2018 People Of Big River Field Class

Day Fourteen: 7/20/18 Today we woke up at 6:30am. Breakfast was already on the table this morning. I just ate cereal and after, I made my lunch. For some odd reason, I felt like having PB and J sandwich, and I don’t like peanut butter. It was a good morning. I had some time to put my feet in the water and it was lovely. The morning was so calm, and I was able to gather my thoughts and just felt peaceful. Well after that I went to get changed out of my sweats, packed my stuff, and was ready to go. Our first stop at the old 99 county road where there was planting and thinning going on. This was one of the plots. One of the people that stood out to me is Clinton, not Mr. Clinton LOL ;) He was a firefighter forestry manager. He fought fire for 18 years. After looking at that plot, we headed to another up the road. This is a plot where they already had thinned out and didn’t clean up. It “looked bad” but in five years or so, it’ll look healthy and open. I can see how their forests are

Day Thirteen: 7/19/18 Today was a culture day. This day was about the people of the Colville reservation. We learned about the history of the people from our wonderful, respectful, and welcoming guide. Her name is Lucy. Here is her business card. She showed us around to two museums on the reservation. This was for us to learn more about her people and how their life was before the dam. It was amazing to see how similar the Yakama tradition is to the other tribes from Colville. This was actually a long day. We started off in the morning packing up to go to a new camp ground because the one we were at surprisingly hot and all rocky. I didn’t sleep with my air mattress since we were only staying there for a night. We also were able to see the stampede grounds where they have the suicide race. The hill was really steep. At the end of the day, we finally made it to our new camp site. It has shade, a lake, trees, and is grassier. It very comfortable and cozy. The view is amazing. Pro

Day twelve: 7/18/18 Today we didn’t really do anything much. We woke up around 7:30am this morning. Today was pack up day. It’s a very slow but fast day. All we had planned today was to get up, eat breakfast, shower, pack up, do our blogs, and then head out to Colville, WA. Everything was alright, but I’m not feeling the best. My wisdom teeth are coming in and is not feeling pleasant. Today is just one of those days.

Day Eleven: 7/17/18 Today was a pretty cool day and was also very hot. What we had planned today was to go to the fisheries and see what fish they have and to learn more about how they spawn and what work they are doing to help the fish population grow. They had also talked about the new invasive species called Northern Pike that was introduced illegally and is taking over the habitat of the native fish in the river. Pike are very invasive and they had started eating the fish that’re in the river and destroying the fish population. After going to the fisheries, we went to the “The Cave,” this is what the locals call it. This is located Kalispel, WA. This place was grave site for a women who was crushed by a stone that had fallen off the wall. This cave was made of sand stone, this is also where women would come to sharpen they’re root digging sticks and to ensure the have a successful year gathering for their families. After the caves, we hit the powwow grounds to eat our lunches

Day Ten: 7/16/18 Today in Wellpinit WA, we woke up around 7:30am. We ate breakfast then Warren drove us to the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) building where he works. He also introduced us to Brian and Kacie the fish biologist (A.K.A. The fish Doctors), also Kyle and Xavier. We had hit the road to go shock fish at a creek called Little Creek. We were there looking for Red Band trout. I didn’t go and shock fish though. I went to look and collect information on the different forms of life living in this creek. We were able to determine if the water in the creek was clean or not. It was clear that there were much life in the creek and was a good sign already. I was doing this with Pedro and Maria. We had two butterfly like nets. The creek didn’t have a very strong flow so we kind of had to create our own currents. This all took place in Kalispel by the way. The strategy was to put the two nets together as close to the ground and Pedro went a little ways up stream. He kicked roc

Day Nine: 7/15/18 Today was a pretty chill day. We work up around 8:00am or so. We met Warren Seyler, Francis, Francis’s brother, and Jim. They came and brought their drum and sang for us. They all had shown us new songs that they sing. They even allowed us to sing at the dumb with them. It was pretty fun. After drumming we headed to the watch tower. The tower was high, and I’m afraid of heights. I sucked it up and held my breath. I went up to the top and boy that felt like a life time. The view was beautiful, but I was afraid that I was going to die. After the tower and the long trip down, we went swimming in the Spokane River. The water was perfect and it was fun swimming with most of the people. Today was just a really fun and chill day. This is Warren Seyler.. A man who would take the world under his wing, and forever will be a long time friend.

My other computer has stopped working an my other blogs are still on there.. so slight change. I'm going to upload the ones I have on the computer I have now.

