Something to Ponder
… Don Miller
Several summers ago a couple of buddies and I packed up the van and headed to Theodore Roosevelt National Park in North Dakota. We ended up spending most of four days there hiking the North Unit of the park. We met and went on an eight hour hike with the Park’s “do-it-all” guy, named John Heiser. John was an incredible interpreter of the history, geology, flora, fauna and political status of the place and while looking over the badlands landscape eating our pb and j’s, he even read original writings of his beloved space. It was awesome for my soul to hear him talk about this countryside with a passion that is unsurpassed. John mails out a small semiregular e-notes that he calls, “Roamin the Range.” The last one I got contained a letter that he had written to the tourism bureau of his region.
While my friends and I were in Western North Dakota, the “oil rush” had just started to take a strangle hold of that pristine landscape and culture. Paralleling the gold rush of years ago and its impact during and after the “rush” is obvious. Read the letter and feel the passion and John’s sense of place for a landscape that is vanishing. We all should hold a special place in out heart for an area as strong as John Heiser does.
Read the letter
Amazing Stuff
Wisconsin’s St. Croix cougar killed in Connecticut?. Long-distance travel sets record
Here is an article I came across while researching for a completely different topic. More details regarding cougar sightings can be found on the Wisconsin DNR site
Picture of the Month
This photo was taken at a large beach just south of the Wind Point lighthouse near Racine, WI around Christmas time. A volunteer sent it to me and asked what I thought they might be. After several e-mail flurries with Wisconsin DNR and Illinois DNR as well as some other wildlife specialist, it was determined that they were coyotes. One has a bad case of mange and yes, black coyotes do exist in Illinois too.
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