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Gleaning #2
Livingston, Montana
2010

Same park as yesterday’s photo, same activity, different year. Different birds? Maybe, maybe not.

Gleaning
Livingston, Montana
2011

I’ve heard that getting oil from tar sands or even ethanol from corn is very inefficient in the sense that the net energy gained from the fuel after extracting and refining is a very low percentage of the energy required to produce it. Perhaps that is not unlike crows and ravens searching for tidbits of food in a lawn–they  seem to spend a tremendous amount of time poking around before finding a small bug or other morsel. No wonder they seem to prefer congregating around garbage cans and dumpsters, the yield is much better.

Next
Livingston, Montana
2011

Another crow coming in for a drink. It wasn’t clear if the first one was being polite in yielding to the next in line or because it was being forced off. I was sure these were crows but now I see the wedge-shaped tail on the incoming bird, which is supposed to be a distinguishing sign for ravens, so maybe I was wrong. As much time as I’ve spent photographing the two species you’d think I’d be better at telling the difference.

Westward Wagon
Grand Teton National Park
2011

This scene got me to thinking about the movie Shane which was filmed in the area back in 1951. Maybe this wagon was used as a prop in the movie. It certainly would have fit right in.

Old 89
Grand Teton National Park
2011

The cargo cover on an old stage coach stored at Menor’s Ferry.

The Coincidence
Livingston, Montana
2011

I’ve tried with little success to avoid the extensive news coverage of the anniversary of the 9/11/01 bombings in New York, Pennsylvania, and Washington, D.C. It’s not that it’s not worth remembering, even if it is uncomfortably sad at times. It’s just that we get daily reminders that the tragedy of 9/11 did not end with the events of that day. The “war on terror” that 9/11 spawned has been a decade long extension of that day’s violence that has produced more tragedy than triumph.

Who would have thought that many times the 3,000 original 9/11 victims would die in the subsequent decade of fighting and that so many of the people killed or affected by the aftermath would be just as innocent as those who died on that day? The whole sequence that has unfolded since then reminds me of a desperate attempt to battle cancer with chemotherapy. Doctors and patients acknowledge that chemotherapy attacks a specific problem with a systemic treatment that, while potentially effective against the cancer, may well do significant harm to other parts of the body. In fact the treatment itself might be fatal. It is an act of desperation. Every day the world reels with the side effects of our chemotherapy attack on terrorism.

So, I’ve tried to avoid too much exposure to the media remembrance of this anniversary, but with little success. Today after Sunday morning breakfast in Livingston as has come to be our custom, we took a drive through the city park along the Yellowstone River–also as has come to be our custom. But, deviating from that customary itinerary, we decided on the spur of the moment to cross a one-lane bridge to a residential area on a small island in the middle of the river. In our thirty years in this part of the country, we’d never actually driven over to the island although we’ve driven by the bridge countless times. The island road crosses under another bridge, this one carrying Interstate 90 across the river and the island. It was on the I-90 bridge support that we saw this mural. It was not until after I’d looked over the mural for a while that I saw the date in the lower right hand corner (shown below).

What’s that saying, “there’s no such thing as coincidence; everything happens for a reason”? It’s going to take me a while to figure out why this happened today.

9-11-01
Livingston, Montana
2011

Cover Your Pansies
Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming
2011

A brave flower poking it’s head out from under the cover put over some planters in preparation for a cold night. You just can’t keep a good flower down.

Frosty Jungle
Brooks Lake, Wyoming
2011

Frost covered grass at the outlet of Brooks Lake.

Boundary Water
Brooks Lake, Wyoming
2011

No, not the Boundary Waters Canoe Area in Minnesota, just some grass growing in Brooks Lake at the interface between the calm lake and the flowing water of Brooks Lake Creek.