Podcasts about kicking horse pass

This week I look at an amazing report from Alaska that shows that given the choice, salmon may not be a grizzlies first choice for dinner. I also bring to a close, the story of the building of Canada's transcontinental railway..and with that said, let's get to it. Grizzlies Choose Berries over Salmon Every once in a while you come across a study that throws out everything that you thought you knew about a subject. As a biologist and naturalist, I often lament about how tough the bears in the Rockies have it over their counterparts on the north coast of British Columbia and Alaska. To most people, coastal bears live in the land of milk and honey. They have 5 kinds of Pacific salmon, and many kinds of edible berries. I often talk about the importance of understanding the seasonal food preferences of bears in order to stay safe in bear country. If you know what they're eating when they're eating it, it becomes safer to avoid unwanted encounters simply by avoiding the bear's food de jour. Stay clear of what is on today's menu. We often talk about the critical importance of meat in the diet of bears. Here in the Rockies, they don't have a great deal of meaty options. They'll take some 45% of newborn moose and elk calves, feed on winter killed bighorn sheep and mountain goats, and dig up some ground squirrel colonies. Since they can't have enough meat calories, they rely upon buffaloberries to build their fat layers for winter. If they can't find meat, then berries are their second choice…or so that's what we used to think. What if a bear found itself in a world with unlimited numbers of tasty salmon, but also a bumper crop of berries? What do YOU think they would choose? A recent study on Kodiak Island in Alaska tried to discover the answer to this question. They focused on a well-studied portion of the Karluk watershed on the island. Because bears have been studied here for many years, it seemed like a good place to start simply because there was some good historic data that might help them to determine the food preferences of the resident grizzlies. In this study, bears feed on a variety of berries including red elderberry, salmonberry, crowberry and blueberry. Of these four, red elderberry is by far the preferred choice for bears. If you're not familiar with elderberry bushes, look for a shrub that can be as tall as 3 or 4 metres with compound leaves and dense spikes of white flowers. Later, the flowers will be replaced by dense clumps of berries that grizzlies find very appealing. The denseness of the berry clusters is also what makes these berries popular with bears as they don't need to expend great deals of energy eating them. This experiment was prompted as a result of changes in the seasonal food patterns on Kodiak Island. Historically, while sockeye salmon run for 4 months, they are most vulnerable to bears when they enter smaller tributary streams in July and August. Year after year, decade after decade, the salmon always arrive at the same time of year. Because the bears are able to catch the salmon before they spawn, the fish contain up to 3 times more food energy than dying fish. In the past, elderberries ripened later in the season, usually mid-August as the salmon run was beginning to wane. For bears, this was ideal. As one food disappeared, another food was ready for feeding. Things have been changing rapidly in the north as a result of changing climates and increasingly warm spring temperatures. In warm years, the berries are beginning to ripen earlier and earlier, with ripe berries as early as mid-July on some years. For the first time the bears found themselves in a situation where there were two key foods that were available in the same area at the same time. What surprised University of California scientists though was that they did not make the obvious choice - salmon. Instead the majority of bears abandoned the streams and moved upland to feast on elderberries. I know what you're saying - "fake science". After all, no self-respecting carnivore would choose berries over salmon, but despite all logic indicating that they would stick with salmon, they didn't. Biologists used a number of methods to track the bears behaviour in years where the elderberries ripened at the same time as the sockeye runs. When they studied images from 8 years of aerial surveys of the rivers during the salmon run, in every case, years with early berry crops coincided with fewer bears fishing for salmon. This was backed up by looking at areas outside the Karluk River and when 31 years of aerial photographs were compared to ripening dates, the same results were shown. In particular, during the exceedingly warm summers of 2014 and 2015, studies of scat showed the same results. Of 151 scat samples identified, 125 were composed primarily of red elderberries. 2010 formed a good control years as there was a failure of the elderberry crop and, when they looked at the location of GPS collared bears, they remained at the river to feed on the available salmon. Their conclusions showed that if elderberries were available at the same time as sockeye salmon, the bears would largely ignore the salmon and turn into a furry frugivore. As you can imagine, this put the biologists into a tizzy. Why would grizzlies purposely choose foods with lower nutritional value and a lower percentage of protein. When they looked into the nutritional content of the foods, they discovered that the berries offered only around 50% as much food energy as salmon. This number can be reduced even further when you consider that with a seemingly endless number of salmon, the bears are able to select just the most nutritious parts like the skin, the brains and the eggs. This still seemed to confound common sense. They had to look deeper. What they discovered is that it's not just about calories. In order for the bears to maximize weight gain, they may need to look beyond simple calories. The choice may be impacted by the relative percentages of macronutrients like protein. They turned to food studies of bears in captivity. In one case, the bears were given the choice of foods of varying protein levels. The bears selected foods with protein levels in the 11-21% range, much lower than the 83% found in salmon, but right in the range of elderberry with 12.8%. In the end, it looks like all calories are not created equal. When given the choice, bears looked for a more moderate amount of protein. Elderberries may be the berry of choice, despite there being other available berries to choose from, simply because they occur in dense clumps which allows bears to eat vast numbers while expending minimal energy. As temperatures continue to warm, the trend looks like elderberries will continue to ripen earlier and earlier. Currently, they are ripening at a rate of 2-1/2 days earlier each decade. This would put the average ripening date at the same time as the peak salmon run by the year 2070. It's unknown how this will affect bears in the long run. Currently, the two foods normally occur sequentially, extending their feeding season. It will also depend on what other food options are available to bears once the salmon and elderberry harvest ends. I love it when science gets turned on its head. Sometimes the obvious conclusion just isn't the right one. This study helps to really show the importance of fruit to black and grizzly bears. It also has a local connections as we look to the end of buffaloberry season. This study helps to show why berries are critical to bears and it also means that it is even more important for us to protect the supply of berries for our local bear populations. Simply chopping down every buffaloberry bush in town is NOT the solution. Bears are creatures of habit. Once a location is a part of their regular foraging routine, they'll continue to return. If they don't find buffaloberries, then they may find…crabapples. Wildlife corridors should be for wildlife. Clear berry bushes from places like the Peaks, but the wildlife corridor berries should be left for the bears. If the berries are concentrated there, so will the bears be. If, as a community, we can get people to respect closures, than maybe we can help to keep the bears healthy and the wildlife corridors viable. Next up…the last spike The Last Spike Over the past few weeks, I've introduced you to the main players in the building of the Canadian Pacific Railway. This week, I want to talk about the completion of the line through the Kicking Horse and Roger's Passes. While the stories of adventure and exploration were taking place, the financiers and managers were doing everything they could to keep the flow of money coming…and many times, they were failing. In 1880, the government of Canada gave the contract to finish the CPR to a group of financiers led by George Stephen and Donald Smith. The contract required the line to be finished within 10 years and offered the "syndicate" a monopoly of the line along with $25 million in cash and 25 million acres of land grants in stages as they completed sections of the track. When the job was done, they would be given an additional 1,100 km of track already completed. The value of those lines was some $75 million. During the battles to pass the C.P.R. contract in the house, the conservatives had to defeat 23 different amendments during an excess of 30 sessions that extended past midnight. The ordeal took its toll on Macdonald who was confined to bed with severe bowel cramps when the contract was passed in parliament. When he left for England to recuperate, many believed they would never see him again. Stephen knew that it would be next to impossible to raise money in England due to the fiasco surrounding another Canadian railroad, the Grand Trunk. It had earned the nickname “The Big Suitcase” for the immense amounts of money it had managed to walk away with, without ever paying a penny in dividends. The Grand Trunk also did all it could to discredit the C.P.R., whom it saw as a competitor. When Stephen arrived in