LOG SKIDDING ARCH PART 2

Mini Grinder

Make do tongue

 Bryan will make a proper tongue when he is at his shop in Atlin and can use a welder.  This one is just mickey moused.....it needs to be a longer tongue.

It will haul logs!!!!!

First you release the handle.

Then you put the chain around the log and re hook the chain.

The log is raised as you lever handle back into starting position.

Handle is painted red....

 The reason the handle is painted red is to remind the operator that that handle can come up really quickly and hit you in the head......And then you will really be seeing red.

Chain Hook

A Log Skidding Arch Part 1

 Bryan and Henri had found a old Honda Civic at the Atlin Dump last summer and had saved the rear wheel spindle by cutting it off with a grinder.  Now it was going to be used to get the Old Log Skidding Arch on wheels.... it had been on ski's.

Brake Drum taken apart

Before Bolting on

The brake drum was in the way so Bryan had to cut them off so that the wheel would fit the pattern.  This was done with a mini grinder

What was cut off the brake drum

It all fits together now.

We had Dreams....

After we'd been here a couple of years, we started thinking about sharing what we see here with other like minded people.  We knew others would love it, and we like to show what is possible, to others.... so we really looked into it.  But the obstacles were ridiculous.  After about 7 months of paperwork, meetings, talking to Government Officials.... we put our dreams of sharing away.... except on this blog. 
Even the big beautiful Lodge down the lake stands empty.... the Guide Outfitter who built it could make a go of having people stay there because they were willing to pay BIG BUCKS.  (12,000 to 18,000. for one person for 10 days).  Now that lodge is left empty and is starting to show the effects of neglect.
Here's some of the list of things we found out and learned from experience.
1.  A Trap Line Tenure can not make money on anything else but trapping.  Well, we didn't need to make money outside of the trap line so that was no problem.
2.  To get a Adventure Tenure..(Bear Watching, Bird watching) you have to let go of the Trap Line Tenure.  (You can not add an Adventure Tenure to a Trap Line Tenure).  Now we were told we could have taken the Lake Line Cabin out of the trap line and applied for another Line Cabin Location but when we applied for a new cabin site it was put on hold because of Land Use Planning, that is still working its self out.  Also talking to the BC Government people we were told that Mom and Pop operations just don't make it any more. He said the Insurance will kill you.  The rules and regulations are so many that only large Corporations with money to burn can succeed.  This Government Official told us to save our money.
3.  Most people from the city are on a schedule.  Out here you can be stuck for weeks at a time without being able to fly in or out.  The fog in the high Pacific Coastal Mountain Range that has to be crossed, the  low valley fog so you can't see the lake to land on.  The lake overflow in the winter makes landing here possible only sometimes.
4.  Bear are not seen often... neither are Mountain Goats.  It's an event that thrills us.  We can spend days and days stopping what we are up to and going to look with binoculars and not see anything.  So far this spring we have just seem the 7 Mountain Goats twice.  Still no Bears on the hills behind us.  And in the fall Bears are here for about 2 to 3 weeks.  That is the time of year when the land is starting to cool and the fog is here, making flying very dangerous.  So it is a difficult thing. 
5.  Some of the best well know Bear Viewing Lodges are up for sale cheap.  If there are no Salmon in the fall the Bears are not going to be there.  
6.  Some lady thinks people would pay for listening to Wolves..... well maybe on a tape recorder.  We've been out here 5 years and I can count on my fingers and toes how many times we have heard Wolves howling.  Try to get someone to pay for that change.  
7.  A Bush plane trip one way out here costs between 1,200 and 1,500.  A helicopter is 2,000 or more for a one way trip.   A person can fly anywhere in the world for that kind of money. 

Re-Use, Re-Use, Make Do

 Every plastic bag gets washed and re used over and over again. ( I can remember back in the early 60's, my mum's good friend Shirley, hanging out the plastic bread bags to dry...  before that bread came in waxed paper.  At that time she knew the value but that has been lost on a lot of people.
When you're out here for a long time you really appreciate plastic and so  do not treat it like garbage.  Even the tin foil has many lives.

 Washed margarine containers are used for collars around the cabbage plants. 

Newspapers that our friend Henri sends in on the plane are used for seedling pots.  The plastic meat containers are used many years as plant starters.

 Bryan uses the old oil from the generator etc for chainsaw bar oil.  He has a metal bin where every little scrap of metal is kept for his projects.  Bent nails are kept in a bucket.... they might be really needed.

 So far since Sept. we've filled one garbage bag that goes to the Atlin dump.  The flatten tin cans, pop cans and clean glass jars go to Whitehorse recycling when we fly out.

Bag of garbage, Tin cans to be flattened, and 1 bag of pop cans.

Stored dog and cat food bags

Solar

Been spending a lot of time fiquring out what we need for a small system.. now it`s just finding someone to sell it to us.  
Vikki`s emailed a place in Sask. but no response yet.  If you`ve had luck with a distributor in northern BC let us know.  
We`d need their email address.

