Paper Birch trees are starting to release their winter seeds. The catkin in focus has some of the winged seeds just barely hanging on. These shorter (about 1 1/2 inches) female catkins were pollinated last spring. The seeds have developed over the last seven months. Now they take flight on the wind. We are seeing…
Details
Tim, from Kentucky, is on a dogsled trip this week. He helped with feeding and caring for the dogs this morning, during the coldest part of the day. It took less than 15 minutes for his eyebrows and eyelashes to freeze up in temps south (not South Beach warm ‘south,’ but lower down on the…
Details
Started a lodge-based dog sledding trip with four participants today. We launched our teams in temps colder than 25 degrees below zero Fahrenheit. The folks are most surprised that they remained quite comfortable, even in the frigid temps. Chalk that reaction up to quality clothing (they all rented or purchased clothing from the Wintergreen clothing…
Details
What is the psychological profile of a typical guide? Guides tend to be friendly, outgoing, interesting, and adventurous sorts. After watching Chris’ Greenland dog sledding slideshow, we sat back for pics from another guide’s recent travels with the nomadic people of Mongolia. Our youngest guide, Christina, is a Luther College student who did an independent…
Details
One of our long-time Wintergreen dogsled guides, Chris Maher, decided to move to where they invented dog sledding: Arctic Greenland. He moved to Greenland in Spring 2008 and purchased a dog team. Now he spends his fall like the native Inuit people he lives with. He drives his team of Inuit dogs hunting seals by…
Details
It’s not too uncommon for forecasters to be 20 degrees off in their low temp predictions for Ely. Case in point: The National Weather Service and the rest of the forecasting crews predicted a low of -6 to -8 degrees Fahrenheit last night. We woke up to a somewhat chilly 29 degrees below. And a…
Details
Over breakfast, a participant mentioned she had a three-legged dog pulling her dogsled the day before. My ears perked with concern. Then she said, “Yeah, Baloo was lifting his fourth leg to pee on every single tree that passed by. He may as well had only three legs pulling.” Above, Baloo.
Details
Kids seem to take to dog sledding with a certain grace and ease that sometimes escapes adults. Here is Lill, age 8, from Texas with Lucy. Lucy is less than a year old, and is happy in lead. Lill and her twin sister, Georgia, did a great job working with the dogs. Georgia even caught…
Details
We dogsledded by this beaver lodge today. For curosity’s sake, we stopped to see if it is occupied. If beavers are wintering over inside a lodge, then the warmth from their bodies melts a small chimney in the snow at the very top. Sure enough, beavers are present in this lodge. The photo shows Cassidy…
Details