It’s early-June in the Torrey Creek Valley.   The sky is clear of clouds, and the lakes are clear of ice, but a sharp wind is blowing off surrounding peaks still blanketed in white.  The spring thaw has not started yet; more likely the cool temperatures and precipitation in the past week have added to snow accumulation in the high country. Along the road, shaggy-coated mule deer eagerly graze the first green shoots. The yearlings, still a squattish-shape, have not matured into the elegant grace of adulthood. There are two small bands of bighorn ewes relaxing amid boulders on the sunny slopes below Torrey Rim. Soon the ewes will begin making their way to the higher, most secluded ridges for lambing.

 

I’m a little disappointed to find the osprey nest at the top of a dead tree is inhabited by, well, osprey. A few weeks ago the Dubois newspaper sported a photo of a goose peering curiously from the nest. Judging from the talk around town and crazy as it sounds, this practice of geese temporarily occupying an osprey nest is not such an uncommon occurrence in the spring.   Eventually, either the osprey object to the goose invasion, or the geese realize it’s a long way to the ground for flightless goslings, because there were no local stories about geese taking up permanent residence in the lofty nests.

 

A pair of trumpeter swans graced the edge of Lake Julia. The caretaker of the ranch speculated this is the same pair that nested there the past few years. Trumpeter swans are a success story, bouncing back from near extinction in the early 1900’s, to a viable population now. There are more than 500 trumpeters in the tri-state area of Idaho, Wyoming and Montana.

Startling flashes of bright blue brighten an otherwise drab landscape. Bluebirds returned to the valley around the end of March.  A pair of bald eagles circles overhead. 

 

The earliest of the spring flowers are bravely opening in the chilly air: mounds of white and pale lavender phlox, and yellow biscuitroot.   Shiny brown aspen buds are swelling, but not yet opening. All it takes is a few warm days for the aspen and cottonwood to burst into iridescent green, and then it will feel less like winter and more like the beginning of summer.

~Ellen Vanuga