Winterlude
Katie’s blog rule #3: always have a camera handy so you can capture unexpected moments of beauty. The snowy hills and changeable overcast light were something to behold today.
Photo taken outside Barn Anew.
Farmers market cooking demos
If you’ve never gone to the Scottsbluff winter farmers market, here’s a reason to go (or a reason to linger longer if you’re already a regular): cooking demos – every market at 2 p.m. (Market runs 1-4 p.m. two Saturdays a month during the cold season at Aulick’s TLC on Avenue B.)
It’s pretty cool when you can get a cooking demo FROM THE PERSON WHO GREW / RAISED / CREATED THE FOOD.
Also cool that you can get ideas for dinner that night – the chefs share their recipes.
Here was last market’s demonstration:
The ingredient vendors
Dan Manville, Open A Bar 2 Ranch: beef, chicken
Nick Gompert, Spotted Tail Farms: beans (not pictured: Dan Weitzel, Mitchell Valley Farm)
The demos
Chef Laura Leggott, Leggott Family Farm
Kathi Manville, Open A Bar 2 Ranch
The results
Cup o' southwest white chicken chili
What was left of the platter of Charlie's steak sandwiches by the time I got to it
At this Saturday’s market (February 11), the cooking demo chef will be Sarah Pinet of Victory Hill Farm. Expect a cheesy demonstration. Sarah makes cheese. (She also has a cheesy sense of humor.)
This market should also be fun because it’s close to Valentine’s Day, and the vendors usually have quite a bit of fun merchandise around holidays like that.
And don’t forget that every winter market benefits a chosen charity – if you donate to the cause, you are entered to win a sizable basket of market goodies, such as this one from last week:
This photo didn't even include the "cold items" in the goodie basket that couldn't be left sitting out.
At this next market, you’ll be entered to win if you donate a pair of new/gently used shoes for the Shoe Ministry.
See you at the market! (Or at the next ones: February 25, March 10 & 24, April 7 & 21.)
Copyright 2012 by Katie Bradshaw
I’m no Snowflake Bentley, but I aspire
My bicycle commute to work today was livened up a bit by snowflakes pinging into my eyes and melting on my thighs. There wasn’t much snow coming down – just enough to notice.
And notice I did.
The snowflakes were the beautiful, perfect kind – the kind that put me in awe of nature’s artistry.
When I got to work, the snowflakes landed and then promptly melted on my black bicycle seat, which was still warm from my bum. The black metal rack on the back of my bike, however, was nice and cold – a perfect contrast-y landing site for the snow.
I stood there for several minutes, marveling at the diversity of form, just as Wilson “Snowflake” Bentley did back in the 1880s. I even tried to take a few photos, but Bentley’s got me beat by a mile and a half in that skill. Check out some of his photos here.
Here are two of my attempts:
Next time it snows like this, do yourself a favor. Pause, look and be amazed.
Copyright 2012 by Katie Bradshaw
Low snow? Oh no! A visual tour of Wyobraska’s managed water
I’ve only had to shovel my driveway once or twice this winter. The ground is bare.
While the urbanites among us may say “yay!”, those with links to agriculture peer warily at the sky and poke the toes of their boots into the soil. (Ok, so that’s a rather dated visual. They are probably checking weather radar and deploying soil moisture probes.)
Last summer we had an overabundance of snowmelt. This year seems to be headed in the opposite direction, which could create a different set of problems around here if the trend continues.
Snow – particularly snow upstream in the mountains of Wyoming and Colorado – feeds the North Platte River, which feeds the irrigation systems that feed the agricultural economy in this semiarid region.
Two summers ago, I went on the Scottsbluff-Gering Chamber of Commerce water tour – a two-day excursion upstream into Wyoming to see the North Platte River dams and reservoirs that are the source of Wyobraska irrigation systems. I wrote about it for the Star-Herald. Last summer, Bugman and I took a Sunday drive through the Wyoming landscape to see the water gushing over the Pathfinder Dam spillway – just the eighth time that’s happened in the 100-plus years since the dam was completed in 1909.
I meant to blog about the experience both times, but I got too caught up in my perfectionism and kept setting the topic aside.
The dry winter thus far has prompted me to think about the water upstream. And the following document prompted me to go ahead and put my blog post out there, so I could share a few literary highlights typically unknown in government-sponsored writing about engineering projects: North Platte Project by Robert Autobee of the Bureau of Reclamation.
