Strutting season is winding down, with probably only a couple more mornings of lek surveys left. After that, I'll be hard pressed to justify the time or gas to go out and look for birds. The 2001 data set will be completed.

Don't know what I'll write in this diary after that. Not much field work in the next two months, mainly just sitting here and writing annual reports.

Except for flying antelope counts, which start next week. Not sure how much you'll enjoy reading about how many times I get to practice being bulimic.

*****

Heeler sisters and I went out lekking again this morning, but headed into the mountain foothills, instead of the desert. The leks we were checking are about 1500-2000 feet higher than the others we have visited, so it is like stepping back a couple weeks in time, into early spring. Lots of snowbanks still left, and plenty of mud.

We're still straddling the Continental Divide, but here it is steep, well defined and lined with snow. Probably a third of the land is filled with groves of pine or aspen, with the valleys and hilltops covered with sagebrush or other mountain shrubs. Only a few miles away the true forest begins, and then it's solid trees up to the alpine.

Certainly cooler up here. Most of the mud is frozen.

Had 87 cocks and two hens on the first lek. No slowing of the strut here. And we managed to get muddy water splashed all over the clean, shiny repaired truck.

The road to the next lek was blocked by a huge snowbank, at least four truck-lengths wide. Decided to bypass it by going cross country over the hill beside it, but when we got to the other side I found a 4' dropoff to the road.

It would not be good to smash the front end of the truck into the dirt, especially only two days after getting it out of the shop.

Tried backing up the hill, but no luck. Managed to turn around, but still couldn't get up the hill. Turns out it was frozen mud, not good dirt. As soon as the tires spun, the mud melted and down we went. Only option was to crab along the side slope looking for a low spot in the bank to drop down below. Took a while, but we made it.

Managed to check five more leks in that high country, and saw birds on one site I had never been able to find before. That always feels good.

Now, unfortunately, we had to go home to get ready for a 9 o'clock meeting.

How do we get across the big snowdrift? I know we'll never make it if we try to go cross country headed uphill.

There's the other end of this road, which drops straight off the Divide (wonderful view, by the way), but I know there will be a major drift blocking the top of the road. Always is this time of year.

There's the fenceline/ridgeline road (that literally follows the Divide), but I can see it's drifted over in many places.

The trail down the rocky face would be fine, until it hits the snow in the trees at the bottom.

We can drop into the Pacific watershed, but odds are the switchbacks on that road will be both drifted and muddy. And it's clay soils, not the hard chalk we have up here. No guarantee the road over the pass beyond will be open either, and if we go down, we probably won't be able to come back up.

So that leaves us back at the drift.

Feels hard and sturdy. Too hard to dig out. There's a good 20 feet of muddy road below the drift that we'll have to cross first, but it's frozen now. Won't be in about 20 more minutes.

I try driving the truck halfway onto the snow. You can feel the tires sink in, but it's only a couple inches. But for 40-50 feet? How long would it take to dig out if we sank in the middle? How many hours? Wisdom takes over, and says we need to take the road to the Pacific side and head for the pass.

Somewhere along the way, as I backed out of the snowdrift to find a place to turn around, Wisdom got booted out the window. In his place, Daring stepped up and said "We can make that, we just need a good running start."

And he was right.

But if the drift had been two meters wider, Wisdom would have been sitting smug on his ass, saying "I told you so."