London, he was shocked to find that the newspapers were more interested in the fact that Jumbo the elephant had been sold to P.T. Barnum. This was a few years before John, Paul, George and Ringo, and Jumbo was the closest thing England had to a Rock Star…he was one famous elephant. Revenge can be sweet though, and Stephen had his chuckle when, just three weeks before the hammering of the last spike, a Grand Trunk locomotive ran over Jumbo and killed him. Financial difficulties were not long in arriving, and repeatedly, the syndicate had to ask the government for assistance. Each hand out made it more difficult to approve the next, and to cut costs, Sandford Fleming’s Yellowhead Pass route was abandoned for the shorter route through the Kicking Horse Pass. In the two years between 1880 and 1882, the company spent almost $59 million dollars, but barely collected $21 million. The remaining $37 million was not covered by the fact that they had less than $20 million in investor money. That left them with a whopping $17 million in debt. Thomas Shaughnessy, the C.P.R.’s purchasing agent managed to keep the line afloat through some interesting financial dealings. In one case, an American firm accused him of taking bribes to secure work, while not delivering. When he was hauled into Stephen’s office, he pulled out a collection of deposit slips, all to the C.P.R. account, which totaled exactly what the American firm had claimed. When asked if they had been bribes, he answered: “Of Course, but by God we needed the money didn’t we!” In the end it became clear that they needed at least another $27 million dollars in order to get the line through. The only way to get the funding would be for the government to, once again, bail the railway out. By Dec of 1883 Stephen was desperate, and he wired Prime Minister John A. Macdonald: "Things have now reached a point when we must either stop or find the means of going on. Our enemies here and elsewhere think they can now break us down and finish the CPR forever." While Macdonald had no interest in bailing out the railroad yet again, his Minister of Railways, John Henry Pope pointed out: "the day the Canadian Pacific busts the Conservative party busts the day after" Once again, the railroad was bailed out. In October, Stephen set out for one last fund raising trip to England. Along with him was Macdonald who was trying to escape the stress that pushing through the railroad aid bills had put on him. Finally, through a feat of financial finagling, Stephen managed to borrow $250,000 from a Scottish bank. He then sent off the most famous telegram in Canadian history to Smith—all it read was “Stand Fast Craigellachie” Smith and Stephen had grown up in Banffshire, Scotland, and a giant rock nearby had become a symbol of the clan Grant’s defiance during the clan wars—it was known as Craigellachie. This telegram was Stephen’s way of informing Smith that the funds were on the way. A final saving grace occurred when a Metis named Louis Riel, led a revolt against the government beginning in March of 1885. The Metis were of mixed blood French/Indian origin and had begun to attack settlements in the west and the troops were being sent in. Van Horne dedicated all the resources of the railroad to get 3,000 troops to the front in just 7 days. With this quick response, the uprising was quelled more quickly than expected. An earlier uprising had required 3 months to get troops to the front. Suddenly the railroad had shown it had more value, and the government bailed them out at the eleventh hour. Workers had not been paid for several months and were refusing to work. The banks had turned them down for any temporary loans, and when the government agreed to back their loan, Van Horne Stated that when they received the news: “We tossed up chairs to the ceiling; we tramped on desks; I believe we danced on tables. I do not fancy that any of us knows what occurred, and no one who was there can ever remember anything except loud yells of joy and the sound of things breaking.” Van Horne then sent out a hasty telegraph to Shaughnessy. All it said was: “Pay creditors now. Van Horne.” Stephen had lost all pleasure in the enterprise. The government sent appraisers to his vast Montreal mansion for security for his loan. They evaluated everything from his silverware to his underwear, and with a stroke of a pen, he signed it all away. In fact, he did not even go to the hammering of the last spike, but returned to Scotland to recover from the strain. The Last Spike Ceremony Finally, on Nov. 7, 1885 the day had arrived. The last spike would finally be hammered. The location was named Craigellachie in honour of the three word telegram that had saved the railway. But before I tell the story of our last spike, I like to share the story of the American last spike ceremony that occurred in 1869 in Promontory, Utah because no two events could be so wonderfully different. In Promontory Utah, there were two gold, and two silver spikes. The main spike had been forged at a cost of $400. Attached to the spikes were telegraph wires, so the whole country could hear it driven home. The Governor of California was on hand for the occasion and he had a specially designed silver maul, silver hammer with which to drive the stake. When everyone was in position and the cameras were ready, he raised that hammer and he brought it down…and he missed. He missed the last spike. That's okay because the telegraph operator sent the word "done" and simultaneous celebrations broke out from New York to San Francisco. They even rang the long silent liberty bell. When Van Horne was asked about what kind of ceremony he would like, he declared that '“...the only ceremony I fancy may occur will be the damning of the foreman for not driving it sooner...” He also declared that there would be no golden spike, that the last spike would be a plain iron spike, as good as all the rest. There were no heads of state or government at the hammering of our last spike, just some of the financiers and surveyors who would not have missed this moment, along with the workers that just happened to be there at the time. In the photograph, hammering the spike is Donald Smith, one of the main financiers. Behind him, with a stove pipe hat and patriarchal style beard is Sandford Fleming. To Fleming’s right, with his hands in his pockets, is William Cornelius Van Horne. Out of sight is Major A.B. Rogers, and way in the back, with a Stetson hat, peaking over the crowd, is a young Tom Wilson who would not have missed this day for the world. Now Donald Smith had heard the story of the Governor of California missing the spike, and we would have no such shenanigans here. And so when everything was ready, and the cameras were in position, he raised his hammer, took careful aim, and he brought it down…and he didn't miss!… …he bent it. He bent the last spike! It obviously had to be taken out, so we actually had two last spikes in Canada. It was later cut up into pieces to make souvenir pins for the many dignitaries that were not present. A new spike was put into place, and this time Smith drove the spike home. It was also immediately pulled out. The last thing we wanted was souvenir hunters tearing up the track as soon as we got it built. After the spike, there was silence, as the men pondered the friends they had made, the friends they had lost, and in more cases than not, just what the heck they were going to do next because with that simple act they were now unemployed. The silence was followed by a cheer and cries for a speech. We needed some words by which to mark the occasion…after all, what would the historians say? Finally Van Horne reluctantly agreed. He climbed on the platform, cleared his throat and stated: “All I can say is that the work has been done well in every way!” That was it. That was the entire text of the speech at our last spike ceremony. After that, Major A.B. Rogers, so taken by the moment, forgot about hiding his emotions, grabbed a piece of railroad tie and tried to thrust it into the ground to mark the spot. After a few minutes of private celebration, the sound of a train whistle and a call of “all aboard for the pacific” broke the silence. And for the first time, the train was able to continue over what had once been a gap in the tracks, and that little train chugged its way into history. The last spike had been removed shortly after the dignitaries left by Frank Brothers. In the famous photograph of the event, he's the bearded man on the left of the image looking directly at the camera. He later presented it to Edward Beatty who became the first Canadian born president of the CPR. It was reportedly stolen from his desk and at that point it was largely lost in history. In 2012, the mystery of the missing spike may have finally been solved. Rumour has it that the spike somehow made its way to railroad surveyor Henry Cambie, who in turn gave it to the chief of the patent office in Ottawa, W.J. Lynch. It was to be a gift for his son, Arthur who was a railroad buff. From Arthur it made its way to his daughter, Margo Remnant. The spike was silver plated and fashioned into the handle of a knife blade. Metallurgical studies showed it was consistent with the metal used in spikes at the time. In 2012, Remnant's widow presented it to the Museum of Civilization where hopefully it will find a permanent home. And with that, it's time to wrap this episode up. I want to thank you for sharing your time with me and I appreciate you hitting the subscribe button so that you don't miss any future episodes. Ward Cameron Enterprises is your specialist on guided hikes, tours and photography outings across the mountain west. If you'd like to make the most of your mountain experience drop us a line at info@wardcameron.com or hit me up on Twitter @wardcameron. Don't forget you can always comment and find links to additional information in the show notes at www.mountainnaturepodcast.com/ep042. And with that said, the sun's out and it's time to go hiking. I'll see you next week.

