Finding Balance in the Yew Street Woods

The Pacific Northwest has thrown us some interesting weather this fall, and our Explorers Club participants have proven to be resilient adventurers.  We have had some outings cancelled due to some fierce winds, but the Short-Tailed Weasels were able to sneak in a great trip to the Yew Street Woods just before another storm cycle broke over Bellingham. 

Learning some neighborhood trails

The Yew Street Woods is a fairly new site for Wild Whatcom, and the drop off point and trail access are a little bit separated.  Luckily we had some awesome participants that lived in the area.  They were able to take us on some neighborhood trails that brought us right to our trail head.  From there we hiked out the power line trail, and found a perfect space to set up our base camp.  

Hiking on the power line trail

The Short-Tailed Weasels are working on shelter building as their earth skill this season.  A little bit of friendly competition is a great way to build teamwork and keep focus.  The participants were separated into two groups.  Each team was tasked with building a debris hut in an allotted amount of time.  The teams worked great together.  Many hands make light work.  The Short-Tailed Weasels proved themselves to be hard workers with innovative ideas.  When it came time to add the top debris layer, I witnessed both groups using branches as a rake to gather the big leaf maple leaves that blanketed the ground.  The final test was to have one of the participants get into their shelter while one of the mentors poured water over their structure.  Both teams constructed shelters that were stable and kept out most of the water.  

 

Our shelter training was a huge success.  The Short-Tailed Weasels were on task and focused.  This left us plenty of time for free exploration and games.  We circled up and talked about what they wanted to do with the remainder of their day.  It was an awesome exercise in “Collaborate and Compromise.”  Not all of the participants wanted to due the same thing.  After some debate the group came to a consensus.  Half of our remaining time would be used for capture the flag, and the last half would be used to explore some rock formations that we found on our hike in.  

gathering debris

Our game of capture the flag was played with honor.  The playing field was challenging but fun, and the game ended in a draw.  We hiked out through a marshy area in the bottom of a little draw.  It was good practice in route finding through thick underbrush.  The participants then explored a ridge and watched some mountain bikers building jumps.  Our outing ended with a respectful closing circle and a short hike to meet up with their rides home. 

putting together the bones of a debris hut

The Short Tailed Weasels are focusing on shelter building this year, but like every trip, there is so much more happening.  I was impressed with the work ethic, teamwork, and ingenuity shown in our shelter building competition.  The group is learning to talk through differences in a respectful way and decide as a whole what to do next.  They had fun playing games as well as embodied an explorer’s mindset.  Thanks Short-Tailed Weasels for a well balanced outing.  Please check out the rest of the photos from our outing here.

Short-Tailed Weasels and Kingfishers Remove Invasive Plants at Woodstock Farms

The Short-Tailed Weasels formulate an attack plan while Conor shows them what initiative looks like

The original inhabitants of the Pacific Northwest utilized the sea to gather (and sometimes farm) food as well as for transportation.  At some point in time, the native people who lived near these beaches were forced out of the space that we now call Woodstock Farm. They were no longer able to live here like they had since time immemorial. Then, in 1905, Cyrus Gates established Woodstock Farm by constructing some buildings and clearing the land to plant food and raise animals. Cyrus Gates was a local businessman with a particular interest in conserving public places. He lead the creation of Larrabee State Park, Arroyo Park and Fairhaven Park. In 2004, the City of Bellingham acquired the property and now manages it in order to preserve its historical importance while at the same time conserving and restoring the patches of wild space on the site.

Today, the Short-Tailed Weasels and the Kingfishers would add their own legacy to this piece of  land by participating in some invasive species removal. Woodstock Farm features heavily wooded areas as well as some Garry Oak meadows. We spent the day removing Himalayan blackberry, holly and herb Robert (aka stinky Bob!).

An EMA helping on of our younger explorers remove invasive weeds

On the hunt for sharp, invasive holly plants

A cool beech tree was a perfect spot for our backpacks

Going for the holly root...

...and its out!

Another stubborn holly root 

Taking breaks is important (and fun when you get to climb around on glacial erratics)

We can't NOT take pictures of bugs

We also got to have a couple of EMA's (click here for a description of our EMA program) along with us today. These veteran explorers from some of our older groups did a great job of modeling work ethic and helping the mentors keep everyone safe when using tools.

