(PARTll) THAT GREAT GRAND CANYON RESCUE EPISODE!

Well, we survived Powell’s Falls.  At the time, I remember thinking that the adrenaline rush that I experienced could not be topped.  Today, 25 years later, I still believe it is at the apex of incredible experiences that now define my life, and that includes a few high-speed (over 100MPH) police car chases through the streets of New York City that make the famous “French Connection” chase scene seem like a leisurely ride through the country.

The end of day six finds us in the bottom of the canyon.  We enjoy a comfortable night’s lodging and are told that day seven starts early with breakfast.   Our gear would be leaving before us and would be at the hotel at the rim of the canyon.  We needed to fill our canteens and head over to the trailhead.  We were instructed to pace ourselves (as the weather was warm) and that water would be accessible at oases along the way.

(The guides amazingly continue the water journey with their equipment for four more days to a landing place where the rafts can be trucked back to Flagstaff.)

I remember that morning as clear as if it were yesterday!  It was 75 degrees as we finished breakfast and headed to the trailhead.  I remember we stopped, I looked up, I looked at Don and Bob and I remember saying ‘Holy Shit”!  In a flashpoint right out of the “Treasure of the Sierra Madres”, I suddenly realized why we needed burros.  I looked at Don and said, “Don are you ffffing kidding me?” 

The trail, a rocky footpath is a modest 2 feet wide at it’s beginning.  I remember thinking to myself, “my God it’s 1985 there has to be a better way.”  We began our ascent on the canyon with me shaking my head, every step or so, it seemed like I turned and looked at Don and cursed him.  When I wasn’t cursing him, I was planning his demise. 

It was hot getting hotter.  The trail zigzags back and forth across the mountain in annoying fashion.  I remember thinking “this is ridiculous why didn’t they just cut this trail straight up?”  Back and forth, forth and back!  Hour 2 it was at least 90 degrees.  I was sweating like a pig as I finished the water in my canteen.  I turned to Don and muttered something about “where the fffck is the watering hole?”  He answered, but I don’t remember it being intelligible.  It was at this point that I remember saying to Don “I HOPE YOU GET FFFFING HEMORRHOIDS!”***  I don’t remember what really predicated that thought and those words, but I remember them rolling off the cotton balls on my tongue as clearly as if it were yesterday.  On and upwards we climbed.  My mouth was dry as the sand beneath my feet.  Finally, at about hour 3 we hit a watering hole.  Nothing could possibly have tasted sweeter at that point (and yet I remember the taste of that ever-present southwest sulfur reverberating on my palate).  We splashed and rested in the water.  There were no shade trees so we found some solace on the darkside of one of the larger boulders.  It was about 95 by then!  After six days on the water and being exposed to all that sun I did not think it possible to burn anymore then I had already, but there, in the desert, is always that next degree of pinkish hue that extends the spectrum.  Upward we pushed, by hour 5 we were out of water again and Don was looking at me like I was a juicy pork-chop!  I am sure the temperature was hovering around 100.  Finally, a watering hole in the distance, I was so overheated I ran to the far end and jumped in!  As I raised my submerged head and cupped the water to my lips I heard the frantic high pitched scream of a woman (or so I thought, it was just Don)  “DON”T DRINK THE WATER!”  I looked at Don.  From his end of the pool he reached into the water and pulled out a signpost that had been pushed over into the water.  The sign had words to the effect of “DO NOT DRINK THE WATER” some kind of dangerous bacteria existed and ……. blah blah blah!

OMG!  What had just happened?  Did Don just save my life?  Is that what really happened?  Those four words (DON’T DRINK THE WATER) are words that I have had to hear (ad nauseum) every year, every hunting season, at every campfire, every family-get-together and every chance that my buddy Donald has had to tell that story.  For years I was in denial, for years I would rationalize that I probably would have had a case of really bad diarrhea and that everything would have turned out alright anyway!  It wasn’t till a few years ago that I was able to come to terms with the reality that under the circumstances, maybe, just maybe Donald had a positive influence on my life!  That’s it, ha ha!

