10 YEARS on 10*10*10

Good Super Early Friday, Friends!

I am writing to you in pjs from our Bozeman Bungalow while listening to our very hurt puppy snore in her bed. Bella tore her shoulder muscle hunting and will be out for two weeks with NO activity, more on this to come. She is doing better but it is truly heart-wrenching to see her in this much pain.

And thanks for reading this blog, lots of you have told me that you do, and I appreciate it a bunch.

Last Sunday I celebrated my 10 year anniversary with NRCS. I can't believe how fast 10 years have flown by. Shortly after moving to Bozeman in 2000, I was hired by NRCS as a GIS digitizer developing digital soil surveys. Thank goodness that job lasted only 4 years, it was worse than watching white paint dry. While it was totally worth it to get my feet in the door, I have since been in my current postion for 6 years as a Cartographer on the Area Office staff here in Bozeman. To sum it up what that NRCS does....well, we spend your tax payer dollars that are allocated through the Farm Bill on conservation projects for private landowners. Yes, I am a bureaucrat and happy to be a civil servant, as well. My mixed bag of duties include office work, making maps, running GPSs, training to our Field Office Staffs, trouble shooting computers, geodata management, payments, field work, electric fence building, grazing plan maps, and everything in between. Clearly, it is never the same and includes so many duties, I love the variety. Bottom line, I am very grateful and do enjoy my work.

On the day of the photos below, we were in Musselshell and Golden Valley Counties near Round Up, Montana earlier this summer. We were out scouting for cultural resources from our ancestors and would re-route our proposed fences should we come to a site. We found a few chips from American Indians and several homestead sites from more recent years. It felt like it was just me, the grass, the plains, and the sky. Somedays, I can't believe I get paid to have so much fun. If my Grandpa Hawk was still alive and I told him I got paid for being on the lookout of FLS (funny looking rocks) he would crack up!

a chip

my ride

our new fancy GPS

YEEE HAWWWW!

an old well site

what do you suppose this is?

pottery shard from a crock

they even had turquoise glass back then

more glass shard

My Grandpa's little Bureaucrat,

Kristin

My Favorite Pink Legume

Good fall day to you and happy Friday to boot.

Every since I have been travelling between Big Timber and Harlowton, Montana this field of Sainfoin has absolutely mesmerized me. How can there be an entire field of just pink flowers? This year the hail had its way with the legume crop but many flowers still perked up to bloom. So this time, instead of just rubber necking the field from afar, I parked the rig and hopped the fence. Afterall, how could one be trespassing if for the sake of science I must further investigate? I would talk to anyone who might stop for a visit while I was having a little photo shoot, but no one stopped to chat about what I was doing on the wrong side of the fence and why? Aside from being gorgeous, this special legume is nitrogen fixing and beneficial in soil and the nutrient cycle and it is non-bloating for critters should they over eat in a green field. NRCS recommends Sainfoin in some wildlife plantings and some seed mixes for pasture plantings but I have never seen a whole field of the plant. Check it out for yourself in the photos below and learn even more HERE.













See what I am talking about?


We have a weekend packed full of canning plum jelly, cabin chores, dates with friends, our first try of the sauna at the cabin, and bird hunting on private land. I am just giddy.


I hope you have swell plans.
Be well,
Frisky Bisquit

A Field Day in the Big Horn Mountains

Yesterday we traveled deep into the Big Horn Mountains

of Montana to teach a soils class to

graduating seniors from the

Crow Indian Reservation.

Kate, Jeremy and I had a swell

time teaching.

Black Canyon is so beautiful, pristine,

and an ideal place for a work day.

As a cartographer for the NRCS,

I get the opportunity to teach kids, too.

I really like this part of my job.

Kate spotted this mushroom and she didn't know what it was.

Lucky for me, I DO, and we ate if for dinner.

This little tasty beauty is a wild Morel Mushroom.

Really mid June is a bit late for these,

but we are just getting a bit of sun from summer now.

Time to look for more, as this is the only

Morel I have harvested.

NOTE:

Make sure you know what you are eating,

False Morels are poisonous.

With Love and Squeezes,

Krissy Fletchy