Our wonderful EMAs for the day!

In EC, we utilize lots of wild spaces and parks in Bellingham to learn, play and sustain our emotional and physical health. With this understanding, we appreciated the opportunity to give back to the woods that provide us with so much.

To see the rest of the photos from our day together, click here!

The Short-Tailed Weasels Collaborate Beside Caves on the Rock Trail

The Short Tailed Weasels arrived in a convoy for the first outing of the fall season. We gathered together for opening circle and after meeting new group members and going over our plan for the day we headed down the Rock Trail. Our focus for the day would be shelter building, however in the end we would learn our true lessons would be learned on another topic. 

Checking the map for information to help our outing

Heading down the trail the group was tasked with searching out “natural shelter” as in any emergency, finding a shelter that is already build for you is much quicker and easier than constructing one of your own. Further down the trail we found a series of caves that offered up plenty of natural shelter. One of the caves in the sandstone cliffs was even big enough to fit four Explorers!

Hiking beside the sandstone cliffs

Clambering into caves!

Seeing how many Explorers can fit in the cave

 Transitioning to the second half of our outing we circled up to plan what to do. We would need to focus on shelter building, however afterwards we had the option of either playing Spider’s Web or trying to hike down to Lost Lake. As the group tried to deliberate on what to do, we revisited the “four C’s of decision making”; circle, collaborate, compromise, consensus. First and foremost we needed to circle up and focus ourselves on communicating with one another. Next we took time for each person to share what they wanted to do. The upcoming step of compromising was where we faced our challenge for the day. 

Hanging out to eat lunch

With about half of the group wanting to play Spider’s Web and the other half wanting to go to Lizard Lake, we hit a sticking point in our decision making. After much deliberation and discussion the majority of the group began leaning towards Spider’s Web, however a couple group members were still not satisfied with the plan. Although most of the time outside of Explorers Club, decisions like this are made by a democratic vote resulting in a majority rules scenario. However, this often leaves a group polarized and at least a few members, if not half of the group, unhappy with the decision made. In order for a group to agree with a decision in its entirety, a consensus must be reached. This is not easy, and we asked a lot of the Short-Tailed Weasels to come to a consensus, but through determination and thoughtful compromise we finally arrived at a consensus. We would have a brief shelter building lesson followed by a game of Spider’s web and a strong intention of returning to the Rock Trail in the spring time to hike down to Lizard Lake. 

Transitioning to learning how to construct a model debris hut

Although the process of reaching a consensus is often painstaking for both Explorer and Mentor alike, the resulting group morale and lessons learned in communication, leadership, and creative thinking to arrive at a compromise were well worth the lengthy time in circle. Not only did this group get a chance to play games and practice their shelter building, but they took a big step forward in their ability to function as a whole and arrive at decisions that everyone can agree upon.

Proud shelter builders. Next we will see how they do constructing full size shelters!

Check out the rest of the photos form our outing here!

Short Tailed Weasels Expand and Play at Locust Beach

The Short Tailed Weasels met at Locust Beach for their last outing of the 2016-2017 season. We were glad to have some unseasonably warm weather today that allowed us to swim in the shallow waters of Bellingham Bay. Many of us were reacquainted with sunscreen in the parking lot before our outing for the first time this year.

The word of the day was expansive. The scenery, the beach, the clear skies, and the boys' excitement for mud and exploration were all expansive in a certain sense. The goal for the day was simple: get as far down the beach as we could and see what we find along the way! As it turned out, Locust beach had many hidden treasures for us that we uncovered during our exploration.

Heading out across the rocks

Where the mud meets the rocky beach

Our first discovery of the day, what kind of skeleton is it?!

One of the many cool beach forts that we found

What lives in the mud?

A neat tire swing we found

The head of a flounder!

Dungeness crab legs a-plenty 

Another skeleton!

In addition to cool things and places, Locust Beach has plenty of mud that begs to be splashed in, walked through, formed into sculptures and smeared on our faces. We enjoyed the freedom of getting totally muddy and loving it! Afterwards, we enjoyed a swim to get somewhat clean.