Well, the trip did not end at that watering hole.  We made it to the next oasis.  It was about hour seven when we heard noise and voices approaching us from above.  There ahead, were several touristy looking people with straw hats on donkeys coming down the canyon trail.  Apparently, the hotel above has these donkey excursions to the bottom of the canyon to satiate the tourists who had no need for a white water adventure.  It was at this point that we realized that we would literally have to hug the canyon wall in order for the donkeys to squeeze bye.  I will never forget that feeling of being crushed against the jagged rocks as the sweaty sure-footed animals squeezed on bye!  Finally after 9 ½ hours we reached the rim.  I still remember those last few curse laden steps onto flat ground above the canyon.  It had made it up to 107 degrees that day in the canyon.  I had a mild case of sunstroke, a crack in my lip the size of the canyon and a head full of incredible memories.  I remember thinking ‘we didn’t need those stinkin badges’, but we sure needed those stinkin burros!

***Bye the way, on March 15^th, 2010 my dear friend Donald had a surgical procedure on the largest hemorrhoid in Long Island medical history!

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THAT GREAT GRAND CANYON RESCUE EPISODE!

It was the early Fall of ’84 the phone was ringing and my buddy Don was on the other end.  Don and I met in ‘82 and became fast friends the minute he invited me to go woodchuck hunting with him.  Well, this call wasn’t about hunting.  This call was about another serious adventure!  I remember he was excited and needed an answer right away.  He said, “a buddy and I are whitewater rafting the Grand Canyon, are you in or out?”  Back in those days I didn’t need much prompting for any outdoor adventures.  I remember saying, “I’m in.”  I started to ask, “when?” But Don interrupted and said, “I’ll call you right back!”  Click!

Two days later Don calls me back, he says, “I got two questions for you, the lady wants to know if we want to rent burros and how many tents do we want to rent?”  I said, “Don when is this trip?”  He says, “May, 1985.”  I said “Don that’s nine months from now!”  Do I really have to book a fffing donkey nine months in advance; and what do I need a donkey for anyway?  Don says, “well, the seven day rafting trip leaves you off in the bottom of the canyon and we have to either ride burros out, or walk out from there.”  I said,  “Don how far a walk are we talking about?”  I remember him saying, “it’s just a couple of miles, I really don’t think we need them!”  BAM – mistake number 1!!!  I said, “what’s the story with the tent?”  He said, “well, you are the odd man out, me and Bob are getting a 2-man tent just in case” I said, “well what is the weather like in Arizona in May?”  He said, “it’s hot during the day but the nights cool off nicely, so bring a sleeping bag!”  “If anything happens you can squeeze in with us!”  BAM – mistake number 2!!!

Nine months flew bye.  The next thing I knew I was on a 9-seater jet going from Vegas to Flagstaff, Arizona.  The lady across the 15-inch wide aisle from me filled her barf bag in the first 10 minutes of the flight.  Her bag was full and now she was elbowing me across the aisle to give her my bag, as she wasn’t finished yet.  That was the longest 40-minute flight on record. I think I held my breath the last 20 minutes of that flight.  Let it be known, when you fly around the Grand Canyon there is a lot of turbulence!

Our group consisted of 16 adventurers from all over the country, 5 guides, and 5 rafts.  These people formed a diverse group from all over the country.  There were two brothers from Cleveland, a couple from the Midwest, three elderly folks in their upper sixties from California and a few people from the Southeast.  One raft was filled with food and equipment and navigated by one of the guides.  Don, Bob, myself, and a rotating guide were in one raft, the others decided that they would enjoy being in different rafts with different people every day.  We were explained some simple rules of the river:

                        Hang on tight!

                        If we were dislodged from the raft keep your feet in front of you and keep your head up!

