Blog From The Bog

McAnalloy Family and Friends Wildlife Tour

Today was the day that I promised to take the McAnalloy family and some of their friends on a wildlife tour of the park.  I suggested that they meet me at the park at 11 a.m., then we could take a tour of the park, they could have lunch in the meadow or orchard, and the boys could run around and blow off a little steam before being packed in the van for the trip home.  It was one of those late summer wierd weather days.  I left the house at 9:30 a.m. so that I could scope out the park a little before the tour group arrived.  It was only 59 degs F. outside, and I was cold, so I threw a hoodie on over my long-sleeved teeshirt.  By 11 a.m. the temperature had climbed to 69 degs F. and I ended up stripping off my hoodie and stuffing it inside of my pack.  The hoodie filled up every spare inch of my pack, making the job of finding anything inside of it highly problematic.

  I got this wonderful bird hat at GearCon in Portland.  When I put the bird hat on with my EarthCorps teeshirt, it made me instantly recognizable as the tour guide and crazy old bird hat lady.  The kids loved the hat and kept adding to it during the day.  Every time one of them spotted a feather on the ground, they picked it up and gave it to me to add to my hat.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I started off by talking about the Denny and Barker cabins and encouraged them to come back to the park on a Saturday when the cabins are open so that they can see what's inside of them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our next stop was the habitat restoration site where the hawthorne tree is.  I made them all promise me that they'd be careful not step on any of the new plants, then took them back to look at the northwestern thatching ant nest.  I think this nest has almost doubled in size since it was first spotted several months ago.  Of course, one of the kids was immediately bitten by an ant, causing all of us to beat a hasty retreat.

 

 

 

 

Since the trail begins as gray gravel, one of the fathers was beginning to buy into the crazy part of crazy old bird hat lady.  He'd been promised a boardwalk and there wasn't a board in sight.  I think he was greatly relieved when we finally reached it.  The kids were treated to a visit by a very large red-legged frog who was sitting on the edge of the boardwalk.  This poor patient frog was surrounded by a bevy of chattering children, two of whom squatted down to get a closer look.  The frog was probably having an amphibian version of a heart attack.

 

 

 

Here's a closer look.  What a beauty!  You can clearly see why he's called a red-legged frog.  Look at how long the middle toe is on his hind foot.  After the kids got a good look at him, I hurried them off so that Mr. Frog could make a quick getaway.  He's going to have some story to tell around the dinner table tonight......all about how he was suddenly surrounded by a tribe of brave warriors, but managed to fake them out by pretending to be dead.  Learned that trick from brother opposum, he did.  Learned it well, indeed.

 

 

 

I found this beautiful garter snake sunning itself next to the boardwalk when I scoped the park out prior to the tour.  Of course, he was all warmed up and long gone by the time I got the kids down there.  It didn't matter though.  The kids seemed to spot snakes everywhere and one of them said that he even attempted to pick a snake up.  People are so funny about snakes.  Their reactions to spotting one seem to run the gamut from terrified screaming and dancing feet, to "Come here my little slithering serpent.  I vant to take you home and make you my friend.  You can live in a shoebox under my bed and I'll feed you juicy wee mousies."  One never knows.

 

 

Another, much smaller, red-legged frog was spotted on a tree in the tree-well near where the baby owl was spotted.  That particular pool of water has gotten very small.  It's in dire need of a good rain to fill it up.  One of the kids said that they spotted a tadpole in what little water was left.  It's way past tadpole season now, but it's possible that he saw a juvenile salamander.  I've seen them there before with their wonderful gill ruffles.

 

 

 

 

 

Someone finally clipped back all of the vegetation that was blocking the view in front of the Brooklake viewing platform.  Whoever did it really whacked it down to the ground, so it's going to be a while before it becomes a problem again.  Well, you know me.....I always say that, despite the fact that I've been proven wrong time and time again.  Once it takes off, it'll go from ground level to six feet tall in a matter of weeks.  I was glad to see it gone for now because it allowed us to see this green heron fly in.  It was all of the way over on the other side of the lake, so I had to use my extreme zoom, and with all of those kids making the viewing platform bounce up and down, it was impossible to get this amazing bird into focus.  I don't see the green herons very often, so this was a real treat.  It looks like something is wrapped around it's beak.  Could that be a snake?