I’ll put up some quotes from this 1996 document on the history of the North Platte River Bureau of Reclamation projects. Then, I’ll insert some pictures from my summer explorations of the river system.
Despite cave drawings confirming the presence of Indians thousands of years previous, the parade of history was loudest along the North Platte River during a 25-year window in the nineteenth century.
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Compared to most languid western tributaries, the North Platte often runs wild and mighty. But, like other rivers in the West, summer saps its strength.
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The [Oregon-California] trail confirmed that Americans are a transitory people always looking to get someplace else faster.
And, my favorite:
Perhaps for the first time, Nebraskans saw red, and it was not out of local sporting fanaticism, but out of indignation that their access to the North Platte was in jeopardy.
And now, the pictures, with a map screen-captured from a Nebraska DNR page (which does not show all the dams on the river).
Going from downstream up, the Whalen Diversion Dam comes first.
Photo taken July 2010
Next, the sluice gate and spillway of Guernsey Dam (which gives Guernsey State Park its lovely reservoir).
Photo taken July 2010
Photo taken July 2010
A bit further upstream is Glendo Dam, of Glendo State Park fame.
Photo taken July 2010
Next up, Alcova Dam.
July 2010
Upstream of Alcova is Fremont Canyon and the Fremont Canyon Power Plant, which you have to drive into a 1,692-foot-long tunnel to reach.
Fremont Caynon Road bridge over Fremont Canyon. July 2011
A map showing (from the bottom) the North Platte River, Fremont Canyon Road and the 3-mile tunnel that carries water from Pathfinder Dam to the Fremont Canyon Power Plant
The normally-closed metal tunnel door to the power plant
During the water tour – open sesame! (Note the no-trespassing sign, keycard access control and security camera.) We got to tour the 1960s power plant and gawk at all the vintage equipment down there, including the oldest operational microwave over I have ever seen in the staff break room.
Then, the main attraction – the granddaddy of North Platte River dams: Pathfinder.
When I visited in July 2010, you could walk on the pathway behind the dam to get a better view of things, and even walk on the dam itself.
Old construction equipment at the rim of the canyon adjacent to the dam. July 2010
Stone blocks making up the dam (note itty bitty people walking along the top) July 2010
Outlet at the bottom of the dam. July 2010
Here’s a broad view of the dam posted on Wikipedia:
And here are some images that show why so many people were heading out there summer 2011 to see the spill, and why the walkway atop the dam was closed:
Is that a fire there on the horizon? July 24, 2011
No - it's not smoke.
It's mist!
As you approached the edge of the canyon, the air temperature dropped (mist + dry air = evaporative cooling effect) and the thunderous crash of water-on-rock filled the air. Ephemeral rainbows danced on the thick spray of water droplets, which amassed on the canyon walls to create mini-waterfalls all around. Gorgeous.
I couldn’t help but marvel at the amount of water pouring through that dry terrain.
The view downstream of Pathfinder Dam. July 2011. There's a hiking trail at the entrance to the overlook parking lot that takes you down to the bridge in this photo.
I also noticed, in both 2010 and 2011, evidence of government attempts to save people from their own stupidity.
See the security camera set into the rocks? (Next to the lone shrub at center.) It was trained on the spillway in July 2011, presumably to keep an eye out for bored idiots (see the linked story above).
Which leaves only Seminoe Dam, backing up water to form Seminoe Reservoir of Seminoe State Park, left in the North Platte River sequence:
And with that, my day is nearly spent. (Such a crime to have been indoors all day today – dry, clear and 50 degrees in the sun.)
If you have the opportunity, I highly recommend the chamber of commerce water tour.
Copyright 2012 by Katie Bradshaw
Beautiful Nebraska
The Nebraska state song is called “Beautiful Nebraska.” I don’t really know the song very well, but thanks to living out here in Scotts Bluff County, I know what the song looks like, if that makes any sense.
Sunset view from the parking lot of the Farm And Ranch Museum this evening.
“Photography class” response
I’m not taking a photography class, but fellow blogger Laura McKenna over at Apt. 11D is.
Here is my response to her invitation for reader photo submissions that play with abstractions of color.
This was clouds at sunset and their reflection on the rear side windows of my dad's white Ford Edge. I loved how the car absorbed the color of the sky, save for the shadows of the window and door seams, and made the scene look like a wallpapered black and white image. I shall give it an arty title: "Edge of Sunset."
