We left the house at 6 a.m. or so, wanting to get an early start on the expected heat. An early start also puts you in synch with the critters, like these cow elk heading back up to their bedding ground with full bellies after a night of browsing in the valley meadows:
Hmmm... What's been going on with the trees in this area?
Well, taking notice of unusual trees aside, hiking can be a stop-and-go process with Emily. She notices things. There are a lot of grouse whortleberries (aka red huckleberries, Vaccinium scoparium) shrubs in this area. It's an important subalpine food for bears, grouse, mountain goats, and other critters;
Like Emily:
Emily brings a naturalist's eye and a sense of fresh wonder to the world. I hike along, notice "False Hellbore," and pass on. Emily says, "Hey, look at these ants tending their aphid herd;" and, "Hey, look at the gentians!" Gentians are not as common here as in some Pintler basins. When abundant, we gather a handful of leaves for a deliciously bitter tea:
As the trail nears the lake basin, it drops over the nose of a wooded ridge, and you look across the basin to the opposite, very rugged ridge:
Along the creek connecting the various lakes are meadows of bright summer wildflowers, something in the aster/sunflower family, I think:
They are good butterfly food for the seasonally abundant Fritillaries (Speyeria sp?) and Milbert's (?) Tortoiseshell (Nymphalidae sp?). I'm no entomologist, let alone Lepidoptera specialist, so I'm guessing the names here (see http://www.butterfliesandmoths.org/):
The Many Miles Lake basin is typical of our Pintler glacial cirques, each one beautiful and rugged. Here's the view from the upper lake:
As a beautiful place, is it too much to ask for fellow hikers to pick up their own trash? Does the concept, "Pack it in, pack it out" mean anything to yous guys?
The lakes provide excellent fishing, thanks to the aerial stocking effort of FWP, and to some natural reproduction in the lake inlets. We caught a few for supper, though the weather front & wind that moved in made casting miserable. Here's a mayfly looking for a rest, and a friendly hand:
Emily had packed in her fins, snorkel, and wetsuit, but the weather just wasn't conducive to it. What began as another hot, sunny day began changing in the late morning. At first, we thought maybe it was just the haze building from the many forest fires in the area. However, by noon the clouds were heavy, the wind picked up, and we were glad for our polarfleece or wool shirt. Glad to see the weather moderate: by the time we arrived home, c. 7 pm, it began raining and continued much of the night. This week's weather is predicted to be seasonally normal: highs of about 80 deg or so; overnight lows in the low-40s. 'Bout time.
The fishing is especially good from about 9 a.m. until noon, after which one shouldn't fish anyway, given that the water is warming up by then and being caught & released can cause lethal stress on a trout. The fish have not been running especially large -- mostly 10 to 14 inches or so -- but there are lots of them, both browns and 'bows. Some of the largest fish are in very shallow water, which makes for an exciting initial run as you set up and they head for deeper water.
Wow! Are these a beautiful fish, or what? As part of our natural heritage, a creature that evolved in this harsh post-Pleistocene landscape, they are a treasure. How lucky and bizarre, that the mine-polluted waters of Silver Bow Creek provided a poisonous barrier to prevent exotic, introduced rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) from hybridizing the native fish in German Gulch Creek.
When I was elected president of the George Grant Chapter of Trout Unlimited (GGTU) in 2002-2003, I made German Gulch Creek a priority. As good as it was, there were some problems, threats, and opportunities: selenium pollution from a recently abandoned open-pit, cyanide heap-leach gold mine; private in-holdings within Forest Service and state land that were ripe for development; aquatic and riparian habitat that could not recover from the physical damage wrought by placer mining; the threat of rainbow trout entering the creek as Silver Bow Creek is remediated and restored; an irrigation diversion that diverted the lower creek and severed the aquatic habitat connection between Silver Bow and German Gulch Creeks; difficulty with public access to the lower creek... German Gulch Creek was an eye-opening lesson: habitat that -- on the surface -- appears to be good and secure may be a high priority for our attention and protection.
