The Snowstorm of 2015

I'm going to share a few more fun photos from the past year. As a unrepentant procrastinator, I am still working on some gifts that involve photos so I've been going over my library again.

We had a very big snow storm in February, and I might have forgotten about it without the photos. Shyla kept getting stuck in various places where she needed to rest before she tried to get to me through unpacked snow. She actually appeared to snooze during this break!

Then she'd get back to work, trying to wend her way through the snow to get to me.

After getting stuck, she'd sometimes find a burst of energy to barrel over the snow. Even at the time, I was reveling in her pure athleticism. What a strong dog she is! And what an amazing spirit she has!

She was like a snowdog all day long.

Overnight, a crust formed on the snow, and Shyla adopted new strategy for crossing unpacked snow - flight!

In retrospect, it was a very fun storm, with lots of snow play. The only downside was that it was too much snow for R's elbow so he didn't get to play very much in it. I think he'll be having surgery before too long, and I hope it makes him as good as new!

Enjoy your weekend!

Happy Friday!

Forgive me if this is a short post. I feel like I'm teetering on the edge of a migraine. Holiday season brings a lot of stress with it with too many things that need to get done.

I had my quiet time in the forest this morning with Shyla. The sun was especially rose colored, like it often is during the solstice. And at that magical moment when the rays first hit us, the entire rest of the forest is still black. Shyla shined in darkness beautifully.

Shyla wanted to show you that she still remembers how to cross her paws - a trick I taught her last winter. As I've been teaching her new things with my clicker, it seems as if she wants to show off both old and new things all the time!

We played with her new small Wubba later in our snow bike ride. I decided to get one that is very small so I can keep in my pocket for easy access when I want to reward Shyla for good behavior. She likes the Wubba almost as much as treats!

However, today, I managed to capture the incredibly wide-eyed but fleeting look she gives me when she thinks she's about to get a treat. I think that treats still rule!

As we travel through the forest, I feel so lucky that I know that there's a bear snuggled in a den not too far away. I smile every time I think of it.

I am not planning to go near the den for at least another few weeks to give the bear plenty of serene time with no humans nearby. I've realized that there's a chance that a cell-based trail camera will work at the den site. It would send me a thumbnail photo whenever there's action in front of the den. That would be very helpful because I'd love to go to the den only when the bear has been completely inactive for a while. One of my goals the next time we visit will be to check for cell phone coverage to see if one of those cell phone trail cameras would work there.

Happy Friday to everyone!!

Some Favorite Photos from 2015

I am working very hard on some holiday gifts that involve photographs. For that purpose, I've been going through the photos I've taken in the past year. I thought that I'd share a few that I particularly like.

I took this one on New Year's Day, 2015. The Duo was in a sun puddle when R started sniffing and kissing Shyla's face.

I came home one day to find the Duo in yet another sun puddle, sound asleep. I tiptoed around to find a camera and capture the tenderness between the two of them.

At the height of leaf season this autumn, I somehow captured a moment when I had both dogs' undivided attention. There must have been a herd of elk right behind me that they were *actually* ogling!

In February, we had a very deep snow, and Shyla spent one outing under the snow almost the entire time. I'm not sure that she looks happy in this photo but it certainly summed up the day!

Although it's a lot of work, I learn a lot about my photography when I go through an entire year's worth of photos. I also remember some details of the past year that otherwise would slip away from my memory.

Most of all, the photos make me realize that it's been a happy 2015 for our pack.

Almost Wordless Wednesday - Winter Beauty Edition

Yesterday's snow...

Was today's beauty...

and today's fun.

Someone leaped for joy. Look at that air!

Happy Winter!

Snow Day!!!

The forecasts gave me little clue that we might wake up to about a foot of fresh powder. But we did! Shyla was ecstatic.

Everything was closed, including major roads and all schools and universities. Snow Day!

I was on my fat bike and Shyla was on her paws. She was faster than I was - but we both had fun!!

Snowbiking through a foot of fresh snow is really hard work and takes skill that is only gained by experience. I don't hesitate to take lots of breaks to play with Shyla when we have a powder day. 

Shyla is still in that sweet part of life where her body can keep running and playing forever. She's our seventh Lab so life experience has taught me to seize these days and appreciate her incredible stamina and playfulness.

Despite it being very cold, we both had fun in the forest today. I love fat biking with Shyla because "play breaks" help me to pace myself as I start the process of packing down trails that we'll be using over the coming weeks. With this much new snow, I will incrementally pack down a little more trail each day.

Thank goodness, the migraine is gone today. Thank you for your kind comments. However, the neck, which had been improving at a snail's pace, took a step backward. That's life. I'll focus on the fun rather than the pain.

Winter's Beauty

Since we returned from the desert, Shyla and I have been enjoying our snowbike rides immensely! We are usually out at sunrise, dodging moose and trying to get to a good point for photos. I think that my favorite part of winter here is the sunrises.

As the sun just barely touches us, its color is deep red, which is reflected in Shyla's fur.

Then, as the sun gets a tiny bit higher over the horizon, its brightness grows exponentially.

Because the sun rays are almost horizontal, the shadows are amazing. Here are me and my girl.

And here's Shyla sprinting in front of a golden boulder.

I mentioned my new approach to teaching Shyla to recall away from dead animals. We've been training next to whole elk carcasses and elk limbs recently (these are pieces of mountain lion meals that were left behind). On Day 1, I tried to stash an elk leg in a tree to make it accessible to me to pull down for daily training. Shyla leaped vertically and pulled it out of the tree. Her mouth is on the hoof in the photo. That shows you how determined she was to get to parts of dead animals.

