I Love Grizzlies!

Life has been going really well. I am working on a PhD students project examining the effects of mining on grizzly bears. It is pretty interesting work and I spend most of my time hiking around to places that the grizzlies have been and looking for grizzly signs as well as what plants they are eating. The min itself is amazingly huge, but what is really interesting is that there is a large portion of land that is leased by the mine, but has not yet been developed that provides a sanctuary for bears, moose, and especially big horn sheep because hunting is not allowed on mine property.

We are living in a small cabin in Cadomin Alberta which is just a few short clicks to Whitehorse wildland park as well as Jasper national park. Because the weather has been unreliable (sunny, rainy, snowy, hail-y) we have not backpacked very much, but instead do fairly long day trips (4-20km). I enjoy the job because I see so much wildlife and signs of wildlife everywhere I go. So far I have accidentally walked into a bull elk and his harem, seen a bull moose and female, tons of big horn sheep, and on my first day a grizzly bear. On my "weekend" I went to Jasper with one of the other volunteers. I have been nursing my foot so we did not hike very much, but the area is just gorgeous.

Time for a change

I just got back to Edmonton after finishing work with martens and seismic line in the Northwest Territories. I am now moving to an area near Jasper National Park to work on a project studying the effects of mining on Grizzly bears. It should be very different. Instead of the flat dense bogs of NWT there will be lots of mountains and little vegetation. Add in a little snow and freezing rain and you've got Jasper.

The last week in Ft. Liard went well. We were working pretty long hours to get as many cameras up as possible, but were rewarded with a "field trip" drive home that took us the long way through the NWT. I have included some pictures from the area that we worked in this last week to show you a little bit about the conditions and forest that we were working with. The mosquitoes weren't that bad, but I think it is a funny picture.

A Fantastically long month

Everything is going well on the marten crew. We are hiking 8-20km, working 10-16hrs, and carrying 40-75lbs per day and I am enjoying it immensely. The bush is really tough up here. I thought I would be coming back in amazing shape, but I am mostly just really bruised and banged up. Yesterday I had a tree limb fall on my head and have incurred 7 nasty hornet stings and bear sprayed (myself) on 4 seperate occasions.

It is beautiful and there are lots of animals- mostly on the side of the road. I also got 4 days off to go to the Dawson City Music Festival (1800 km away in the Yukon Territory). The crew is awesome and I look forward to a great last month.

I decided to stay in Canada through September and October working on a Grizzly project near Jasper National Park. Although I am excited about seeing grizzly bears and working in one of the most beautiful places I know of I am getting a little home sick and miss my friends and family.
See you soon!
Emily

Martens Here I Come!

Well, my time is up on the bird crew and I am finally able to start the job that I came up to do. My last day on the bird crew was great. Although the mosquitoes and black flies were bad. I still managed to follow an ovenbird for around an hour to map it's territory. Then we set up some mist nets and we banded two ovenbirds. We also caught a juvenile swainson's thrush on accident. Hedwig (boss) was fairly happy and told me:

"Emily for hating birds so much you did a good job". So I thought it ended on a really good note. At home we split a bottle of champagne and had banana bread for desert. I packed up my bags and moved to the campground so I am now officially part of the "swampdonkey" marten crew. Tomorrow is my first day and I am pretty excited.

What a crazy world

Well, life is definately an adventure. I still feel lucky, but uncertain of what is to come. This writing is going to be about safety. For those who were worried about my safety this is a picture of the crew and everything on our table is put into our safety/survival kits (except the coffee cup). We made the most amazing fire starters I have experienced- 100% cotton balls smothered in vaseline- they last a good 2-3 minutes even if you pour water directly on them.

The next two pictures are from my little seizure episode. The first is a picture of the most expensive bracelet I will ever own and the second is me hooked into the EEG machine to record my brain waves. Altogether I have spent about 24 hours in the hospital doing various tests and am happy to say I am "good to go" for the NWT. Unfortunately they would not give me a copy of my CT scan or my EEG results but my brain seems to be functioning as good as ever.

Addresses!

Looks like I will be traveling through this town during the field season. We will pass through Fort Liard quite often.

Emily hamblen
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Fort Liard, NWT
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CANADA

3 Months, 4 People- Nuff Food?

Cinco de Mayo margaritas after a long day of purchasing and organizing food.