The ceremony also proved to be a family reunion, including mother Lois and other family elders, gathered here around "rally rock" on the Layton property:
Children David, Daniel, Sue, and Michael and their spouses:
And the grandchildren and the whole gang, along with some GGTU folks:
We capped the ceremony with a hike down to the bridge crossing for a public trail constructed as part of the project. Here is Andrew McElroy (Boy Scout Troop 8 of Butte, Montana) with the bridge he helped design and build as his Eagle Scout project:
And here is Josh Vincent (left), the good parent who has brought this project along to date, and who remains committed to the many other tasks yet to be completed:
As Hillary Clinton famously wrote, "It takes a village to raise a child." Similarly, it takes a village to pull off a grass-roots based project of this magnitude. At the risk of offending some persons by forgetting to mention them, it is important to recognize some of the key supporters of and participants in this project.
It's a steady and sometimes steep climb of about 5 miles or so. Once into the trees its shady and cool enough, but RTD (RolyTheDog) & I were thankful for the early start on this near-90 deg F day. Passing by some elderberries, 
I thought of Grandma Beryl (nee Fitzgibbons) Munday, the world's best baker of fruit pies (my wife Jan has the title of world's best living baker of fruit pies). The Allegheny highlands of Pennsylvania were a great place for wild berries of all kinds. Elderberry pie was my favorite, and she would bake one or two for my birthday. In Montana, elderberries are seldom sweet and tasty--too short of a growing season, too dry, not enough heat?
Hearst Lake was improved once upon a time with a dam, but the dam might need repairs and the increased height no longer seems to be used:
The saddle between Hearst and Haggin Lakes makes a nice base camp at 8,500 feet. What a place to be as a front moved in, lightning crashed on the peaks, and clouds dropped more than an inch of rain in my cooking pot rain gage. The pleasant meadow, and the old ACM/Anaconda water company (?) cabin (lower left in photo) is on the route to Mt Haggin:
I hope Cindy was (is?) worth it:
I like passing through the feathery alpine larches that invariably mark the Pintler treeline at c. 8500 to 9000 feet. As my now-retired colleagues Jack Goeble and Dennis Haley liked to say, "What are the poor people doing today?":
Above treeline, we join our friends the pika (Ochotona princeps). Here's a "rock rabbit" peeking out directly over RTD's nose:
Global warming has been very tough on them in many areas of Colorado and points south. As the climate warms, they move higher up the mountain side, become "island populations," and are more and more cut off from "marriagable" members of other populations.
The peak is marked by a most impressive cairn, as you would expect, given the peak's ritual importance in the lives of many Anaconda residents. In the peak notes, one can read of marriage proposals, anniversaries, reunions, eulogies, and other touching tributes to local lore (no mention of Cindy, though):
For a time, it looked as if the weather was going to close in as the sun lifted moisture from the night's rain, and dense fog bracketed the ridge. Added to the time of summiting any peak (4:20), the fog created just a bit of "high" anxiety :
But the sun prevailed, revealing a nice panoramic view beginning at the left with the Mill Creek/10 Mile ridge and sweeping west to the heart of the Pintler:
Time to head down. On approaching the meadow, RTD began an intense gaze toward a spot about 300 yards below us. I've learned to trust her sharp eyes. What's this big-assed creature flipping over rocks (lower right in photo)?
Thought it was a big boar of a bear at first, but then saw it watching something, and the cub scrambled into view (sow is on the right, looking back at her cavorting cub on the left):
Big sow black bear--maybe 300 pounds or so, sows usually go half that or less. Glad she left our camp alone, she must have been finding plenty of tasty ants, beetles, and other critters under the rocks she was flipping over:
A quick hike down to Hearst helped supplement our evening supper:
Would have stayed later the 3rd day and fished Haggin Lake before hiking out, but ate like a bear(?) the second day and ran out of food. Oh well, a good 3-day/2-night trip, and a lovely route up Mt Haggin & back.