I bet I have some friends out there who would have fun with this assignment.
Go!
Copyright 2012 by Katie Bradshaw
Why you should go to the winter farmers market on Saturday
Why you should go to the winter farmers market on Saturday (1-4 p.m., greenhouse at the back of Aulick’s TLC):
1. You can buy a variety of yummy, locally-produced foods and support small, entrepreneurial businesses that fold their profits back into the community. (Think: cupcakes, interesting varieties of dry beans, honey, eggs that come from happy chickens that you can meet in person if you wish, etc.)
2. While the weather of late has seemed like spring, the windchill Friday into Saturday is predicted to drop as low as minus 5. The farmer’s market will have a chili cooking demonstration starting at 2 p.m. Minus 5 windchill is chili weather. (But don’t let that forecast LOW temp keep you indoors – the high is supposed to be around 40 degrees.) The Superbowl is imminent, and the chili recipes would be useful for those football/commercial-watching parties.
3. You can help support the proposed project to join the North Platte Valley Museum (where I work) with the Farm And Ranch Museum to create a new museum.
Wait. What? Support a museum collaboration by going to the farmers market?
Yes. The organizers and vendors at the Scottsbluff winter farmers market are very community-oriented people. They have agreed to support a different nonprofit organization at each and every winter market by donating space for the nonprofit to display information and by donating goodies for a raffle basket and giving the raffle proceeds to the nonprofit organization. (How cool is that?)
This Saturday, the North Platte Valley Museum and the Farm And Ranch Museum, which are working towards growing together into a bigger and better “new” museum, are the featured nonprofit organization. At the museums’ table, you can buy a history book produced from material from the museums’ archives (proceeds benefit the museums), view a few items from the museums’ collections, talk to people who are involved with planning the NPVM-FARM collaboration project and sign up to become a member. (Just $40 gets you annual memberships at both museums and helps support these community institutions, which receive no public funds for operating expenses beyond a utility credit from the City of Gering.)
AND, for every dollar you donate in support of these museums and their work to preserve the history of this region and tell the story to the nation and the world (and boost tourism in the area and improve our local economy!), you get a raffle ticket for a goodie-packed gift basket that represents the diversity of entrepreneurial spirit in this rural region.
How cool is that?
See you there!
Copyright 2012 by Katie Bradshaw
Another place to hike: “old picnic area” at SBNM
This winter has been so mild, I’ve been taking advantage of the opportunity to get out and about whenever I can. This past Saturday, Bugman and I checked out another local hiking place that we had not yet explored – the “old picnic area” at Scotts Bluff National Monument.
If this document is is correct, the old picnic area was constructed to the south and east of Mitchell Pass by the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930s, “temporarily closed to the public in late 1939 because of overuse and abuse,” permanently closed “without substantial opposition” in 1940 and “obliterated” in 1941. Judging by the concrete rubble we found out there, the obliteration project was halted just before the “clearing away” phase.
While you can’t drive out there for a picnic anymore, you CAN park at a pull-off on the side of Highway 92 and go for a hike there. Check in first at the Visitors Center, then go west through the pass. You’ll see the chained-off old road just past where the wire guardrails end on the south side of the road.
Bugman and I followed the tire marks left by the Park Ranger patrol vehicle until they ended, wandering off the path from time to time to see what we could see. Here are some of the things we found:
An old boundary sign
A 1935 survey marker. Do you suppose the penalty for removal has gone up since then?
At the based of a slightly burnt pine tree, a pile of mouldering cloth held down by stones that concealed a rotting Copenhagen can and a hole full of sticks and pine cones and perhaps something else that I was too chicken to continue to dig for.
In one of the canyons, a den - three feet in diameter. Wonder what lived there??
Maybe it was the same critter that deposited these hairballs on the trail nearby?
UPDATE: a response from Nebraska Game and Parks Commission on the critter responsible for the above deposit: “Speaking with Sam Wilson our Wildlife Biologist specializing in carnivores it appears that this coyote feces comprised of remnants of deer hair and grass and seeds. It is most assuredly deer hair which would lead us to believe coyote or fox.”
What’s really fascinating to me are the microclimates present on and around the bluff.