In contrast, after a week of playing super fun games of fetch and doing lots of high reward recalls next to these dead animal parts, Shyla now sometimes refuses to leave me to go "check it out" (that's my cue that it's okay for her to go to the yucky thing). She thinks I'm more fun - and that is exactly my goal!!!!!!!! Her recall success rate off of the yucky things is very high now. I am extremely hopeful that this new approach will help us to navigate the forest without Shyla becoming obsessed with her latest dead find.

I'm going to end there. This is a late post because I've had a migraine all day. I've managed to greatly reduce my migraine frequency by making sure that I get a full 8 hours of sleep each night. But then I had a few very busy days, and I woke up with one this morning. Oh well.

Shyla expressed how I felt all today perfectly.

Tomorrow will be a new day.

A Starry Black Dog Sunday

On our last night in the desert, the clouds cleared out for an hour, and I captured the stars above K's Rock, spinning around the North Star. The moon hadn't risen yet so the rock was black.

It was very lucky that we had that one hour of clear sky. After that, the snow started again. The next morning, R enjoyed the new snow as much as Shyla did. Just before we departed to come home, he turned his face to the sun, and I thought the blurry red rock, snow, and juniper tree set off his black fur beautifully.

Since arriving home, I've been doing lots of training with both dogs. I have more time for it in the winter so we are taking a couple of "Fenzi" courses - one on "nosework" and another on shaping new behaviors using a clicker and treats. So far, both dogs are learning to alert on a certain scent (birch), and they've learned how to walk backwards by clicks/treats when they take the tiniest backward step. It's amazing how fast a tiny step turns into walking across the room backwards.

Of course, we never stop working on recalls. The moose have returned to our neck of the woods. They've been running around in a very nervous way this weekend, so recalls are critical! I practice them with Shyla in the mornings and with the Duo in the evenings.

I'm not sure why Shyla has returned to her habit of hanging back and letting R win the recall races.  Here's the victorious R at the end of one recall!

He looks bit like the flying nun, with his ears flapping!

Snow in the Desert

The morning after the desert snowstorm, the world looked alien. Here was a view of K's Rock from a distance. It was a red rock desert with fresh snow!

As I rode around the area that morning, I was awed by the juxtaposition of snow and red rock. Although it was a chilly day, the desert looked beautiful, and I immensely enjoyed exploring.

By that afternoon, a slickrock area where we hiked was totally clear of snow. The rock retains heat from the sun so well that it melts away the snow very fast! The areas surrounding the slickrock were still white but the rock itself was amazingly clear. At the center of the slickrock, there was the most amazing rock structure.

That cone was a little too steep for hiking but there were wide open areas where we could play.

We even saw some sunshine around sunset, which warmed us all.

We thought that our desert winter interlude was over. The evening began with perfectly clear skies and zillions of stars twinkling. Then, just as rapidly as the day before, a storm engulfed us. The stars disappeared. The world was silent and inky black when I went to sleep.

I slept so well that night that I didn't know that it was snowing. We awakened to another few inches of the white stuff. My bike and tripod were encased in white fluffy snow, as were all the plants in the desert.

Shyla loved desert snow just like she loves snow at home.

As we packed up camp to head home because our desert time was over, she seemed to want to stay!

Alas, we had no choice but for our desert sojourn to end - it was time to head back to the mountains. This was our last view during a short hike before we left that afternoon. You can see that a lot of the snow had melted in just a few hours.

I've grown to love the desert more than I ever expected. It puts life in perspective as we are such tiny specks compared to the looming rock structures shaped by eons of wind and water. The desert's landscape seems utterly alien compared to home, which is another reason why I love it so much. I hope that we can visit again this winter... but I know that we will definitely be back there in the springtime!

A Desert Storm

Back to the desert, although I'm still buzzing with excitement about the bear den!!! Just so you know, I have to go to the den to check the trail cameras' memory cards, and I'll do that only about once per month to avoid upsetting the bear. So, there won't be an update on the den for a little while.

In late November, there's a spot along the Colorado River in the red rock desert where I love to get sunset photos. When the sun is low in the sky, I love to get Shyla glowing against the gorgeous red towers behind her. Here's one of the photos from our visit to that spot last year in November.

This year, the day we went looked really promising. Just before we left our campsite to go to the towers, the sun was shining and the sky was blue. It seemed to be a perfect day for it.

However, as we took the short drive to the spot, a wicked weather front moved in, engulfing the entire landscape in low and thick clouds. This was the brightest photo that I took of Shyla when there was still a shimmer of light on the western horizon.

At the same time, the Runner noticed a climber on top of one of the towers. By the time I captured a photo, he'd descended a little bit. He's in orange pants to the right of the photo. He was very high.

We didn't see him again because the clouds took the visibility down to almost zero right after that. However, we also didn't hear of any reports of lost climbers so he probably got down okay. I hope so.

We were literally in the clouds. It was mystical but it wasn't what I'd expected or hoped for!

We could still see a butte with a snowy slope behind it early in the cloud invasion.

The Runner and R had been hiking while Shyla and I did our "photography thing". They beat a hasty retreat as the weather moved in. They look tiny below those towers.

I squeezed in a couple more photos before they arrived at our spot so that we could all return to the LabMobile. I was mesmerized by the sudden transformation in the world.

Indeed, the towers soon disappeared completely from view. This was the last peek of them.

As the four of us hiked the quarter mile to our LabMobile, the snow started to fly.

It was one of those evenings that we felt so lucky to have our warm LabMobile. We cranked up the heater and wrapped ourselves in sleeping bags. We were toasty as a snowstorm raged outside our LabMobile.

We awakened to a world that looked utterly different from the day before. The red rock desert was snow covered! I'll save that for the next post.