (it was protruding onto the sidewalk and posed a danger to society, according to the City of Louisville). The interesting part is that the flowers bloomed a week after we pulled the plant out of the ground.

And now, I leave you with this hoverfly, contemplating life from his blade of grass:

Settling in

So, a lot's happened since my last post. The major thing is that Matthew and I rented a house in Louisville, which is a quaint old mining community about 15 minutes from Boulder. Turns out we have a colony of plains garter snakes living in our vegetable garden. Vicious garter snakes.

Unfortunately we had to destroy their habitat to put in our vegetable garden, but we created a new habitat for them on the other side of the shed. I hope they are still there, eating pests.

I have been volunteering a few times a week at a bird banding station in North Boulder. We capture the birds in nets, secure a uniquely-numbered band around each bird's leg, and record their sex and their measurements so that we can learn about their longevity and migration routes if the birds are ever recaptured. Here I am with a yellow-breasted chat:

And a yellow warbler:

Yellow warblers are gorgeous!

Here Deanna is wrangling a very pissed magpie:

Bird banding is a lot of fun and I'm learning bird species really fast by doing it. And, I get to see some gorgeous sunrises when I get up at 5:00:

Of course, I've been working too. The other day I saw a bobcat on my way in to do field work. It was just about the coolest thing ever. It was stalking something in a field, and Christian and I watched it for about ten minutes. Unfortunately it was too far away to take a picture, but I could see it pretty clearly through binoculars. I also saw a fox on the road. Plus, this abandoned car ridden by bullet holes in the middle of nowhere (sorry, it would have been much more interesting if I had pictures of the animals I saw. But beat up old cars don't run away):

I do have one picture of some wild animals. These are mule deer, and they are everywhere. They wander through the city of Boulder, eating the wealthy people's carefully pruned shrubs. These fellows are up by Nederland.

This week I am going to be getting up before sunrise to do bird surveys, and I will be sure to empty the card on my camera so that it will be ready if I see any more bobcats. Or the ever elusive mountain lion. Stay tuned!

I've been slackin' on my bloggin'

Hi everyone! Sorry I haven't posted in a while; I was back in Michigan last weekend for Matthew's graduation, and work's been keeping me busy. Here are some things that have happened since I posted last:

Nederland got hit with about a foot of snow last week.

The morning after the snow storm, I woke up and the sunrise had turned the low-laying clouds and the mountains bright pink:

Here are the bunkhouses, all cozy-looking in the snow and morning light:

The reservoir turned into a mirror that morning, smooth as glass:

This week, we were out in the field again, setting up some cowbird monitoring points. This is Douglas fir cone. I have been learning my western tree species.

Another random pond, full of chorus frogs. We were hoping to see boreal toads, an endangered species, but alas, none yet. We will be doing systematic surveys for them a little later, after the end of the spring bird migration.

In attempting to find Ponderosa pine forest that had been selectively thinned in which to place our cowbird points, we were led to this lodgepole pine forest that had been "patch-cut" (misleading GIS layers). Patch-cutting basically means that they go into an area with a machine that chews up everything in sight and spits it out. The air was unbelievably fragrant with pine resin.

I think I'm going to have to pick up on my adventures again later, as I need to get up to Longmont to look at some places to rent. Matthew's coming in this weekend and hopefully we'll find a place to live soon. So I'll sign off for now, but I have lots more pictures to share with you later.