When we got to the bridge where the school kids set their salmon fingerlings free, another one of the kids spotted this lovely frog.  I didn't even see it until he pointed it out to me.  It didn't take these kids very long to become experts at spotting amphibians.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The mallards at Marlake were taking a little siesta under the bench on the dock.  When I scoped out the park earlier, I startled one of the muskrats that was feeding in the grass close to shore.  The water is usually much deeper, so when you startle the muskrats, they just submerge and swim away.  The water has gotten very shallow where this muskrat was feeding, so when I startled him, he had to waddle away to where the water was deeper.  I wish you could have heard the sound he made as he took off waddling.  Gosh, that was funny!

 

 

 

One of the dragonflies left it's exoskeleton sitting on a leaf near the edge of the lake.  The kids were fascinated by this.  Dragonflies only grow their wings when it's time to mate.  Until then, they live in, or near, the water as nymphs.  Just like butterflies, when it's time to mate, they go through a metamorphosis, then crack out of their old useless shells and fly away.  Pretty cool, huh?

 

 

 

 

 

Look at this fungus we found near Marlake.  It's huge!  That's my foot in the photograph and I wear a size 6 women's shoe.  Wow!  It's almost big enough to use as an umbrella.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Then, it was back to orchard for a picnic lunch and a little running off steam time.  I had suggested that they bring lunch and do this, but I hadn't expected them to include me in their lunch plans.  This is the point where I usually say my goodbyes and leave people to their own devices, but these truly wonderful folks brought lunch for me as well.  I felt very honored to be invited to break bread with them.  Good food, good company, good weather, beautiful park......what more can you ask?  What a great way to spend a Saturday afternoon!

 

 

 

 

 

Teri I. Lenfest 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

One-sheets

I apologize for not visiting the park lately and posting new blogs.  I've been busy working on creating park one-sheets.  A one-sheet is all of the information I can fit on the front and back of a single page, including photographs.  Since our park wildlife isn't caged, I can't guarantee that any of it will be seen from one time to the next.  Because of that, when I lead groups through the park, I usually carry a binder full of photographs with me so that I can show visitors photographs of what I'm talking to them about.  The biggest drawback to that is that the visitors have nothing to take home with them and have to try to remember what I'm telling them.  If you've ever taken a wildlife walk with me, you know how impossible that is.  I can cover a lot of territory in two hours.

At our last meeting, Margery Godfrey, President of the Friends of the Hylebos side of EarthCorps - Hylebos suggested that I create some one-sheets that could be handed out to our visitors.  That way people can take the information home with them and refer to it again and again.  Instead of spending time in the park, I've been sitting in front of my computer, pulling up photographs from my archive, consolidating information, writing, printing, and copying the one-sheets.  So far, I've created sheets on The Life Cycle of Frogs, The Life Cycle of Salmon, Habitat Restoration, Types of Habitat Within the Park, Snakes, Mammals, Birds, and Dragonflies.

I leave for Portland tomorrow.  I'm going to help my daughter man her vending table at GearCon.  Hopefully, when I return, I'll be able to add one-sheets on Park History, The Old Cabins, and Plants.  We'll see.  I'll return to my regular park blogging once I've completed this project.  We hope the park one-sheets will make the park tours even better than they already are.  Take care, stay cool, and I'll talk to you again when I get back home.  Get out and enjoy this weather!

 

 

 