In a sheltered area on a south-facing rise, plants were already sending out new buds:
While in shady draws there is still snow clinging around, and I can’t even remember the last time it snowed (apart from Sunday morning, after this hike):
On a larger scale, it’s interesting to compare the relatively treeless east-facing south bluff, which is visible from the Visitors Center:
Photo taken February 2011
with the pine canopy of the west-facing portion of the south bluff that you can see from the old picnic area trail:
Photo taken January 2012
Here’s a photostitched panoramic view from where Bugman and I climbed up towards the face of the bluff:
This is one of the few photos on this blog you can click to enlarge
The lovely scenery and potential diversity of insect habitats at the old picnic area has got Bugman’s curiosity piqued. He wants to go back and explore some more.
I hear there are quite a few rattlers out in the picnic area in warmer weather. All the better reason to go hike there now!
If we go back in the summertime, I may have to invest in some type of snake chaps – maybe SnakeGuardz (linked just for the annoying video and the name spelled with a “z”), designed for “Hunters, Hikers, Campers, Fishermen, Ranchers, Surveyors, Realtors and Border Patrol.”
Copyright 2012 by Katie Bradshaw
I’ve been blogging at SCB Citizen for 2 1/2 years now. Each January, WordPress sends me a summary of the past year’s blogging – how many posts (114), number of page views (about 20,000), the top sites referring people to this blog (Facebook, Urbanspoon, WordPress and fellow bloggers Country Chicken Girl and Apt. 11D) and the most prolific commenters (Suella Hanlon, Rick Myers, Kathi Manville, Val Newman and Sue Fehn – thank you!).
The year-end report also gave me the five most-viewed blog posts in 2011. Only one of them, The new Nebraska license plate, was written in 2011. The report commented that my writing “has staying power” and suggested that I write about those pre-2011 topics again.
Three of the top five posts were written in 2010: Tis the sssssseason, Blankety-blank tumbleweeds and Sugar factory tour. I could definitely see more posts about snakes and tumbleweeds in my future. If I visit the sugar factory again, I’d surely write about that.
But the blog topic rounding out my top five for 2011, which was written in 2009, I HAVE NO INTENTION OF WRITING ABOUT AGAIN!!! It’s the same post that made the top five last year – Gettin’ my Runza on. Ugh!
Now, I have nothing against Runza. It’s the fast-food joint I visit most often, when I eat fast food. I figure I might as well support a uniquely Nebraskan chain restaurant in this world of increasing global conformity and loss of regional identity. The local Runza restaurants have also been rock stars in terms of corporate sponsorship of local fundraising efforts.
But it’s fast food. Fast food never tastes as good as slow food.
This point was driven home to me last winter, when I tasted a homemade cabbage burger for the first time at the Scottsbluff winter farmers market.
In my personal 1-to-10 continuum of cabbage burger tastiness, with 10 being best, a Runza rates about a 2 and a reheated Gering Bakery cabbage burger rates about a 5 compared to the taste of a real homemade cabbage burger – a 9 for the farmers market version I had.
I was SO looking forward to getting a cabbage burger fix when this season’s winter farmers market started up (every other Saturday 1 to 4 p.m. in the greenhouse at Aulick’s TLC). Alas, the health inspector blocked most vendors from selling that particular treat. Something about preparing meat in an unlicensed kitchen. I understand the reasoning, but BOO! What was I to do now?
Learn to make my own cabbage burgers! And blog about it in hopes of knocking my Runza post out of the top 5 in 2012!
I proceeded thusly:
Step 1: Buy a pound of ground beef, a head of cabbage, some whole-wheat flour and some onions from the farmers market.
Step 2: Dissolve 2 tsp. sugar and a packet of dry yeast in 1/4 cup warm water, mix in 3/4 cup cooled scalded milk and 1 Tbs melted butter, then mix and knead in 2 cups of flour (half whole wheat, half white). Let rise 30 min. (Note: this proportion left me with more filling than I could fit into the dough. I probably could have doubled the dough recipe and come out about right.)
Step 3: Brown the ground beef, then stir in about a cup of diced onion, three cups of shredded cabbage and a cup of water and cook uncovered for about 20 minutes. Add salt and pepper to taste. This step is very close to what my mom calls “schnipfully hamburger” – a term perhaps derived from a German word used in my family generations ago. UPDATE: let the filling cool before making the burgers.
Step 4: Roll out the dough and cut into pieces
Step 5: Add a couple of spoonfuls of filling to a dough square. Last winter, one of my farmers market cabbage burgers was a fusion cabbage burger – it contained jalapeño peppers and was oh-so-tasty. I decided to replicate this with pickled peppers. (Note to self: mince the peppers next time, and use fewer of them.)