This week I take a look at one of our most secretive animals, the northern flying squirrel. It also looks like B.C. has broken a record this summer for the worst fire season on record. Finally, I'll share the story of the Greatest Canadian Railroader, that wasn't well Canadian, William Cornelius Van Horne. And with that said, let's get to it. Flying Squirrels We're all familiar with the red squirrel, that ubiquitous little scavenger that invades bird feeders and constantly chatters at us whenever we enter its forested domain. However were you aware that the red squirrel is NOT the only squirrely resident of our western forests? The northern flying squirrel shares the forest with its more gregarious neighbour but for most residents of the mountain west, these squirrels remain virtually invisible.  They range from 25 to 37 cm in length and they have a light underside and dark backs. They give birth to just a single litter each year and may live communally in the winter in order to huddle together to share warmth. They are far more secretive than the red squirrel and are usually only active at night. Like red squirrels, their diet is very flexible, including seeds, cones, tree sap, fungi and even eggs, and nestlings. They are characterized by a skin membrane that runs from their front feet to their back which, when stretched out, gives them a large leathery sail that allows them to fly like a furry kite from tree to tree to tree. The proper name for these membranes are patagia. If this doesn't give them enough of a wing, they have cartilage spurs on each wrist that can help to extend the patagia even further. As they leap from their perch, they stretch out their arms and legs and soar away. When they approach their landing site, they'll rapidly raise their flat tail which, in turn, shifts their body upwards. This positions all four legs forward for landing and the patagia also forms a breaking parachute to slow them down for 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                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            Globally, there are 43 species of flying squirrels and in some cases, flights of up to 300 feet can be made. The northern flying squirrel averages around 20 metres, but flights of up to 90 metres have also been recorded. If you've ever seen a youtube video of humans wearing squirrel suits, you will noticed that they don't just fly in a single direction, they can execute sharp turns by changing the orientation of their arms and legs. Squirrles are the real master at this. They can make incredibly sudden corrections and turns mid-flight, even completely reversing direction if needed. While they're foraging on the ground though, they're clumsy as they collect seeds and cones to store in their caches. Large eyes help them to see in the dark and they quietly scurry about looking for tasty morsels. The range of the northern flying squirrel covers almost all of Canada. With the exception of southeastern Alberta and southern Saskatchewan. Just because you haven't seen one doesn't mean they're uncommon. In fact in many areas, they are very common, and like red squirrels, they're not above invading an attic or two.  If you're out at night and see two big eyes staring at you from the treetops, you may just be seeing one of our most secretive residents. Take a few minutes and watch, you may just get lucky and see it make a quick aerial exit. In the winter, you will sometimes come across a set of squirrel tracks that mysteriously just begins in the middle of a field. That's a sure sign that a flying squirrel has been passing through. Next up…a record breaking season - for all the wrong reasons Worst Fire Season Ever It's now official. 2017 already has become the worst fire season in British Columbia history - and the season isn't even over yet. As of Aug 16, fires had blazed across an estimated 894,941 hectares in the province since April 1 according to a CBC story. To battle these fires, the federal and provincial governments have spent in excess of $315 million dollars. That number doesn't yet surpass the $382 million dollars spent in 2009, but again, the season isn't over yet. Perhaps even more important than financial costs to fight the fires, has been the loss of homes and lengthy evacuations of some 45,000 people over the course of the summer. As of August 22, there were still 3,800 people unable to return to their communities due to evacuation orders. Currently firefighters are fighting a single fire that covers some 4,674 square kilometres making it the largest single fire in B.C. history. It was created when 19 individual fires converged to create one single monster blaze near Quesnel. From end to end it stretches 130 kilometres. This is more than double the previous record held by a 1958 fire that charred 2,250 sq km. Province wide, there are still 135 fires burning. This season is far from over. Many of the fires currently burning will continue until the snows of winter douse them. Let's hope for some good solid rains for B.C. this fall. Next up…a rainmaker saves the CPR Van Horne’s Line The building of the Canadian Pacific Railway was an epic adventure for a small nation. There are many stories related to this line but I wanted to introduce you to one of the key characters responsible for helping us to get the job done. His name is Sir William Cornelius Van Horne. As Canada struggled to build its railroad, the epic struggle against an unforgiving landscape and diminishing coffers made for a very difficult undertaking for a small population. We had little experience with such an immense railroad project and the politics around the construction managed to topple two governments. As time passed, and funds diminished, the disorganization around the construction began to become overwhelming. The final straw occurred during the 1881 season where the company only managed to lay just over 200 km of track and in the process squandered $10 million. We still had some 3,000 left to finish. It became clear that we needed to bring in a rainmaker. As it turns out there was just a man south of the border: William Cornilius Van Horne. Van Horne had begun his career as a telegraph operator during the civil war. While working one day, a train rolled into the station and he saw the grand private car of the railroad superintendent…and he was impressed. He immediately declared that someday, he would also have his own private car. In order to accomplish this, he knew that he would need to learn everything there was about railroading; and so, he set out to learn. He began staying after work to copy the drawings of the railroad engineers…until he was caught. Fortunately for him, he was pretty good. They hired him to do their lettering from that point on, and for the rest of his life he was an amateur engineer. He was only 29 when he got his private car, and was named the superintendent of the St. Louis, Kansas City, and Northern Railroad, making him the youngest Railroad Superintendent in the world. Van Horne was a gambler and he never hesitated to gamble on his own abilities. He gained a reputation for taking bankrupt railways and making them pay. Since broke railroads didn’t have a lot of money, but had a lot of useless stock lying around, he would negotiate as much of his pay in stocks as possible. He could later sell them for a fortune; once he turned the fortunes of the railway around that is. One of his contemporaries, Colonel Allan Magee stated: "You always knew when Sir William Van Horne was approaching his office, even when he had just got off the elevator, was still coming down the corridor, but had not yet turned the corner. The sounds were unmistakable--the heavy tread, the wheeze, the shuffle, the snort, all warnings that a portentous figure was about to loom into view" He had a reputation of being everywhere at once, and he took great pains to cultivate that reputation. At one point he learned that some of his workers were taking pillows from passenger compartments to make beds in the luggage compartment. He arranged for a telegram to meet them in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night and all that telegram said was: “put those pillows back! Van Horne” Even though he had his private car, he would often travel 2nd class as that was the best way to see the operation of your line the way your customers saw it. On one trip, some roughians were taunting a young African American woman with a child that wouldn’t stop crying. He sat quietly until one of the youths got up and slapped the child. Van Horne, who was a man of rather generous proportions launched to his feet, grabbed the youth by the scruff of the collar and said: “Leave that child alone!” When the youth responded with: “Who the hell are you?” Van Horned replied: “Never mind! Be careful how your conduct yourself or I shall throw your off the train” By this time the tempers were flaring, and the testosterone was pumping, but the angry stare of Van Horne caused the youth to back down. Things were very tense until they got into the next station when the youth’s sidekicks hustled him off the train. Van Horne watched as they unloaded on the platform, all the while wondering where his conductors had been during this entire time. Suddenly one of them appeared and ordered Van Horne to duck down:  "Do you know who those men are?" he whispered..."That's Jesse and Frank James and the Younger brothers. Lie as you are or they may take it in their heads to shoot you as the train leaves." The story of how the ‘super’ had