Teri I. Lenfest

Bonding Over Bugs

The last time that Margery Godfrey (Friends of the Hylebos Wetland), Steve Dubiel (EarthCorps), and I had a meeting, Margery asked me how I'd feel about visiting local High School classes and talking about the park.  I told her that I really wouldn't be interested in doing that.  I live right across the street from Saghalie Middle School and often run into the kids going to and from school.  Whenever we have a chance encounter, my overall impression falls in the range of, Egads!  I'm so glad I don't have to deal with that!  My forte is Elementary-aged youngsters.  When I was young, I was interested in everything that crawled, walked, slithered, swam, or flew.  My idealistic dream was to give birth to a flock of children who would bond with me over bugs.  In reality, my flock became two and, although I took them to play in the tidal pools, camping, and hiking, I really can't remember a single moment when we actually bonded over bugs.  Children are individuals, after all, not carbon copies of their parents.  When I lead groups of elementary school youngsters, though, every now and then....the magic happens.  A young child will lay eyes on me and we're instantly on the same wave length.  In two shakes of a lamb's tail, without any effort at all, we've spent two hours together, side by side, discusssing bugs, birds, snakes, fish, plants, frogs, herons barfing salmon eggs, raccoons coming along and eating the barfed eggs, touching octopi, what a sea cucumber feels like, petting a Steller's jay, cannibalism, and digging through scat.  Those moments don't happen all of the time, but when they do, they make all of the work that I do in the park absolutely worth the effort.  Those magic moments are why I keep on doing what I'm doing.  Today was one of those magic days.

Once again, Margie Shea brought the Summer Camp kids from Snake Lake, in Tacoma, to West Hylebos Park.  Only one of the kids had ever been to West Hylebos Park before.  I met Margie, with another Snake Lake Summer Camp group last year and we had such a good time together that she asked me if I'd do it again this year.  Of course I would, said I.  I met them near the old cabins at 1 p.m.  When I arrived, they were already settled down east of the Denny Cabin and were having a picnic.  The kids had just come from the M.A.S.T. aquarium at Redondo Beach, where they'd gotten to touch an octopus, among other things, and they were eager to share their experience with me.  To be frank (Good Afternoon.  You can call me Frank.), I was a little jealous.  I've never touched an octopus and wish I'd accompanied them on their earlier trip.  The kids told me all about the crabs and the sea anemone's and fishing and the demonstrator's arms being grabbed by the octopus, and how she had to yell "No!" at it, and how it let go and zoomed away, leaving suction-cup marks on her arm.  They were so excited that I wondered whether the park would pale in comparison.  The young people had studied the environment around Snake Lake and had come to Federal Way to see how the environment at West Hylebos Wetland Park differed from that at Snake Lake.

We visited Marlake first, where they took a sample of the water and tested it's Ph using a paper test strip.  The kids learned that you always take a sample and dip the strip in the sample, rather than just dipping the strip in the lake, because the strip is treated with chemicals and we don't want to introduce chemicals into the lake.  It looked like the Ph of Marlake was about 7, so we discussed why that might be.  On the way to Marlake, we found a pile of scat and stopped to examine it, to determine what might have left it in the park.  The kids decided that it either had to be a fox or a coyote and, after I told them about the pack of coyotes that lived in the park, decided that it was coyote scat.  On the way to Brooklake, we stopped at the Deep Sinks and discussed peat:  what it was made of, how it was formed, what it was used for, and other interesting peat facts.  We could hear a nearby frog singing loudly and discussed what kind of frog that might be.  On our walk, we stopped to investigate spirea (hardhack), salmonberries, Nootka roses, Pacific water parsley, foam flower, Pacific trailing blackberries, and other plants that grew along the way.

At the Brooklake viewing platform, we talked about the life cycle of salmon, the salmon ladder, how last winter's storm changed the environment, encouraging frogs to live where they hadn't lived before, the great blue heron I'd seen eating a snake on my last visit, cedar waxings, barred owls, and, of course, the graffiti carved into every inch of exposed wood on the viewing platform and the tree shot full of bbs.

Coming back down the short end of the boardwalk loop, we discussed how the old boardwalk was built, how the new boardwalk was built, the damage done by last winter's storm, and how much easier it was to repair the storm damage to the new boardwalk than it had been to repair the old boardwalk, and stopped where a huge tree had fallen over, leaving it's rootwad sitting up in the air.  That's where they spotted two red-legged frogs sitting in the mud.  I was so glad that those frogs made an appearance, because I was beginning to fear that we wouldn't see any frogs at all.  We stopped and listened to the bird song and discussed the different kinds of birds that live in the park.