Step 6: Pinch opposite corners of the dough together
Step 7: Pinch the seams together, form into a rounded shape and put seam-side-down on a buttered cookie sheet. Top with pepper slice (optional). Let rise 2o min.
Step 8: Bake at 375 for 30 min. Cool on a wire rack.
Step 9: NOMNOMNOM!
As I was working my way thorough the steps, I was thinking to myself, “Gosh, this is a lot of fuss. Why not just slap the filling between a couple of slices of bread?”
I later answered my own question. The aroma and flavor (a 10 on my cabbage burger flavor scale) of the perfectly-crusty bread baked around the meat filling could not be matched by the bread-slice option. Also, it would be a lot messier. The well-made homemade cabbage burger can be easily eaten with one hand. (Aha! Homemade convenience food!)
The size I made those cabbage burgers – starting with dough squares about 6 inches across – was perfect. Each leftover burger just fit into an empty farmers market goat cheese container. (I’ve saved approximately 46 hojillion of those containers to date.)
Here’s hoping my slow-food cabbage burger post beats the page views of that 2009 fast-food post this year!
UPDATE: almost forgot to include a link to the blog at my friend’s dairy, which includes a good explanation of “what’s a krautburger?” (AKA cabbage burger).
Copyright 2012 by Katie Bradshaw
Nebraska bighorn perspective
Saturday morning, the January sun was warm. Despite the stiff breeze, I was comfortable wearing a short-sleeved shirt topped by a down vest. (With mittens. Yes, I looked dorky.)
I desperately needed to do some time in the great outdoors.
Bugman and I decided to head over to Cedar Canyon Wildlife Management Area - a chunk of public land managed by the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission that’s part of the Wildcat Hills Wildlands Initiative (which has opened thousands of scenic acres to public access over the past decade or so).
We chose Cedar Canyon because it was close (we only had 2 hours to spend) and because we’d been out there once before with a couple of friends last October, so it was somewhat familiar terrain.
On this hike in October, our friends' dog was sooooo pleased to have found a fresh pile of horse pucky to roll in. Horseback riding is an approved use of the land, as is hunting. We collected and disposed of a few dozen discarded shotgun shells out there that day. Stoopid sloppy shooters.
Back in October, Bugman communed with the meaty lubber grasshoppers that were in abundance near the path we walked.
No grasshoppers in January. No bighorn sheep that we could see, either.
“Bighorn sheep?” you say. “In Nebraska?”
Yes. Bighorn sheep live in Nebraska, but only in the scenic, rocky terrain here out west. They were extirpated from their native range here in pioneer times but have been reintroduced in the Wildcat Hills and Pine Ridge areas.
Here’s a link to a small map of bighorn sheep territory from the NGPC. Here’s a screen capture from a USDA report that shows a more detailed western Nebraska map:
I would like to spot the sheep someday. Methinks I need to bring out a good set of binoculars. If you want to see pictures of Nebraska bighorns, check out the NGPC Facebook page “Panhandle collection” photo albums.
We didn’t see any sheep, but, according to Bugman, I acted like one.
Here’s me, as seen via Bugman’s cell phone camera. (I’m the pale blue dot on the ridge about 1/4 of the way down from the top of the photo.)
Bugman is not too keen on scrambling up steepish slopes, so he found a nice, sunny, grassy spot to relax while I was exploring. (What a great place for a winter picnic!)
The ridges I walked had indeed been trodden by sheep, judging from the piles of scat up there. Here’s a photo-stitched sheep’s-eye view of the landscape:
This is one of the few photos on my blog you can click to enlarge.
Here are some other interesting things I saw up there.
A wind erosion rock sculpture underneath a weathering sandstone ledge
A tiny fossilized bone fragment embedded in the sandstone. (Fossil removal is illegal, FYI.)
If you’d like to check out Cedar Canyon yourself, here are directions:
Head south on Highway 71 from Gering. Turn west on County Road T, just south of Carter Canyon Road (it’s all gravel road from here). Follow the road all until it ends in a T intersection with County Road 17. Turn left/south. A sign says the road is a dead end. You’ll cross a little wood-plank bridge and then take a 90-degree curve. Where the road forks, stay right – this will take you to the parking area.
Enjoy!
Copyright 2012 by Katie Bradshaw
