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.

The Short-tailed Weasels Explore Together at N. Galbraith

Plenty of energy today!

The Short-tailed Weasels had their final outing of the season at N. Galbraith trailhead. It was a small group of STWs today; even with an explorer joining us from another group we were only seven total!  We found out that many of our fellow STWs were not able to join us on this outing because they were at home resting and trying to kick seasonal colds. So, we were low in number but high in spirit as we struck out into the forest on this cold December day with plenty of energy and excitement for what our day held in store.

After a brief opening circle (we had to keep moving to stay warm!), we headed straight into the woods.  After winding our way through chest high sword ferns and towering Douglas fir, western red cedar and big leaf maple trees we came to a neat looking spot to take a break and have a bite to eat.  While we were having our snack, we noticed that someone had built two earth shelters here.  We learned that these people were actually another explorers club groups and we took some time to notice the merits and shortcomings of each shelter.  They were certainly well built and sturdy, but a bit to big for our liking.  They also did not have the required three feet (!) of debris on top in order to keep us warm and dry if we had to spend a night inside.

Comfort testing a debris hut

The STWs then channeled their focused decision making energy from the last outing and decided that they wanted to play spiders web and then travel further up the hill to a spot where they could all practice carving.  These boys have played many games of spiders web together so we let them set up the game all on their own.  The mentors simply joined in the fun when it was time to start!

Flies waiting for the wave

After two games of spiders web that included some great work by the spider and some long distance and patient sneaking on the part of the flies, we packed up our bags and headed up the gravel road into an interesting landscape.

We found ourselves walking through a clear cut section of forest. We were headed into this area to harvest wood that we will use next season for making a bowl (Art of Carving II is our skills focus in the spring).  We knew that, being a clear cut, this area would have plenty of wood that was already cut down so we knew we would not be negatively impacting the forest elsewhere.

Clear cut at N. Galbraith

Some of us wondered why the forest needed to be clear cut like this.  We learned that this forest was being cleared to make room for a new housing development.  We had a discussion about this and felt empathy for the plants and animals that had to lose their homes to make way for our homes.  As animals living on this planet, we absolutely have an impact on our Earth.  It is up to us what kind of an impact we will have and how severe that impact is. Many of us had not considered that our homes were built at least in part from trees and that our neighborhoods were previously forests.  This clear cut helped us visualize and deepen our understanding of the impact that we have on our Earth as humans.

Our small group for the day!

We trudged our way up through the clear cut on a logging road and eventually found snow! This was a welcome surprise and we had a (surprisingly) civil snowball fight. Here we searched the piles of dead trees for suitable piece of wood from which to carve a bowl next spring.  Some of us were quite interested in this project and got to practice using a folding saw.  Others were not (Challenge by Choice) and instead honed their sneaking and searching skills playing round after round of Eagle Eye.

Snowball fight!

Harvesting big-leaf maple for our bowls that we will carve in the spring!

We met in a circle of thanks to close not only our outing at N. Galbraith but also our fall season.  We took some extra time in closing circle to look forward to our spring season.  Our earth focus for this fall was Art of Carving, and while we did get to practice with our knives, we agreed as a group that we could benefit from more focused carving time so next season our earth skills focus will be Art of Carving II.  Thank you Short-tailed Weasels and families for a great fall season and we look forward for our winter outing and then another full season in the spring!

To see the rest of the photos from today, click here.