Everyone stopped at the tree-well near the owl tree to see if they could spot any frogs.  I talked about the frogs that live there and how I had spotted salamanders mating there in the spring, as well as juvenile salamanders with their big gill ruffs. There weren't any frogs or salamanders around to see today, but they did find a big slug.  On the way back to the old cabins, the youngsters got to compare the difference between evergreen blackberry, Himalayan blackberry, and the Pacific trailing blackberry that they'd seen before.  When we reached the old cabins, everyone had a chance to take a bathroom break and participate in a couple of games, then it was back aboard the bus and home to Tacoma.  You couldn't ask for a better day than we had today.  It wasn't too hot, or too cold, but about 68 degrees F. and overcast.  The sky was threatening, but it did not rain.  The youngsters had a good time, burned off a little steam, learned some interesting things, took some one-sheets home with them, and said they wanted to come back and visit the park again.  I consider this day well-seized!

 

Teri I. Lenfest

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Day Full Of Wonderful Surprises!

I hadn't intended to go the the park yesterday.  Instead, I'd planned to stay at home, in front of the computer, drafting some educational wildlife one-sheets for the park.  You know what they say about "best laid plans".  Whatever plans I had for the day went down the tubes early when I received a text message from Dana Buck saying that someone had vandalized all of the visitor sign-in sheets on the visitor information kiosk and she'd had to remove them.  She knew she had a pile of blank sheets around the house somewhere, but couldn't find them.  Did I have a blank sheet that I could print copies from?  Of course, thought I.  I was sure that I'd put one away somewhere for safekeeping.  That thought instantly aborted itself in one of my famous senior brain farts, culminating in an intensive search of all logical and/or remotely possible hiding places, to no avail.  I found blank work-party volunteer sign-in sheets, I found blank salmon counting logs, I found blank habitat restoration plant inventory forms, none of which are used any more, but I failed to find a single blank visitor sign-in sheet.  I contacted Dana and advised her of my inability to locate the necessary blank.  She said that she thought she had one in her computer.  Could she attach the file to an email and send it to me.  Yes, certainly, if she could find it.   I knew that Adele had blanks, but Adele was out of town, so I fired off an email to Steve and Margery.  Anyone have any blanks?  Steve said that he had some and would drop them by the park on Wednesday.  That was the point when I decided that I'd better make a trip to the park to pick up the vandalized sheets so that I would have them in case Lt Hatfield, from the Federal Way Police Department, wanted them.  I have a notebook full of photographs that I use when I lead tours through the park.  Just before I ran out of the front door, I decided to check that notebook and, viola!, found a blank sign-in sheet.  I immediately printed five copies of it and headed for the park.  By the time I arrived at Dana's house, she'd found her stack of blanks, so we ended up with blanks galore and the crisis was averted.  So, ...there I was in the park, despite my best-laid plans, and you know that it's patently impossible for me to simply turn around and catch the bus back home without making an end-to-end survey of the park before I leave.  I'm really glad I decided to stay, too.

Mr. Muskrat was busy swimming across Marlake.  I was way down at the opposite end of the lake when I took this photo, but I'm glad that I decided to take it when I did.  The muskrat was swimming in the direction of the old dock, so I headed down the path in that direction, hoping to get a better shot of the little rodent from that end of the lake.  To my great disappointment, when I arrived at the old dock there was no sign what-so-ever of a muskrat.  I don't know where he went to.  I must have stood on the dock looking for him for at least ten minutes and never saw him surface anywhere on the lake.  Sneaky, sneaky, sneaky.

 

 

I did see baby fish though.  These aren't tadpoles, although they were hanging out atop the same plank where I took my best tadpole photos.  These are tiny fish.  And, there are a lot of them!  That's so exciting!  Last year the City stocked the lake with fish and now the big fish are restocking the lake with baby fish, creating a wonderful food source for so many of the park's animals.

 

 

 

 

The dry season has finally arrived.  Even though it seems to have made a late appearance this year, it's effect can already be seen in the park.  This is a spot where I photographed many frogs, as well as a parade of baby ducklings, this Spring.  Yesterday, it was dry as a bone.  There wasn't even a little damp muddy spot that I could see.  If you hadn't seen it until now, you'd never believe that this area was full of water and teeming with life just a few months earlier.

