Friday, April 4, 2025
The Apple State and Tariff Talking Points
Tuesday, February 18, 2025
Cold Weather Flowers
Our cold weather has ended in northwest Washington. It reached 50 F today with misty rain. Given that I had a water venture via kyak I was glad for the warm up although it was 43 F with light rain when I started out.
I noted the above snowdrops on a morning walk about when the temperature was 18 F. They get a head start on the grass next to chunk of the British Columbia Coast Range brough by the last glacial period.
On the same walk I noted Salix scouleriana in bloom in a sunny spot at the edge of the forest.
Saturday, February 15, 2025
1950 Jackson Creek, Skagit County Debris Flow
The Highway 9 corridor from Sedro-Wooley to Kendal follows the Samish River Valley and then after crossing a very subtle divide follows the South Fork Nooksack River Valley. I previously noted the alluvial fans associated with steams that flow into the Sanish River Valley (alluvial-fans-altering-samish-river).
Doing some review of the valley I came across this 1950 aerial of Jackson Creek with a recent debris flow scar path and deposit on the alluvial fan that extends out onto the Samish Valley floor.
Timber harvests have started up again in the Jackson Creek watershed, but the creek and the steep slopes near the creek have been partially buffered versus the previous log everything approach. The other substantive change is road construction across stream subject to debris flows have generally improved to reduce the risk of the road causing a debris flow. That said the creek is lined with steep unstable slopes and future slope failures and accumulation of debris
The Jackson Creek alluvial fan has resulted in a lake upstream from the fan and there is a lake down stream that is influenced by another alluvial fan at Mill Creek. Both of these lakes may also be influenced by beaver activity. Mill Creek had a debris flow in 1983 that resulted in a fatality.
Sunday, January 26, 2025
Highway 397 Road Cut West of Nine Mile Canyon, Part I
Tuesday, January 21, 2025
My Forest Enemy: Ilex aquifofium
I at times visuzlize the Pacific Northwest forests in 10,000 years being a forest of holly. The holly shown above was in an old growth forest. I have come across holly in old forest areas ranging in elevation from the inland coastal areas to as much as 3500 feet in the Cascade Range. I have been digging it out of my own forest stand on regular basis, and when I can, I yank it out of the ground and stick it into a spot above the ground while traversing through the forest during a field ventures. .
KUOW covered recent efforts to get this plant listed as a noxiuos weed (kuow.org/have-a-holly-noxious-christmas). The issue strikes me as a state government and ethics failure.
Saturday, January 18, 2025
Windfall and Dog Hair
I plotted out a route to a steep slope at the headwaters of a creek in the Northwest Cascades. While approaching the site I noted windfall trees on the edge of a clearcut.
While walking the road and a section of trail took about 2 hours to cover 6 miles with a fair bit of elevation gain and hiking out took about 1.5 hours as it was downhill, the last quarter mile to the steep slopes I wanted to reach took nearly an hour each way.
I did reach my goal of getting to the steep headwater slope - that presented its own challenge as there were cliffs in the forest.
Tuesday, November 12, 2024
Volcanic Ash at Palmer Lake
A road cut along the southeast side of Palmer Lake consists primarily of angular rocks, but a thick white layer is located below the uppermost layer of angular rocks. The white layer is volcanic ash.
I am not sure of the source. There are reported ash depsits to the south near Chelan and the soils of the Waterville Plateau that have been connected to Glacier Peak. I have observed that ash and it is generally coarser. I suspect this is Mazama ash from the massive Mount Mazama (Crater Lake) eruption There is widespread ash depsoits from Mazama throughout eastern and central Washington. Because layers of volcanic ash are common in the Pacific Northwest, they serve as extremely good stratigraphic markers when applied to geologic and archaeologic problems, as long as they are correctly identified and correlated. The ash is a time marker for the deposition of the talus and scree exposed on the cut slope.