After that short speech we had no idea what to expect.  What we were told was that it was May, the water was high, fast and cold from the melting snow in the mountains above.  Bathing, was to be done in the heat of the day and no one could stay in the water for more than a few seconds at a time, as hypothermia could set in rather quickly from the bone-chilling water.  Open campfires were not permitted in the canyon, so warming up meant jumping jacks till your blood started to flow again.  As best I can remember the actual water temperature was 37 degrees.

We started off slow, the water was not that deep and the first ½ hour on the water was peaceful and serene.  The scenery is incredible!  For seven days all you do (besides holding on for dear life) is gawk at the splendor and majesty of nature.  I know I took over 400 pictures that week and only that few, because I never thought I would need more than 20 rolls of film.  If I had a digital camera back then, I probably would still be out there!

It wasn’t long until you hit the first set of rapids.  That is when you start to get a feel for what is about to happen.  By the third day you really have your sea legs.  Those rafts get bounced so high and so hard one can only try to equate it to being inside a very deadly pinball machine.  One second the back of the raft is 12 feet off the water and the next second you are plummeting towards jagged rocks at a speed so alarming you don’t have time to be scared.  A minute later you are casting a spinner bait into a placid pool.  That’s how it is all day!  You go from immeasurable adrenaline rushes to tranquil landscapes; all just around the next bend in the river!

At night, the guides would pull off the water and we would all help set up camp.  In many places along the canyon there are huge open caves carved from the base of the canyon that provide perfect shelter from the elements.  We had no idea what to expect as far as the food.  I know I expected nothing more than freeze-dried or hydrogenated meals.  It was to my great surprise when the guides pulled out a propane cook stove and whipped up hot gourmet meals.  I am talking filet mignon and fresh vegetables.  Every night was a different surprise!  The pi`ece de resistance were the boxes of wine!  Granted, these were not fine cabernets, but the novelty of enjoying a simple pleasure after an incredible day on the water made them taste oh-so-good! 

It wasn’t until the third night that we camped along the river under open sky.  It was a perfect night.  The stars were so luminous that you did not need a flashlight for that walk to that evening’s designated latrine area.  Don and Bob pitched their tent, I dug a shallow crevasse in the warm sand and layered the bottom with a small tarp.  I figured between the warmth of the sand and my sleeping bag I was going to sleep like a baby!  When my eyes closed there was not a cloud in the sky, 3 hours later the first drops of rain hit my face.  It started to come down pretty good.  So I went over to the tent and unzipped the flap.  That tent was so small I would not have fit in it even if I had a crowbar to wedge between Don and Bob.  I returned to my now half-filled with water gully and crawled into that wet sleeping bag and I cursed Don for a long time.

 I awoke as the sun rose, I was a frozen Popsicle of a man!  I cursed Don a few more times!  It seems that I have done that a lot over the course of our lifetime afield together!

Day six on the river means Powell’s Falls.  These are the biggest and baddest falls in America.  You don’t play around in these waters, you hold on and pray!  The guides pull off the river to scout the falls and then decide who is going first while the other rafters sit and watch from a higher vantage.  The purpose is twofold: 

1) to give the guides an idea where they want to be at certain points in the falls and 

2) to kick-start an adrenaline rush the likes of which you may never have again in your life!  

Just watching is incredible, never mind the reality that you will be in “it” in a few minutes.  Let me point out that there is no turning back.  There is no way out other than the water; unless you are willing to charter a very expensive helicopter ride.  I don’t remember that being offered as a viable option.  We were all there to make our mark; to chalk up a life experience that few others ever enjoy!

Next week the thrilling conclusion to THAT GREAT GRAND CANYON RESCUE EPISODE!