 

 

 

 

In weather this warm, any self-respecting frog will be found in the water, rather than sitting beside the water, or on a tree branch, or skunk cabbage leaf.  Just like humans, the wild animals that live in our wetland have a very narrow temperature range that they consider desirable.  If the temperature's too cold, frogs dig themselves into the mud to stay warm.  If the temperature's too hot, frogs dig themselves into the mud to stay cool.  Ahh, mud, that multipurpose habitat!

 

 

 

 

This picture was taken in that shallow area to the right of the Brooklake viewing platform, in between the viewing platform and the top of the fish ladder.  Frogs like slow-moving or still water.  Up until this year, I never spotted frogs in this area because the water was moving too fast for them to feel comfortable.  Last winter we had a major storm that brought down a lot of trees in the park.  A handful of trees fell over this area of water, which is normally very shallow to begin with, slowing down the water and creating more swampy quiet space.  This Spring, the frogs returned to this area in abundance.  I've spotted as many as a dozen frogs in this spot on one visit.  Once, I spotted five frogs all crammed together on a single tree limb.

 

The animals were driving me crazy yesterday.  Nothing was sitting around posing for me.  Everything seemed to be moving quickly and was almost always obscured by some kind of vegetation, so that I couldn't get any kind of shot at all.  This great blue heron was one of those animals that gave me a run for my money yesterday.  First he was on one side of Brooklake, obscured by tree branches, then he moved to the other side of Brooklake, obscured by the vegetation growing in front of the Brooklake viewing platform.  I even stood up on top of the benches in an attempt to get a better view, but that didn't work at all.  I finally managed to zoom in on the bird through a pinhole in the vegetation that was only about the size of a piece of toast.  If you look closely, you can see something in the heron's mouth.   Heron's are excellent hunters, patiently moving one tiny millimeter at a time as they slowly sneak up on their prey, then suddenly stabbing into the water with their long sharp beaks.  This one caught lunch.  Yum!  Shortly after devoring his lunch, this beautiful bird settled down into a soft gray lump of feathers and appeared to take a nap.

 

 

 

I was standing on the boardwalk, back arched, camera pointed up, trying to get a photograph of this fast-moving brown creeper in the trees.  Just as I got the creeper lined up in my view-finder and in focus, an entire herd of people, some pushing baby strollers, literally stomped down the boardwalk right in front of me, ruining my shot.  Obviously, they don't camera etiquette.  Darn!  Even with a tripod, my camera can't compensate for the movement of the boardwalk caused by nine people stomping their feet.  What was with the stomping, anyway?  For the life of me, I couldn't figure out what they were stomping for.  Since they didn't appear to speak English, I couldn't ask them either.  It will remain a mystery.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As I approached the Old Sitka Spruce, I got this creepy feeling that something was following me.  I turned around to see what it was and there was this cute little Douglas squirrel right on my heels.  As soon as I raised my camera to snap a shot of him, the little squirrel jumped off of the boardwalk railing, raced across the boardwalk, and disappeared under the boardwalk on the other side.  Rocky the Squirrel!

 

 

 

 

 

When I got back to Marlake, I walked around the back side of the lake and over the bridge.  Just as I approached the log jam at the north end of the lake, I could see these large, long, feathered pantaloons ending in large, sharp, talons heading across my vision to the right, followed by a huge splashing sound coming from the lake.   The bird was so big and so close and everything happened so quickly that it startled me and took my breath away.  What in the heck just happened? Immediately after the splash, I saw this huge osprey flying circles over the nearby trees clutching a big fish in it's talons.  Wow, an osprey fishing in Marlake!  I've never seen that before!  I was so excited that my heart was racing a million miles a second.

 

I was still elated by my run-in with the osprey when I came around the corner and met Chris and Rose Tolvtvar.  They'd just gotten married and had come to West Hylebos Wetland Park to have some outdoor wedding photographs taken.  I can still remember twelve years ago when the park was a dark, creepy, mysterious, well-hidden, barely-used place.  Now, it's bright. open, accessible, and being used as a backdrop for wedding photographs.  That also takes my breath away.  Good job, Federal Way!  Congratulations, Mr. and Mrs. Tolvtvar!  May many joyous years lie ahead of you!