bested the most notorious train robbers of all time helped to cement his reputation. It was stories like these that eventually brought him to the attention of the builders of the Canadian Pacific Railway. When Van Horne was hired to take over the Canadian Pacific he was paid $15,000/year, making him the highest paid general manager in North America. As one author put it: -"Van Horne...took the CPR in his hands like a giant whip, cracked it once to announce his presence, cracked it again to loose the sloth and corruption and cracked it a third time simply because the 1st two had felt so good" On Jan. 1 of 1882, Van Horne officially took over and appeared at the end of track in Winnipeg. R.K. Kernighan wrote about Van Horne's first visit to end of track at Flat Creek, Manitoba--the headline: "Massacre at Flat Creek" "...when manager Van Horne strikes the town there is a shaking of bones. He cometh like a blizzard and he goeth out like a lantern. He is the terror of Flat Krik. He shakes them up like an earthquake and they are as frightened of him as if he were old Nick himself. Yet Van Horne is calm and harmless looking. So is a she mule, and so is a buzz saw. you didn't know their inwardness till you go up and get the feel of them. To see Van Horne get out of the car and go softly up the platform, you might think he was an evangelist on his way west to preach temperance to the Mounted Police. But you are soon undeceived. If you are within hearing distance you will have more fun than you ever had in your life before. He calls the first official he comes to just to get his hand in and leads the next one by the car, and pointing eastward informs him that the walking is good as far as St. Paul. To see the rest hunt for their hides and commence scribbling for dear life is a terror. Van Horne wants to know. He is that kind of man. He wants to know why this was not done and why this was done. If the answers are not satisfactory, there is a dark and bloody tragedy enacted right there. During each act, all the characters are killed off and in the last scene the heavy villain is filled with dynamite, struck with a hammer and by the time he has knocked a hole plumb through the sky, and the smoke has cleared away, Van Horne has discharged all the officials and hired them over again at lower figures." Van Horne met with railroad officials in Winnipeg and boasted that he would lay 500 miles of track during the 1882 season. The room was filled with echoes of laughter, but nobody was laughing at the end of the year when he had bettered that claim by some 48 miles. J.H.E. Secretan, the man in charge of the railroad surveys on the prairies complained that: “construction was moving so quickly that grating crews passed him during the night, grading ground that hadn't yet been surveyed” With the efficiency with which Van Horne was laying track the railroad coffers were also quickly being drained. As the railroad struggled to keep up with financing this breakneck pace of track laying, the 1883 season led off with a bang. They began grading in March and were laying track only a few weeks later. My the end the season they had reached the Kicking Horse Pass. During one 42 day period, they laid an average of 5.6 km of track per day. July 28 was a particularly good day with 10.3 km of track laid. Van Horne was just the man the railroad needed, but as he pushed the crews, the finances of the railway were quickly falling into ruin. Eventually the railway would push through those financial challenges and complete the route. William Cornelius Van Horne was the right man at the right time. We are just beginning to tell his story in this episode and I promise he will be an important part of future episodes. Suffice it to say that without his unrelenting leadership the CPR, the tie that binds this nation together coast to coast might never have been completed. Today you can see his likeness in front of the Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel. His statue stands in front of one of the railroad hotels that he had built in order to provide high class accommodation to passengers traveling his line, but that is a story for another day. Next week I'll look at the completion of the line as there were still major challenges ahead of the railroaders before the last spike could be hammered. And with that, it's time to wrap this episode up. I want to thank you for sharing your time with me and remember, if you're looking for a hiking or step-on guide, speaker or workshop facilitator, Ward Cameron Enterprises is your source when it comes to the mountain west. We will make sure that your western Canada memories last a lifetime. If you'd like to connect with me directly, you can contact me through the show notes at www.mountainnaturepodcast.com/ep041 or hit me up on twitter @wardcameron.

Welcome to episode 40 of the Mountain Nature and Culture Podcast. I'm your host, Ward Cameron, and I record this on August 16, 2017, we've finally received a bit of rain in the Canadian Rockies. Every drop is a gift at this point and hopefully it will reduce our explosive fire hazard and let us stop worrying about unplanned fires. This week, I take a look at the fire fears in Jasper as an increase in pine beetle killed pines has added vast amounts of fuel to an already tinder dry forest. I also continue the story of Major A.B. Rogers, the surveyor responsible for designing the route that the Canadian Pacific Railway follows as it traverses the Rocky and Selkirk Mountains of western Canada. Pine Beetles Wreak Havoc on Jasper's Forests I just returned from 4-days of hiking in Jasper National Park, and I was horrified by the damage being done by mountain pine beetle in the park. In a summer plagued by an almost endless drought, thousands of dead pine trees simply adds fuel to the potential for a huge fire in the park. Mountain pine beetle (Dendroctonus ponderosae) is a natural pest of the mountain forests of western Canada and the U.S. but historically they were only found in very low numbers in the park. The beetles create tunnels behind the bark in the layer of cells called the phloem, the thin layer of cells that transmit sugars within the plant. As they mine this layer, they may end up killing the tree, but they also carry with them a blue stain fungus. This fungus finishes the job by interrupting the ability of nutrients to move up and down the tree trunk. It also stains the wood blue, destroying any potential commercial value that it might have. If you have any doubt about the impact of a warming climate, just take a drive towards the town of Jasper. Warmer temperatures have allowed the beetles to explode in numbers and infest enormous numbers of lodgepole pine as well as western white pine. The lack of sufficiently cold winters is coupled with decades of fire suppression to provide plenty of food for them to take advantage of. The beetle is now expanding its range eastward out of the Rockies while also affecting trees at higher and higher elevation. As populations grow, the beetles disperse in one of two ways. In the first, dispersal within stands, they usually just travel a short distance, up to 30 metres or so, but when they move above the canopy into a long-distance dispersal, they can travel hundreds of kilometres. Long-distance dispersals are difficult to stop, so many of the management decisions are based on stopping dispersal within stands as the infestation spreads from tree to tree. Prior to fire suppression, many of the valleys in the mountains would have had far fewer trees as the flames would kiss the forests every 15 years or so. Today, we've created a massive monoculture of huge stands of lodgepole pine and the beetles are loving them. The simplest solution to this problem is to bring more fire, much more fire to the landscape to try to restore some of that balance. Back in episode 35, I talked about how fire is an integral part of the mountain landscape. The wildlife benefit from fire, the plant communities are refreshed and the mosaic of forest stands of different ages also helps to challenge insect pests. These regular fires, also help to protect communities like Jasper from the potential for large conflagrations like the one that the town is currently afraid could occur. Because of the huge amount of fuel that has built up over time, these fires may need to be tempered by some selective logging in areas that are too sensitive to burn. In some areas, the beetles have killed 70% of the lodgepole pine trees and the infection is spreading quickly. Experts believe that the number of infected trees could increase exponentially over the next few years, continually increasing the fire risk to communities like Jasper. Surprisingly, at a meeting in Jasper recently CAO Mark Fercho talked about his experience fighting the pine beetle when he worked in Prince George, B.C. He was quoted in the Fitzhugh newspaper as saying: “It’s the green trees that are full of beetles, not the red ones,” Each one of those live trees can infect a dozen or more additional trees. The area of infected trees has tripled since 2014 to some 21,500 ha. Back in the day, when we had proper winters, it was the cold that helped keep the beetles at bay. On average, mid-winter temperatures in the range of -37 C are sufficient to kill 50% of the beetle larvae. Earlier in the season, temperatures as low as -20 C can also be effective. Communities like Prince George were forced to cut down thousands of trees in order to reduce the fire hazard in and around the community. They followed that