Until then, take a minute to view the website below.  It is a fine depiction of what you can expect in the canyon.  Keep in mind though, that this portrayal was done in August many years after ours and the water just by the nature of the time of year was much slower and warmer then when we undertook our journey!

http://philip.greenspun.com/travel/grand-canyon-rafting

THE SOLUTION TO DOE MANAGEMENT --- --- ASKING THE RIGHT QUESTIONS

Many sportsmen, myself included, have lauded the need for the NYSDEC to micro-manage the deer herd.  I have heard fairly regularly the rationale ‘that the DEC does not have the manpower, nor the budget’, to forego a plan that includes micro-managing a deer herd.   While we can’t expect a biologist behind every tree, I don’t think it unfair to expect them to ask the right people the right questions. 

(For most of your edification, Region 2 (NYC) was excluded from the planning of the recent DEC Deer Meetings.  It was not until I drove upstate and informed Dir. Riexinger of this oversight, that a meeting was hastily planned.  I am one of those that have always felt that arbitrarily excluding 55,000+ license buyers from the process is a bad way to begin gathering information.)

It seems, as usual, that I disagree with the direction, or lack of direction that the NYSDEC is going.  Here is why!

The DEC is mired down in hunter satisfaction surveys for the third time concerning antler restrictions.  Part of the problem is how they have solicited the questions and answers in these surveys.  Somewhere along the line, some genius decided that instead of asking a straight question and getting a straight answer that it would be more fun to ask a question and get several degrees of answers that could be manipulated to say one thing while it really might have meant something else depending on the chronological order that they were listed in or how perhaps a bureaucracy was leaning that day!  I think you get the idea!

Instead of sending out these inane surveys and waiting for Mrs. O’Leary to milk the cows before she sent it back half filled in, or with hanging chads; or not bothering to do anything but throw it in the composter, it should be made mandatory to have to fill out a questionnaire at the time of issuance of a hunting license or when filing for a doe management permit.  The following questions, when answered, will give the DEC a wealth of information that will assist in micro-managing the herd:

1)  What Wildlife Management Unit do you do the majority of your deer hunting in?

                        ________

2)  How many days a year do you spend afield hunting deer with a firearm?

            3+_____       7+ _____      12+_____

3)  Are you a meat hunter?       YES_____          NO_____

           

4)  Would you be willing to harvest a doe for the venison donation program?

            YES_____          NO_____                  

5)  Do you believe that antler restrictions will have a positive influence on deer hunting in your WMU?           YES_____          NO_____

Five questions, that when answered, gives the DEC a better way to insure that doe management gets done!  For too long we have used a lottery system that DOES NOT work!  Give the majority (85%) of deer management permits to those that will get the job done.  Give 10 or 15% of the permits to those that would use one if they had enough time or were lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time.

With the information gleaned from question #’s 1, 2, & 3 it should be pretty easy to predict who should be placed in the top positions for a doe management permit in specific WMU’s.

Question’s 2, 3, & 4 will give you a pretty good idea who is capable and willing to fill more than one permit.

Question #5 unequivocally gives you the answer as to who wants AR’s and what areas they should be implemented first.  No need for a super majority either – simple old democracy will do – majority rules!

SOME SIMPLE RULES:

A)  Meat hunters must donate their 2^nd doe to the venison donation program.

B)  Food banks would have a monumental amount of venison in them and the meat could be distributed in two ways.

1) 60% of the meat to the banks for the poor and

2) A reasonable amount of meat could be given to a hunter who had applied for a permit (and paid his $10 fee) and did not get one.

3) Those that donate a deer would be entitled to another permit for their own consumption or donation.

SCORING:  You need a minimum of 6 points to be considered for a deer management permit.  10 points would put you in an optimal position to get more than 1 deer management permit.

Question #2   3+ (2 points)   7+ (3 points)  12+ (4 points)

Question #3   A YES answer is worth  (3 points)

Question #4   A YES answer is worth  (3 points)

I understand that perhaps wildlife biologists are too busy saving ecosystems around the state and they are much too busy to sit around collating the extensive information that my five questions will render, but this information could be gathered and data-banked by resourceful college students from science programs across the state.

