The rains keep coming at regular intervals here on the island. I find it challenging to make it through a day without getting some item of clothing soaked from either the skies above or the lake itself.
This past week I finally got myself on a sailboat for the first time of the summer. Camp owns a few boats considered trimarans. They have a cockpit in which the passenger sits with a pontoon extended on each side. A simple boat, they are supposedly impossible to tip over. They make sailing easy for even an amateur like myself. Growing up in the land of 10,000 lakes, but about as far away from any lakes that a person can be, I viewed sailing as a leisurely activity of those better off than I. Lately, however, I have grown to greatly respect the sport.
Moving fast on a mechanized machine burning gas can be a thrill, but slicing through the water harnessing the primitive technology of the wind adds a new dimension of excitement and accomplishment. Furthermore, sailing requires an added element of knowledge and skill-leaving room for improvement as one becomes better acquainted with the sport.
Recently a camper found a bald eagle nest on the ground near camp. Scattered nearby, were two eaglets. After a couple of days of observation, he called the raptor center at the U of M and sent pictures of one of the eaglets with an injured wing. With no trained raptor handler near camp, we were asked to “box up the bird” and send it to the twin cities in the next vehicle heading south. With some cardboard and duct tape we construed a container big enough for the giant eaglet. Wearing welding gloves he scooped it up without much resistance. Even a young eaglet is a big bird and quite impressive to study from so close, however, it didn’t quite top the grizzly bear we captured at the ranch last summer.
Traditions run deep here at camp. Perhaps the most important tradition is the greeting of campers on the dock when they arrive, and the departing chorus of “Happy Trails” as a sendoff one week later. After a fun and exhausting week and the hugs and handshakes goodbye we line up at the end of the dock in a kick-line and sing the aforementioned song in about as many different keys as there are people.
Afterwards, a staff member or two are traditionally thrown in the lake, much to the enjoyment of the departing guests. For six week’s I’ve avoided the plummet. I hypothesize my staff were too scared of the consequences pushing their boss in the water might inspire. This week their fear was overridden, however, as two of them ganged up against me and threw me in the drink.
Camp relies heavily on volunteer labor in an effort to keep fees as low as possible. For years a do-it-yourself culture has built up a roster of campers eager to fix the leaky faucet, the broken pipe, or an old water heater. One might consider it fortunate that so much help abounds; however, it comes with its drawbacks. A walk around camp and a quick study of some of these do-it-yourself projects makes a person shake their head in frustration and bewilderment. Pipes beneath cabins go from plastic PVC to steel pipe to rubber fittings and back to PVC. Scrap pieces of sheet rock where puzzled together in one instance, to sheet rock a wall in our staff housing. Behind some light switches in camp can be found a rat’s nest of electrical wires. A careful look at some of the carpentry will reveal some boards cut too short, others left too wide.
We had a local well driller stop by the island to examine our backup well. He conveniently flew in on his personal floatplane and beached it on the island. The plane is one he assembled from a kit years ago, and is a small two-seater. Up here floatplanes aren’t that uncommon. With most towns located on the shores of a lake, they provide a convenient and fun way to travel.
After studying our well we learned of a corroded pipe that is gradually filling the well with sand. This piece of bad news explained why the pump burnt up earlier in the week as I tried to flush it out after a year of disuse. Luckily, the bad well is a problem I don’t have to deal with this summer. Once the lake freezes to a safe thickness they well company will drive one of their rigs to the island and drop a new well 135 feet.
A shoreline restoration specialist from the Minnesota DNR also paid us a visit. With a few hundred feet of shoreline under our management, I invited her to come and assess what we were doing right and how we could improve our stewardship of the land. We were happy to learn that they variety and quantity of natives found on our property is almost unprecedented for inhabited shoreline. Arial photos of many of the lakes up here with significant development around their shores makes obvious the dangers of having a nicely mown lawn up to the water’s edge. Erosion and sedimentation are big problems around some lakes. Reeds are removed from coveted boating and swimming areas and with them go the buffer of protection from erosion causing waves.
A shoreline bill currently sits on Governor Pawlenty’s desk. The bill would change the type of shoreline development that is allowed and provide better protection for our lakes, wildlife, and water supplies. Unfortunately, it sits in the veto pile. In recent years the science community has highlighted these problems and finally attracted the attention of many shoreline owners who have chosen to take corrective action. Many, however, retain old habits and continue to turn native lakeshore to mimic the aesthetic of their suburban yards.
In our case the less we do to our shoreline the better off it is. Now that’s the kind of advice a busy camp director likes to hear.
Happy Trails
Greg
