Blog Archives

If at first you don’t succeed... You recall no doubt that a number of us have been trying to get the state to adopt a Washington Children’s Outdoor Bill of Rights for several years. Jerry Pettit, Deborah Essman, Gary Berndt, and I have spoken to any number of groups...

Many writers have observed that wild, naturally-behaving predators and their prey seem to communicate with each other at some level – indeed, that there is some sort of tacit agreement about who will eat whom, and when. Too, there are observations about how that...

You recall that Martha Heyneman, in her story “The Never-Ceasing Dance,” (published in the summer 1991 issue of “Parabola” magazine) was concluding her note of what she saw between the cat and the young cardinal: “Cat and bird have taken on a great dignity, as if two...

The moment Homey introduced himself, I knew this was going to be one of those phone calls. “Look,” he said, “I have an idea for something you should write about – or maybe revisit, if my dad is right.” Once we got a bit centered, he explained. “We have been talking...

Magpies are all around the town and country of our Central Washington Paradise this summer. Few creatures are as striking as these black and white, long-tailed, black-billed birds. Flashy, big, boisterous and loud, their black plumage shimmers with bronze and blue or...

The topic of our impromptu confab outside Ellensburg's Bi-Mart was “getting and keeping little kids hooked on outdoor stuff.” Homey, hand wrapped around a couple shiny new youth fishing rod/reel sets, had two questions. “Yeah,” he said, “I really want to get my...