by a replanting program to help replace the lost trees. Standing dead trees, like those left behind by pine beetles are capable of sending sparks high into the sky allowing fires to spread. Natural fires are not quite as explosive simply because they lack the tinder dry, standing, dead wood. Jasper has a lot of work ahead of it, and the character of the place will also change. If Parks is able to combine increased prescribed burns along with selective clearing of standing dead trees, the future may not be as bleak as it seems at the moment. Across North America, fire experts are beginning to realize that the biggest challenges faced by most forests is NOT forest fires, but the lack of them. More and more fire ecologists are suggesting that fires be simply left to burn themselves out - at least those that don't threaten human lives or property. These same scientists suggest that if some of the money being spent on suppression were actually devoted to fireproofing homes in communities then these towns may actually be much safer than they currently are. With changing climates and increased beetle expansion, fires are coming. I applaud the work Parks Canada is doing in recognizing the growing challenges that our western forests are experiencing and, for Jasper, I hope that they have received some of the rainfall that finally soaked my hiking group over the past few days. I'm happy to walk in the rain, and even the snow that we had yesterday, if it helps to reduce the fire hazard that we have all been worried about in the mountain west. A.B. Roger's Line Last week I talked about Major A.B. Rogers and his quest to find a route through the Bow Valley and the Selkirk Mountains in B.C. Well, by the end of the 1882 season he'd found a route…or had he? Unfortunately for the Major, his unlikeable personality meant that he had a long line of rivals that considered him to be all bluster and no substance…and then there was the fact that he was…oh, what's that word? Oh, yah…American! Even back then, there was that inherent rivalry, although we would see more American involvement in this line before the last spike would be driven home. By the start of the 1883 season, nobody BUT Rogers had actually traversed his route through the Selkirks, the Kicking Horse Pass route was far from finished, and finally, there was the matter of some inconvenient tunnels to be corrected. All in all, it was just another frantic year of exploring, confirming, and changing the slowly coalescing line on a map that would, just a few years down the road, become the tie that binds this nation together. In addition, Rogers was acting as a pathfinder as opposed to a proper surveyor. The fact that he forced his way through some mad wilderness, that didn't mean a train could follow his trail of tobacco stains. Any potential route still needed axe men, transit men, and the levelers before a real route could be confirmed. It really needed more than that. It needed a sober investigation to prove that the route down the Bow River, through the Kicking Horse Pass, and across the Selkirks was indeed possible. Too much money and time were being invested in this commitment to risk any chance of error. Rogers had his detractors. Perhaps it was his gruff nature, or his penny-pinching way of economizing on supplies, leading many of his expeditions to retreat on the verge of starvation. One of those was Jon Egan, the western Superintendent of the railway. He was unwavering in his assessment of the route through the Selkirks: "I want to tell you positively that there is no pass in the Selkirk Range...It has to be crossed in the same manner as any other mountain. The track must go up one side and down the other." At the same time, the Governor General of Canada, the Marquis of Lorne, the husband of Princess Louise (after whom Lake Louise is named), also was concerned about the potentially steep gradients that might be involved, but he was more concerned with the time constraints. As he put it: "It would be better to have them than further delay, with the N. Pacific gaining Traffic." Any fan of TV shows like Hell on Wheels, coincidentally filmed along the route of the Canadian Pacific Railway, can understand the focus on time and money. This was the biggest investment this young nation had embarked upon and, quite frankly, we couldn't afford it. Time was money and every dollar spent was not easily replaced down the road. While some may have underestimated Rogers because of his American birth, there was one American that nobody dared underestimate, the General Manager of the line, William Cornelius Van Horne. Van Horne is the star of the show, and I'll devote an entire episode to sharing his story but at this point, he pondered: "we must take no chances on this season's work because any failure to reach the desired results and have the line ready to put under contract will be serious if not disastrous. I think it important that you should take an extra engineer, who is fully competent, to take charge of a party in case of sickness or failure of any of your regular men." Van Horne was also concerned about the fact that Rogers often pushed his workers in difficult conditions with few rations. He added: "It is also exceedingly important that an ample supply of food be provided and that the quantity be beyond a possibility of a doubt. "Very serious reports have been made to the Government and in other quarters about the inadequacy of the supplies provided last year and a good many other reports have been made tending to discredit our work. The officials in Ottawa, as a consequence look upon our reports with a good deal of suspicion... "We cannot expect to get good men for that work at as low or lower rates than are paid further East and we must feed the men properly in order to get good service. It will be cheaper for the Company to pay for twice the amount of supplies actually necessary than to lose a day's work for lack of any." To understand his caution, we need to remember that the ribbon of steel that was the Canadian Pacific was winding westward day after day after day, mile after mile, creeping ever closer to this question mark on the map. Every rail cost money. Every railroad tie cost money. The further west the line progressed, the more committed they were to a route for which some still harbored doubt. Despite this dispatch, Van Horne fully trusted Rogers, he just came from a very different point of view. He defended Rogers to a businessman in New York: "There has been a good deal of feeling among some of the Canadian Engineers particularly those who have been accustomed to the Government Service against Major Rogers, partly from natural jealousy of one who is looked upon as an outsider, partly from his lively treatment of those whom he looks upon as shirkers or 'tender feet' and partly from his somewhat peculiar methods of securing economy, but more that all perhaps from his having succeeded, as is supposed, in doing what was unsuccessfully attempted by the Gov't Engineers, namely, in getting through the Rocky and Selkirk Mountains by a direct line. "I believe him to be capable and I know him to be thoroughly honest. He is something of an enthusiast and is disposed to undertake himself and put upon his men more severe duties than most engineers are accustomed to and I have reason to believe that in his anxiety to economize in every possible way he has gone too far in some cases and that a good deal of unnecessary discomfort, although no suffering, has resulted from it." The route was to be scrutinized from east to west, beginning with the area closest to the westward moving rails, the Bow Valley, beginning at Fort Calgary and extending westward. Charles Shaw was asked by James Ross, the western division manager to look at Rogers line covering the first 60 miles to the west of Calgary. He was unimpressed. He stated: "It's a nightmare to me and I'm afraid it will hold us back a year." Shaw felt he could improve on the line when Roger's who was present at the time leaped to his feet and blurted: "That's the best line that can be got through the country. Who in hell are you, anyway?" Undeterred, Shaw claimed that if he could not only find a better line, but: "If I don't save at least half a million dollars over the estimated cost of construction, I won't ask for pay for my season's work." There was another tunnel to the west, around a mountain in Banff. Van Horne knew it would delay work so Van Horne demanded: "Look at that," the general manager exclaimed. "Some infernal idiot has put a tunnel in there. I want you to go up and take it out." He was talking to his locating engineer J.H.A. Secretan, never a fan of Rogers, yet Secretan responded: "Mr. Van Horne, those mountains are in the way, and the rivers don't all run right for us. While we are at it we might as well fix them, too" In the end, Roger's nemesis Shaw, found a way to just go around the mountain which still bears the name 'Tunnel Mountain" in Banff although the tunnel was never actually built. Shaw was very critical for Rogers because he missed this option. He stated: "Roger's location here was the most extraordinary blunder I have ever known in the way of engineering" To make matters worse, Shaw was now sent to examine Rogers route through the Selkirks. This was easier said than done. To get to the Selkirks, you first needed to cross the Kicking Horse…and it held its own special brand of challenges. One did not just stroll, down the Kicking Horse, no more than Albert Rogers strolled, er crawled up. To traverse the