Yeah...this seems like a good idea!

Slowly but surely making our way

The mud is a kid trap!

Some of us utilized tools to more efficiently cross deep sections of mud

Out "at the edge"

Whether it was due to the excitement of the warm weather, the vast expanse of the beach or some other reason, the Short Tailed Weasels had difficulty today with respecting boundaries and making smart decisions. There were numerous times when the mentors had to remind boys to stay within sound distance, which was disheartening considering that the Short Tailed Weasels are no longer our youngest group and should be at a point where they follow our safety rules responsibly. Certainly, we all need gentle reminders that keep us on track throughout our lives, and hopefully the conversation that we had at closing circle regarding safety and respect resonates with these boys through the summer and carries over into the start of their 2017-2018 season next fall.

After our closing circle, we made the long trek back to the parking lot. Many of us met our edge in terms of sun exposure and hiking through knee deep mud today and it showed on our faces on the walk back. The expressions on our faces showed exhaustion for sure, but inside our cups were full of gratitude for an interesting exploration of Locust Beach.

The pictures from this outing are particularly awesome, given the setting of our location. Be sure to check out the rest in our photo album by clicking here!

Short-tailed Weasels explore at north Lake Whatcom

The Short-tailed Weasels first dedicated winter outing came in with classic Pacific Northwest style: cold, light, steady rain. Regardless of this we had a few new faces out and energy ran high. In fact, before our outing even kicked off a group of boys disappeared down the trail and into the woods while our mentors, Conor and Jedidiah chatted with their parents. They emerged a few minutes and crow calls later, running and short of breath. The energy of these first boys was reflective of the rest of group and day.

Initial discoveries

After we had everyone together we met under the dripping canopy to discuss our plan for the day. The Short-tailed Weasels focus for this season is the Art of Carving, so we knew we all wanted to get some carving in. However, as we have learned in the past, cold and wet are not the best conditions for carving. The boys unanimously agreed that before we got our knives and got to work we should do some exploring, find someplace a little dryer to set up shop, maybe play a game, and warm up a little. And so began the search for someplace dry among the red cedars and hemlocks of a temperate rainforest.

Heading out to explore

We observed that the area along the trail near our opening circle would be a good place to play a game, but we didn't want to pass up the opportunity to find someplace really great. We headed out south along the trail, deciding to keep this first place in mind in case we didn't find anywhere better. Shortly thereafter we arrived on the shores of Lake Whatcom. The view of the lake being somewhat hypnotic, we decided we wanted to stay and have a snack. As we lingered, we realized it was wet and the wind off the lake was cold, and although this was a fun place to look out, skip rocks, look for tracks, and play in the sand, that it would be too cold to carve here and that we should move on.

Checking out the lake

We decided to head north along another trail that seemed to parallel our first. Making excursions off to either side in search of base camp locations, we located a shelter likely made by an earlier group of explorers. Here we spread out to look around and played a couple rounds of 'hide'. Our rule is we never play 'hide' more than twice in a single location. With these two rounds up, we decided that although this place was nice, we wanted to find a location better suited to a meatier game: Spider's Web. We headed west through the bush to complete our circle and return to our starting location. It turns out sometimes the first place you find is the best after all, though we never regret searching.

Checking out a found shelter

After playing two very intense rounds of Spider's Web and warming up we settled in to carve. After a review of knife safety protocol, we decided to carve something simple and pragmatic: digging sticks. Digging sticks were an important tool for First Nations people in our region and serve us in our harvesting endeavors just as readily today. Being a simple pointed or chisel tipped stick, they are also well suited to developing our carving abilities. Being a personalized tool, all shapes and sizes emerged. Partly because so much of the wood in our area was wet and rotten, and partly because the parameters for digging stick construction are so loosely defined, the boys spread out and found a variety of different woods of different shapes and sizes. In the process they discovered some of the qualities varied woods posses.

Getting to work on some digging sticks

Circling up and giving thanks, we ended our day. We all agreed that all though the day had been fun, we were glad we could return to a warm, dry house. For our next outing we'll be heading out to Tenant Lake to explore the wetlands.

Be sure to check out the rest of the photos from this album here.