All of this plan, is contingent on the DEC doing a better job of figuring out where there is need for doe culling, but even with their current formula, assigning permits should assure a significantly higher success percentage then the “hoping” and “praying” methodology that is implored today!

Now, some will say that my plan is too simplistic.  I say, in order to fulfill certain management goals it is imperative to ask hunters specific questions.  For far too long, the DEC is absolutely positively guilty of dancing and skirting issues and their mandates.  A system that counts on hunter’s mistakes to fulfill management goals is lamentable!  A system that stipulates that outrageous criteria be met, as in the case of antler restriction expansion, and then reneges on their own criterion, well that is pathetic and contemptible!

Oh, one other thing!  It’s obviously my blog and I have always believed that criticism is only fair if you inform those being criticized of how I feel about things.  Printed below are the e-mail addresses of the upper echelon of the NYSDEC that I have sent my blog too.  While I try to let them know exactly how I feel, please feel free to e-mail them your own feelings on the issues, and tell them I sent you!

Alexander “Pete” Grannis --- petegrannis@gw.dec.state.ny.us

Patricia Riexinger --- pxriexin@gw.dec.state.ny.us

John Major --- jxmajor@gw.dec.state.ny.us

Gordon Batcheler --- grbatche@gw.dec.state.ny.us

Jeremy Hurst --- jehurst@gw.dec.state.ny.us

LET’S GET SERIOUS ABOUT DOE MANAGEMENT

The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation informs us that only 16% (approx.) of all deer management permits are filled annually.  In 2008, DMP’s accounted for 86,417 antlerless deer being harvested in New York State.   (56,117adult does, 13,040 female fawns, 15,001 fawn bucks and 2,259 adult males).  In my opinion, other than the adult does, that equates to 30,300 mistakes, or errors in judgment.  Call them what you want, but you can’t convince me that hunters take to the woods with intent to shoot button bucks and fawns!  When 36% percent of the DMP’s account for the harvest of juvenile males and fawns; that suggests to me that there is something terribly wrong with this state’s deer management scheme.

“In recent years, only about one-third of hunters with DMPs were successful in filling them. Hunters fill about half of those permits with adult does. Therefore, it is necessary to issue about six permits for each adult doe to be killed.”  --- DEC Website

The DEC approximates that in order to fill one adult doe permit they need to issue six!  In the last few years it has become possible to consign your unused permit over to another person!  They are “hoping” that the tags get filled and that is NOT responsible, effective deer management.  The percentages are stark when you think about them.  In real terms, the DEC accounts for 30,000 (approx) mistakes annually to try and reach their doe management goals.  That my friends, is NOT deer management!  It is a feeble understanding of real numbers that the DEC expects to positively affect management goals.  In reality, that is not good deer management at all! 

A reasonable person only has to look at the way the DEC accounts for deer numbers and management needs to realize what a travesty deer management has become in New York State!  The DEC proudly tells you that their primary resource for accounting for deer “number fluctuation needs” is the Citizen Task Force Groups.  I wonder if the average hunter realizes how often these groups meet?  The DEC website tells you these groups should convene at least every five years.  Now, for example, if you go to the DEC website and look at WMU 3H, you will see that the last time a Citizens Task Force Group met was 1996.  Yes, that’s 14 years ago in a management unit that has an antler restriction pilot program going on.  Does anyone think that the deer population in 3H has not changed over the last 14 years?  How about the landscape and its effect on an already unstable population?  Anybody out there think that maybe the DEC needs to re-evaluate their protocol for managing deer numbers?  I certainly do!

The premise of the Citizens Task Force Groups on paper is probably a good one.  People from diverse groups throughout different communities are brought together to discuss and address deer populations and management needs, but when those groups, either don’t meet often enough or a community’s logistics change, then the value of their management goals is only as good as the last meeting.  This cannot be the acceptable practice for deer management in our state.  It is irresponsible to think that management needs and goals 14 years ago would be applicable today!

I will offer a solution to the ineffective system of deer management permits in New York in my next blog.