Kicking Horse, you had to survive the Golden Staircase. Essentially, you had to survive a two-foot wide trail carved into the cliffs several hundred feet above the raging waters of the Kicking Horse River. The surveyors that plied these mountains were some of the toughest men these mountains have ever seen, but some were so terrified by the Golden Staircase that they would literally shut their eyes and hold on to the tail of their horse for guidance. As Shaw descended, he encountered a packer with a single horse ascending the staircase while he had an entire packtrain. As they mentally went through the arithmetic, one horse, several horses, one horse, several horses. In the end, they had no other option than to push the one horse off the cliff to its death. You simply can't turn a horse around on a 24 inch ledge. To attempt it risked spooking the entire pack train and risking much more dire consequences. So Shaw gets to the bottom and he bumps into the old man. I know, what are the odds. An entire mountain range and…oops, what brings you here. Rogers, in his usual congenial manner offered up a pleasant greeting that went something like: "Who the hell are you, and where the hell do you think you're going?" Thankfully, Shaw was a more reasonable man…or maybe not. The exchange continued. "It's none of your damned business to either question. Who the hell are you, anyway?" "I am Major Rogers." "My name is Shaw. I've been sent by Van Horne to examine and report on the pass through the Selkirks." That was a name that Rogers knew. Rogers was not a man to forgive a slight and he virtually exploded: "You're the…Prairie Gopher that has come into the mountains and ruined my reputation as an Engineer" Shaw was a big man, a much bigger man than Rogers and so he wasted no time jumping off his horse and grabbed Rogers  by the throat, shaking him and threatening? "Another word out of you and I'll throw you in the river and drown you" Rogers, not a big fan of water since his incident in Bath Creek in last week's episode, decided to back down. He claimed that he had been let down by an engineer and agreed to show him the route through the Selkirks. Rogers dragged Shaw up the Beaver River to the divide and then down to the Illecillewaet River. Shaw constantly criticized the route. At every turn, Shaw was there to dismiss Rogers and demean his progress. Simple things could add fuel to the fire…even former fires. As the story goes, Rogers gestured to the great Illecillewaet Glacier and exclaimed: "Shaw, I was the first white man to ever set eyes on this pass and this panorama." Shortly after this happened, Shaw found the remains of a campfire along with some rotted tent poles and asked Rogers where they had come from. The hatred continued in the exchange. Rogers replied: "How strange! I never noticed those things before. I wonder who could have camped here." To which Shaw countered: "These things were left here years ago by Moberly when he found this pass!" This was a world of egos and it usually seemed that one surveyor could never praise commend or support the work of another. Rogers was an easy man to hate and it brought him great grief. Stories like this sowed doubt in the Canadian Pacific and this pass had to be carefully scrutinized before the line could continue. After Shaw departed Rogers, heading eastward towards the Kicking Horse Pass, they encountered a second party dispatched to check up on Roger's route, led by none other than Sandford Fleming himself. Fleming had been dispatched by George Stephen, one of the two main financiers of the railroad; and if Stephen suggested an outing, you kitted up and headed for the hills. Shaw enjoyed telling Fleming that the route was impassable and that Rogers was a charlatan. As it turned out, Fleming ignored most of Shaw's stories because he had just descended the Kicking Horse and it had been the most horrifying experience of his many years in the wilderness. Nothing could possibly be worse…or could it? Descending the 'golden staircase, he later stated that he could not look down. If you did: "gives one an uncontrollable dizziness, to make the head swim and the view unsteady, even with men of tried nerve. I do not think that I can ever forget that terrible walk; it was the greatest trial I ever experienced." It was also a scorching hot summer, much like this one, and he added:  "I, myself, felt as if I had been dragged through a brook, for I was without a dry shred on me," Now let's back this up a little. All this happened before they met Rogers. As they continued on, Shaw's allegations faded and they began to recover from the terror of the Kicking Horse Pass. After connecting with Rogers, he dragged them up to the pass and Fleming, happy to see a way over the ramparts pulled out a box of cigars and toasted Rogers accomplishments and proposed that a Canadian Alpine Club be formed. Fleming was immediately voted in as president. The concept did not really take shape though until 1906 when former railroad surveyor A.O. Wheeler and reporter Elizabeth Parker took this spark and created the Alpine Club of Canada on March 27, 1906. Of course, this is a story for another episode. Things took a turn for the worse when they began the descent down the western side, into the dense interior rainforest of the Columbia Mountains. Along with Fleming was his former Minister George Grant and the experience was so harrowing that Grant would never return to such a wilderness again. As he described it: "It rained almost every day. Every night the thunder rattled over the hills with terrific reverberations, and fierce flashes lit up weirdly [sic] tall trees covered with wreaths of moss, and the forms of tired men sleeping by smoldering camp fires." In the following 5 days, they travelled only 27 km. How bad could it be? According to Grant, they pushed their way: "through acres of densest underbrush where you cannot see a yard ahead, wading through swamps and beaver dams, getting scratched from eyes to ankles with prickly thorns, scaling precipices, falling over moss- covered rocks into pitfalls, your packs almost strangling you, losing the rest of the party while you halt to feel all over whether any bones are broken, and then experiencing in your inmost soul the unutterable loneliness of savage mountains." Essentially, a good time was had by all. In this time of catered tourism with 5 million visitors a year swarming over routes that caused terror, hardship, privation, and death. It's important at times to stop, step back and wonder…if these forbearers could see what we have done with their legacy what would they think? As they see the landscape trampled and the wildlife sequestered, what would people like Rogers and Fleming say? They saw the landscape in its rawest form when even the idea of a national railway was simply a fanciful idea. Today, we don't have room for a single grizzly. We think it's more important for our dog to pee than it is for black and grizzly bears to be able to feed on the single food that allows them to exist on the landscape. Rogers was a miserable curmudgeon. He loved neither man nor beast, but he loved one thing…wilderness. As a guide, I spend a great deal of time relating the stories of those that came before. At the same time, I've written three books on the trails of western Canada and designed a 7-day mountain bike race that both Bike Magazine and Mountain Bike Magazine called 'North America's Toughest Race'. This meant that I had to explore thousands of kilometres alone in the wilderness. During this time, I often reflected on the experiences of these explorers and pioneers…the men that came before. To them, the wilderness was not something to be appreciated, it was something to be conquered…or was it? People often ask me about these men. I reply that" "Lots of people want to know what these men thought when they tore through that last tangle of wilderness and encountered an emerald green lake that had a glacier capped peak at the far end. To the left was a sheer vertical wall, and to the right was a matching vertical wall. What did they really think? Damn, another dead end!" These mountains were not something to be appreciated, they were something to be survived. Yet today, we see them with an eye of entitlement. The journals of these explorers describe a landscape of hardship and terror, but also one full of wonder and opportunity. As I look at the decisions being made just on local levels when it comes to preserving these landscapes and the ecosystems and animals that call them home. I fear that I may be one of the storytellers writing the last chapter… chroniclers of the end of our local wilderness and the animals that define it.  And with that said, it's time to wrap this episode up. I want to thank you for sharing your time with me and if you like the stories, please share the episodes with your friends. Stories are always best when shared. At Ward Cameron Enterprises, we sell wow! As a tour operator for the last 30 years, we can make sure your visit to the mountain west is one that you'll never forget. We specialize in hiking and step-on guides as well as speaking programs, nature and culture workshops and guide training. Drop us a line at info@wardcameron.com if you'd like to book your mountain experience. Today I took clients up to Mirror Lake and along the Highline Trail in Lake Louise. It's a classic trail that offers the option to crest the Big Beehive and offer panoramic views for miles. I'll post a picture in the show notes at www.mountainnaturepodcast.com/ep040.