Day Five: 7/11/18 This morning we woke up around 6:00am. It was freezing cold. I didn’t want to get out of my bed. Breakfast was good. I’m glad they had bought some more bagels. Anyway, we started getting ready for the day and we had a long day ahead of us. We were able to meet with the smoke jumpers! I had fell asleep so I don’t really know how long it took to get to the Pacific Northwest Training Center. First we met people to kind of give us a run down on what they do and what opportunities are open to anyone interested in firefighting. This kind of open my world a little more. I wanted to do a lot of things in college such as being a musician or band director, nurse, and now possibly, firefighting. The smoke jumper carry so much weight on them it’s kind of mind blowing. To think how much weight those men can carry and that’s 60-70 pounds just the suit they wear and the gear they have when they jump. Plus another 45-50 pounds of cargo they have dropped for them. Everything

Day Four: 7/10/18 Today we were looking towards a long road trip to Deschutes Oregon. We woke up a little after 5:00am and hit the road around 7:00am. I am a very forgetful person sometimes. We took a shower last night and I have a nose stud. I left it in the shower, and knowing me, I didn’t realize that I did. So, early in the morning when we were leaving, we stopped at the showers at the youth camp, thankfully my stud was there! That was my morning blooper, I guess. We left the mountains going through Glenwood Washington, a little town right behind Mt. Adams and behind the Yakama Nation Mountains. It was said to be a long trip this day, and indeed, it was. We had planned some stops on our way to our second camp grounds. We stopped to see She Who Watches. A petroglyph in near Lyle in WA. These petroglyphs have meaning and stories that are meaningful to the Native American people of Warm Springs Oregon (OR) to Yakama Nation. Possibly even farther. She who watches was a leader who w

Day Three: 7/9/18 Today we woke up at 5:30am to get ready for the day. We had to leave at 7:00am to do the activities that were planned. So we had a tight schedule and really had to get moving. I am in group 3. We have three groups of four and each one has a different job to do, but every day we switch jobs. Today my group was responsible for taking breakfast out. Group 1, dishes. Group 2, cleaning up the food. We all worked together to get hurry and get done. Still, no matter how fast we were, we still manage to leave a little later than expected. We left at 7:30am. After we had left, we started heading to White Salmon in Washington. We had arrived in Husun and this was actually really close to White Salmon. When we stopped, we were greeted by a women named Jeanette Burkhardt. This is Jeanette Burkhardt talking about the Condit Dam. She is a Yakama Nation Watershed coordinator. She talked to us today about what her work is and how the water is important, especially for the

Day Two: 7/8/18 My day started with low energy and confusion. I woke up to find that most of the HU students have left to go hike on potato hill, along with the White swan students (WS). I woke up around 8:30am.  Breakfast was getting prepared. I enjoyed breakfast because the cold fresh mountain air and just being around happy people. After we were done eating, we started to pick up after ourselves. By this time we started to get ready to go to a youth camp to shower and possibly do some activities. We arrived around 10 or 11: 30am, just a rough estimate. After our shower we came inside to do our blogs. So that’s what I’m doing right now. This is inside the youth camp lunch room. You will see Rudy in the green here. Destiny in the white, and Maria in the black. After we did our blogs we went on a hike down the road from the camp to look at how the trees are doing and what is happening to them. We learned that some of the trees are not healthy and there are some over growing a

Day One: 7/7/18 I arrived Heritage University (HU) to prepare for the trip early in the morning around 8:30am. The HU students had already counted inventory and organized the stuff that is provided. They lend me a sleeping bag, tent, backpack (with a water pouch inside), and a headlamp. After we had done everything that was needed to carry on, we had went inside to listening to a guest speaker, Jonalee Squeochs. She talked about climate change and how it would/could affect us in the future and what how it effects the wildlife. The thing that stood out to me is how the lower Yakima valley rivers, canals, and any other water source was too hot for the salmon to come back home. That has a really bad impact on my Yakama Nation cultural ways because fish is one of the traditional foods. This had caught my attention because I participate my in cultural ways. After we had learned and recognized what we could do, we ate and then loaded up to head to the Yakama Nation Mountains to pot

 People of Big River Field Trip This trip was to learn about new things in the environment in the camping spots we travel to. White Swan High School and Heritage University are joining together on this amazing trip. We are to gather information on what we have learned about the many Native American reservations we will visit to see how they improve their environments, and see how we can improve ours.  A Picture of Mount Adams. In Yakama Nation It's known as, Pahto. (paw-toe)