To ANONYMOUS

To those of you ANONYMOUS`S that seem bent on destroying our day with stupid comments.  We don`t need to share what we see with you.  If you don`t like it.... go tour around the internet til you find something you like.  Maybe a Walt Disney Movie..
 All we can say to you is to look to yourself to make the world a better place. We`re sure that your time could be better spent. 
For all of you ANONYMOUS that have already contacted us with something about yourselves just sign a first name at the end.... 

Busy Beavers....

 The creek is opening up so early this spring.  In a day or so we will not be able to walk over to see the Beaver lodge. 

Alder are starting to bud out... if you look alone the shore you will see "Bee" out for a walk with us....If we get too far away from her she starts to howl...

Moose droppings

Lake Beavers

 Bryan thought they were just using the shore openings for air holes.  Every night they would break then open again.  But last night he learned something.  He always knew aquatic plants were in their diet but had never observed it other than lily pads dragged up on shore or on the ice.  We first noticed them at dusk and at 1 am they were still there and also a daybreak.  A large adult and a last years kit would go out under the ice for 1 to 3 minutes and then they would come back with another arm load of vegetation (size of a coconut ball).  They would drag it out on the ice and sort through it, hold and rinse it underwater and then eating with their fingers just like we would.  

The shores of our lake in the fall are covered with dieing Salmon and Bears looking to catch one.  Every predator in the area is cruising the lake shore looking for dieing Salmon.  Two falls ago we counted 23 different Grizzlies on one evening. 
This is the time of the year when Beavers are making their feed piles. Since we've been here almost every year a colony has tired to set up on the lake.  Whether it is a Bear, Wolverine, Lynx, Eagle, Wolf.... their lodges are destroyed and the Beaver taken.

Where they're not stressed.... way up in the high valleys and ponds, we take one ..... but not down here on the lake.

Beaver Head Butts

Wolves Are Not Varmin in Canada

Wolves are one of the governors of prey in Canada and are protected under the Game Laws.  In some areas of low population in BC they have complete protection, in some areas of large healthy populations they are managed. The Rules and Regulations are in the Hunting and Trapping Synopsis.
British Columbia has always been at the forefront of game management in Canada and the World.  In 1926, BC was divided into trap line Tenures. A trapper (or trappers) holds a permit to trap and manage a defined area (usually between 2 or 5 hundred kilometers or 150 - 300 sq. miles)  Some northern lines are much larger.  Our line is 1300 sq kilometers. Both Bryan and Vikki have their Trappers License. We can only physically trap about 10 % of it.  No other trapper can trap on this line.   In BC there are about 3,500 hundred trappers and approx. 2,000 trap lines.  A vast majority are run by First Nations families. 
There are always exceptions but no responsible trapper would over harvest his area knowing that in years to come his trap line would suffer.  Highly educated guesses delved from sign and past experience regulates a trapper.  He usually already knows at the start of the season , the number of each species he will harvest...  much the same as a farmer.  There must always be a reserve of cows and heifers.  This applies to all fur bearers including Wolves. 
WE DO NOT ADVOCATE THE KILLING OF WOLVES UNLESS THERE IS AN EXCESS FOR THE INDIVIDUAL Trap line AREA, and even in our case where we now see an excess, we know we will have a small impact on the numbers.  Wolfing, being the most labor intensive forms of trapping, is not worth the money for the effect it requires and so it is for the Management of the areas Wolves that trapping is done.  
If each trapper manages the wolves on his/her line and is adequately compensated, then there wouldn't need to be the Government Poisoning of Wolves Program that some Provinces have had to do or the helicopter hunting of Wolves.  Both of which we are not in favor of.
As we set by the campfire this morning at 9 am writing this post, a large pack of wolves started to howl near our camp.  The snow is hard packed at this time of the year in early morning and there is no place a wolf can not go,  but by afternoon they punch through.
The sound of the Wolves howling is Beautiful .... and we love to know that they are out on the land..... it would be a sad place without them....  so there is mixed emotions.  But we think that managing the population numbers of large Wolf pack areas is the answer to their continual health and the continual health of the Moose, Mountain Goat and Bears which also share this rugid area.

Mountain Goats and Junco's

 There's 6 in this group (3 on the snow trail and 3 more already up on the rock ridge over to the left), and a single about 400 yards away ..... shown in the photo below.

 There are tracks from the top all the way down to the bottom of the picture. 

 Bryan is rusting some traps.... the Junco's are eatting the bird seed he threw.  This is the first year we have had Junco's in. 

Feeding the Lake Beaver Colony

Each morning after coffee we walk the 300 yards to the Beaver House.  Bryan has been dragging white poplar trees down to the lake from 1/4 km away up in the hills. 

Beaver breaks thin ice for air and to look around

Creek is already starting to flow.... way ahead of any other year.