The Bears Bite Back I hate it when the inevitable happens! We've been talking for weeks about people entering closed areas during the most critical time of the year for black and grizzly bears to put on fat for the winter months. I've witnessed numerous people violating the closures and have called for a wildlife ambassador program for Canmore, similar in some ways to the Wildlife Guardians program that has been pioneered by Banff National Park. If you might be interested in getting involved in such a program, drop me a line at info@wardcameron.com or leave a comment in the show notes for this episode. This week, this all came to a head. This week an 18 year old Canmore woman decided to violate the closure in order to take her dog for a walk. Keep in mind that any time there is a close encounter with a bear and you have a dog, there is a chance that the encounter will escalate simply because a snarling dog can be perceived as a threat by a bear. She was walking the trail that runs beside the Rundle Forebay when the attack occurred. She met what is believed to have been a black bear, and the bear made contact resulting in some superficial injuries. She was treated at hospital and released…for now! For the sake of a walk to let her dog pee, she now faces both enormous fines and jail time. Her family and friends dispute the contention that she was in a closed area, stating that it was an open area connecting the Highline far connector along the reservoir. Alberta Environment and Parks insist however she was indeed in a closed area. The entire Rundle Forebay area is closed and it is well publicized within the local area. According to a story in the Rocky Mountain Outlook, Sherene Kaw, assistant director of communications for Alberta Justice and the Solicitor General indicated that the woman did NOT have bear spray and that, while the dog was on leash, she released the leash when the attack occurred. While it can't be definitively determined if the bear was a black or grizzly, no grizzlies were known to be feeding in the area, at least based upon trail camera evidence. This incident really showcases the need for a Wildlife Ambassador program in Canmore. In most years, it may only last for 6-8 weeks. The buffaloberries only last until the first frost, and then they all fall from the bush. Programs like this must operate in conjunction with programs focused on reducing attractants within the townsite. In 2015, when the buffaloberry crop failed, the town saw a huge influx of bears attracted to our flowering fruit trees. Since then, Banff, Jasper and Canmore have developed various programs designed to help reduce the problem. Buffaloberries are no different than any other crop. They need the right conditions at the right time, and if we don't get them, we get a failure in the crop. This year and last were bumper crops, but 2015 was an utter failure. This young woman is being publicly vilified. Her identity is currently being protected and I support that. The tendency of internet vigilantism has no role in this story. Her life is changing by the moment. It is NOT confirmed at this point, whether she is guilty, but let's set that aside for the moment. I truly believe that her point of view has shifted dramatically in the last 48 hours. Instead of vilifiying her, why not bring her into the conversation? It's easy to pour on hate but let's put this into perspective. She's a kid who, as the story currently stands, did a dumb thing. I personally would like to spend some time simply talking with her to understand her point of view at the time, and how it may have changed since that encounter. Protecting corridors is not going well. Social media is composed of adversarial groups unable to see any other viewpoint. I understand that completely. I find it difficult to comprehend the decisions that many people make when their actions do not match their stated beliefs. So let's talk. If found guilty, she faces the potential for large fines and even jail time. The fact that the spokesman for the Alberta government is in the Solicitor General's office indicates that there may be plans to make an example of her in the courts. So many of us that are expelling comments on social media are, well how do I say it, more experienced. How do we reach that younger generation which is far more likely to violate closures simply from a feeling of invincibility and entitlement? Maybe we just talk to them. I would love to talk with you. Please reach out. If you know her, please have her contact me. I will protect your privacy 100% because I think you have something to add to the conversation. Let's put away the pitchforks and look at this as another chance to build a bridge to a community that is an important part of the conversation. Just sayin' And if we're keeping score, this is not a new story. A colleague of mine that is interested in helping coordinate the wildlife guardian program pointed me to a Calgary Sun article from 2014 that looked into the same issue in Canmore. In this story, there was an aggressive bear was known to be in the area. It had, in a similar situation, had a minor infraction where it bit the finger of a Danish tourist. It was a minor encounter, but bears sell newspapers and the story was all over the media and airwaves. Just like this year, yellow flagging tape and signs indicated that the same areas were closed to access. And in case you're wondering, the same closures will happen next year, and the next, and the next. However in this case, Fish and Wildlife officers placed automated cameras at the main access points to the closed area. What did they find? In just 8 days they photographed some 60 people completely ignoring the closure and entering the restricted area. In one case, an entire family with Mom, Dad, one kid on a bike and a burley in tow went under the flagging tape closing a trail and continued on their merry way. This is the world we live in. it's time we embrace the conversation, create a visible wildlife guardian program, provide eyes and provide ears for Conservation Officers. We can help remove the potential for people to 'anonymously' enter closed areas. Guardians would be there for education and outreach. The goal would be to help Parks keep both people AND bears safe. We may find other areas where we can assist in keeping people and wildlife safe down the road. I'm a believer in dialogue and collaboration. I don't know how this will eventually manifest itself, but I'm willing to do what I can do help reduce the challenges we are experiencing this year in the future. Maybe Bear 148 will be one of the last to be removed from the landscape on our watch. Please remember, any time that Parks has to make a decision like the one they did with 148, it's a gut wrenching one. Nothing moves forward without their help and support. Let's build bridges towards viable corridors. Next up…Hells Bells Rogers. Hells Bells Rogers Last week I talked about railroad surveyor Walter Moberly. He was a pivotal figure in the early days of the Canadian Pacific construction. Another surveyor of note was American Major A.B. Rogers. Railroad surveyors were an independently minded lot. Each would select one route for the railroad - their route - and they would defend that to the death. "Nobody could possibly have a better route than the one I selected" However there were a few things that the surveyors agreed upon. One was that the Selkirk Mountains in the interior of British Columbia were impossible to put a train through. Even Walter Moberly planned to go around the Selkirks rather than through them. Well clearly we needed to find someone with an open mind - and we found that in Major A.B. Rogers. Rogers had earned his reputation as an Indian fighter during a Sioux uprising in 1862 during which he rose to the rank of Major. Later, while working as a surveyor for the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railroad, he earned a reputation as a man that could find the best route for a new rail line. He was not a well-loved man. He was described by the CPR's locating engineer, J.H.E. Secretan as: "A short, sharp, snappy little chap with long Dundreary whiskers. He was a master of picturesque profanity, who continually chewed tobacco and was an artist of expectoration. He wore overalls with pockets behind, and had a plug of tobacco in one pocket and a sea biscuit in the other, which was his idea of a season's provisions for an engineer." He also had a reputation for heading out a little short on supplies, if not faculties, and many of his expeditions returned on the verge of starvation. At one point, the general manager of the railroad, William Cornelius Van Horne tried to urge him to bring more supplies. The exchange apparently went as follows: Van Horne stated: "Look here, Major, I hear your men won't stay with you, they say you starve them." The Major replied with: "Tain't so, Van." Van Horne continued: "Well, I'm told you feed 'em on soup made out of hot water flavoured with old ham canvas covers." To this, Rogers replied: "Tain't so, Van. I didn't never have no hams!" James Jerome Hill, more well known as the builder of the Great Northern Railroad in the U.S. was also a part of the Canadian Pacific project and he hired Rogers to find a shorter route between Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan and Savona's Ferry in British Columbia. The only way to do that would be to go straight through the impenetrable Selkirks as well as through the southern Rockies. While the Rockies had seen more exploration both as part of the Railroad project, but also earlier as part of the fur trade, Rogers would need to link one of these passes with a route through the Selkirks. Jim Hill offered Rogers a bonus of $5,000 and his name on the pass if he could find a route through the Selkirks. Rogers scoured the journals of explorers and surveyors like Walter Moberly to look for some hint of where he might begin to explore for a potential pass. In Moberly's journal, it looked like there might be a possibility by following the Illecillewaet River. Rogers took note of a particular passage in Moberly's journal from 1865: "Friday, July 13th--Rained hard most of the day. Perry returned from his trip up the east fork of the Ille-cille-waut River. He did not reach the divide, but reported a low, wide valley as far as he went. His exploration has not settled the point whether it would be possible to get through the mountains by this valley but I fear not. He ought to have got on the divide, and his failure is a great disappointment to me. He reports a most difficult country to travel through, owing to fallen timber and underbrush of very thick growth..." In the spring of 1881, the Major, along with his favourite nephew Albert Rogers, and 10 Indians headed out towards the Selkirks. While Albert was his given name, the Major generally just referred to him as that Damn Little Cuss. It took them 22 days to reach Kamloops, and from there, the 'Gold Ranges', today known as the Monashees also had to be crossed before they even arrived at the start of the Selkirks. That ate up another 14 days. After spending another 22 days on a raft on the Columbia River, they finally reached the mouth of the Illecillewaet River where the real work began. Each man hoisted a 45-kg pack and they slowly tried to make their way upwards. They went through mile after mile of the most horrific plant to ever grace the planet Earth - Devil's club. If you've never had the pleasure of Devil's club, imagine a six to seven foot woody shrub with huge maple-style leaves and everything from the leaves to the trunk is armed with razor sharp thorns that can easily tear through a pair of