 

 

 

 

Teri I. Lenfest

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Park Patrol

 

Due to a rash of recent vandalism in the park, the Special Operations Unit of the Federal Way Police Department has formed a special mountain bike unit of police officers who will patrol the park and monitor activites along the boardwalk.  Someone has been using park trees for target practice.  This is harmful to the trees, but more importantly, has the potential to be harmful to innocent visitors.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Park informational signs have gone missing, sometimes up to and including the stanchions and footings the signs were attached to.  These signs are not only expensive to replace; but, when removed, deprive our visitors of valuable educational information pertaining to the various environments that exist within the park, as well as the amazing variety of wildlife that makes it's home here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The zip-lock baggie containing my park blog cards was stolen last week and the cards were scattered willy-nilly along the boardwalk.  I picked the cards up and replaced the baggie and cards on the information kiosk.  Sure enough, the baggie had gone missing again by the time we visited today.   Neither EarthCorps, nor the Friends of the Hylebos, pay for these cards.  I pay for them out of my own pocket and provide them as a service to our visitors, so that they can take the park blog information home with them without having to search for a pencil and piece of paper to write on.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Instead of scattering the cards along the boardwalk, like the last time, the vandals crammed the cards all of the way down to the bottom of one of the long, thin, brochure containers.  There was no way that I could fit my hand down far enough to retrieve the cards, and I have very small hands.  It's impossible to unscrew the containers without using a special tool, which I do not have, so I was forced to find a thin, sturdy stick with which to fish the cards out.  Notice how the vandals are deliberately scratching up the plastic on the containers, not to mention the fact that have used the containers for ashtrays, as well as removing the sign-in sheets and brochures and setting them on fire.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here's a photo of some of the police officers who will now be patrolling the park.  I took them on a tour of the park today so that they could see what kind of vandalism was going on and where the trouble spots were.  They will use the information they obtained today to form a strategy designed to nip this kind of vandalism in the bud, and hopefully identify and detain the perpetrators.  I've also been given an emergency number that I can use to contact the unit and report any suspicious behavior that I witness.  From now on, we'll be watching you!  If you're not already a member, Lt Hatfield suggests that you go to www.Safecityfw.com and follow the instructions to join.  Once a member, you can post real-time information, including photographs, about any criminal or suspicious activity at the park as soon as you find it.  You don't have to be a member of the police force or park staff in order to report the activity that you see.  The information that you provide will help make the park a nicer place for everyone to visit.

 

 

 

While in the park, I met a woman who was escorting a group of children through the park playing Hide 'n Seek.  The animals do the hiding and the kids try to find them.  The children had a checklist of things to look for.  This beautiful banana slug was hiding inside of a crevice in a log.  I know the kids went back into the area where the log was located.  Did they spot the slug?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Every time they found something on their list, I could hear their excited voices loudly announcing the find, such as this duck on Marlake.  Scratch one duck off of the checklist, and......ZOOM!, off to find something else.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I heard them announce the fact that they hadn't found any frogs.  I wonder if they saw the dragonflies flitting about the lake, such as this bright red cardinal meadowhawk.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And this vivid turquoise and black Pacific forktail?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I know the kids were on the old dock.  While there, did they notice this busy little spider who seemed to be building an entire hotel chain for hungry arachnids?

 

 

 

 

 

 

I hope so!  It would be a shame to let a little vandalism done by a few thugs keep people out of the park.  I can honestly say that I've worked in the park for twelve years, visiting the park anywhere from one to three or four times a week, and I've only felt uncomfortable a couple of times.  So, strap on your walking shoes and get out there and have some fun!

P.S.  A geocacher recently reported a find to me and I want to quote his report:  "Had a little time to kill while waiting for our grandson to swim at the Aquatic Center, so decided to explore this beautiful place.  Hats off to those who volunteer funds and labor to preserve such places for all to enjoy!"  Everybody take a bow and give yourselves a well-deserved pat on the back.  People do notice all of the hard work you do.

 

Teri I. Lenfest