canvas pants. So terrible was Devil's club that entire stretches of the railroad were rerouted to go around the worst patches. You couldn't even hack through with a machete. As they made their way through swamp and up vertical rock faces. Albert Rogers later stated that: "many a time I wished myself dead," and added that "the Indians were sicker then we, a good deal." The going never got easier. On numerous occassions, they had to cross bridges of snow suspeded 50 metres above the foaming water of the Illecillewaet River. By this time, their supplies were also beginning to run low, and the cold nights sent a chill right through their thin blankets. They clung to the lower slopes of a mountain that would later be named Mount Sir Donald after Donald Smith, one of the two chief financiers of the railway. "Being gaunt as greyhounds, with lungs and muscles of the best, we soon reached the timber-line, where the climbing became very difficult. We crawled along the ledges, getting toe-hold here and a finger hold there, keeping in the shade as much as possible and kicking toe-holes in the snow crust. When several hundred feet above the timber line, we followed a narrow ledge around a point that was exposed to the sun. (Here four Indians fell over the ledge.) It was in the evening when we reached the summit, very much exhausted. Crawling along this ridge, we came to a small ledge protected from the wind by a great perpendicular rock. Here we decided to wait until the crust again formed on the snow and the morning light enabled us to travel. At ten o'clock, it was still twilight, on the peaks, but the valleys below were filled with the deepest gloom. We wrapped ourselves in our blankets and nibbled at our dry meat and bannock, stamping our feet in the snow to keep them from freezing, and taking turns whipping each other with our pack straps to keep up circulation." Now doesn't that sound like a good time? In the end, they found a stream which split into two channels, with one branch heading west and the other east. It looked like they might have found a pass through the Selkirks, but a shortage of supplies once again forced them to retreat without exploring the western side of the divide. Rogers also realized that the survey crews were rapidly approaching the Bow River valley and he had still not explored the Kicking Horse Pass yet. One of the other things that most of the surveyors agreed upon was that the Bow River valley was the worst possible route to put a train. Not only did it force the line to traverse the Selkirks, but it also meant that they had to go through a horrible pass to the west of present-day Lake Louise, Alberta called the Kicking Horse. Despite these difficulties, this was the route finally chosen and that's a decision we've dissected for more than a century. The long and short of it was that this was the shortest route surveyed and the promoters hoped it would be the cheapest, but that turned out to be completely wrong. We also have to remember that this was a sovereign tool and this route was also the most southerly. They hoped that it would be far enough south to discourage American spur lines from moving into what was Canadian territory. At least in this case it proved true. With the rush towards the Kicking Horse Pass, Rogers party rerouted towards the Bow River valley. Now Rogers, was more of a pathfinder at this point and most of the proper surveyors, the men with the actual instruments necessary to lay out the line, were waiting at about the point visitors to the Rockies would enter the mountains as they drove west from Calgary. The Major came from the south and west and met up with them, and he sent that Damn Little Cuss to come up the Kicking Horse River from the west. He didn't think twice about sending Albert, a 21-year old greenhorn that had never before even been to the Rockies to attempt a task that had never before been accomplished by a non-native. Even the local natives avoided the dreary valley of the Kicking Horse because there was very little in the way of game to hunt - and therefore no real reason to hang about. Needless to say, Albert never showed. The Major paced like a caged animal. He said: "If anything happens to that Damn Little Cuss, I'll never show my face in St. Paul again." He sent out search parties in all directions with orders to fire a volley of shots in the air when they found him. One of those search parties descended the Kicking Horse Pass from the west and finally, they stumbled upon Albert Rogers…literally. Barely moving, and on the verge of starvation, his progress had slowed to a crawl. The only thing he had eaten in the previous 2 days was a porcupine that he had clubbed to death and picked clean right down to the quills. They picked up this pitiful sight, put him on a horse, made their way to the summit of the pass and fired a volley of shots in the air. Apparently the Major road in on his big white horse and as Wilson later recalled: "He plainly choked with emotion, then, as his face hardened again he took an extra-vicious tobacco juice shot at the nearest tree and almost snarled...'Well, you did get here did you, you damn little cuss?' There followed a second juice eruption and then, as he swung on his heel, the Major shot back over his shoulder; 'You're alright, are you, you damn little cuss?'" And with that Albert's face apparently exploded into a grin. He knew the old man better than anyone else and knew that he could never let his real emotions be seen. But the say the double-speed eruptions of tobacco juice from between his big sideburns said more about his emotional state than any words ever could have and nothing more was ever said about the matter. One of the men waiting for the Major was a young punk named Tom Wilson. Wilson was one of those characters that seemed to have the incredible knack of timing. He had the ability to be in the right places at the right time in history. He had begun his career as a Northwest Mounted Policeman and had joined the great march west of the mounties in 1875. He then resigned to join the first survey crews through the Rockies. He described Rogers as he arrived to meet the survey party: "His condition--dirty doesn't begin to describe it. His voluminous sideburns waved like flags in a breeze; his piercing eyes seemed to look and see through everything at once...Every few moments a stream of tobacco juice erupted from between the side-burns. I'll bet there were not many trees alongside the trail that had escaped that deadly tobacco juice aim." Rogers was a typical workaholic, and always had to accomplish more in a day then was practical. The season was getting late and so he pushed the survey crews to move faster. He then declared that he was going to ride out ahead to explore the route and asked for a volunteer. As Wilson again put it: "every man present had learned, in three days, to hate the Major with real hatred. He had no mercy on horses or men--he had none on himself. The labourers hated him for the way he drove them and the packers for that and the way he abused the horses--never gave their needs a thought." Wilson, in the end, agreed to accompany him. Eventually, they came to a river which was swollen and muddy with the spring runoff. Generally, during the summer season, river levels can rise dramatically during the daytime due to the increased pace of snowmelt during the sunny days. At night the water levels usually dropped as the cooler evening reduced the rate of melt. Tom suggested they wait for morning to cross and the old man laughed at him: "Afraid of it are you? Want the old man to show you how to ford it?" The Major spurred his horse into the river at which point the horse was pulled out from under him and he disappeared beneath the raging water. All Tom could do was grab a branch, stick it in the water where the old man had disappeared, go fishing and hope for the best. He was rewarded with a welcome tug and when the Major pulled himself onto the shoreline, all he could say was: "Blue Jesus! Light a fire and then get that damned horse. Blue Jesus, it's cold!" From that point on, when the river would be dirty and muddy with the spring runoff, the surveyors would joke that it was dirty because the old man must be having another bath. In fact to this day it's still known as Bath Creek on maps. Wilson left the survey early this year, swearing never to come back to these God forsaken hills. Rogers laughed at him saying: "You may think you're not coming back but you'll be here next year and I'll be looking for you," All that winter, Tom tried to fight something that just seemed to be tugging at him. Have you ever noticed how sometimes you choose life, and sometimes life chooses you. Before Tom knew what had happened, he found himself back in Fort Benton signing up for one more year on the survey. Tom was hired to pack supplies from present-day Canmore, to the summit of the Kicking Horse Pass. In August of that year, Tom was camped near to present-day village of Lake Louise. He had been hearing the sound of thunder under a clear blue sky. When he met some Stoney Natives he asked them what the sound was: On individual by the name of Gold-seeker told him that it was avalanches off of Snow Mountain high above the Lake of Little Fishes. The next day Tom had the native take him up to the lake and as he became the first non-native to lay eyes on what we now call Lake Louise, he wrote in his journal: "As God is my judge, I never in all my explorations saw such a matchless scene." Tom called the lake Emerald Lake because of its beautiful colour, but the railroad promptly changed the name to Lake Louise after Princess Louise Caroline Alberta, the fourth daughter of Queen Victoria. This also gives you an idea of where Alberta takes its name as well. She was married to the Governor General of Canada. The very next day, Tom bumped into the Major for the very first time that year and the old man let out a guffaw: "Blue Jesus! I knew you'd be back. I knew you'd be back. You'll never leave these mountains again as long as you live. They've got you now." He was right. Tom was on hand for the hammering of the last spike. You can see his stetson and mustache peering above the crowd from the back in the most iconic photograph of the event. He then went on to start the first guiding operation in the Canadian Rockies and gave many of the areas other enduring guides their start. He lived into the 1930s and is buried in the little cemetery in the town of Banff. Also this summer, Rogers route through the Selkirks was confirmed, and for breaching the final barrier for the Canadian Pacific Railway, he received his bonus of $5,000. He never cashed the cheque. When the general manager of the railroad, William Cornelius Van Horne cornered him to find out why he hadn't cashed it, he blurted out: "What! Cash the cheque? I wouldn't take a hundred thousand dollars for it. It is framed and hangs in my brother's house in Waterville, Minnesota, where my nephews and nieces can see it. I'm not in this for the money." Rogers more than most, really embodied what drove these surveyors. It was not money, it was immortality, and he got that in the naming of Rogers Pass. Next week, I'll look at the challenges in confirming his route as well as the difficulties that the Kicking Horse Pass would present to the railroad.

M.O.Littles has been laying the ground for many years already, and recently dropped his 3rd solo studio album, "No Matter What." At the time of publication, he is on nationwide tour with Machine Gun Kelly. Before that, he came by the Living Room to talk about his roots, the new album, and nearly dying in the Kicking Horse Pass, among other things.