Armchair Adventures
America’s public lands offer some of the most spectacular and interesting places you’ll ever see. While everyone is encouraged to stay at home, the BLM Blog will feature "Armchair Adventures." This is your opportunity to travel virtually and learn a bit about these amazing places. Today, follow along with the second installment of Armchair Adventures.
Harbor Seal, California
The rocks, seastacks and small islets along the California coast are home to a diversity of marine mammals and seabirds that make use of every available space for resting, roosting and nesting. Harbor seals, like the one shown here, rest on rocks when not hunting and feeding. They don’t just randomly choose a random resting place and will haul-out on the same familiar rock time and time again. Adult harbor seals can weigh up to 370 pounds. Thick blubber under their fur helps to maintain a warm body temperature in icy water. Females outlive males by about 10 years and can live for up to 35 years. Mothers give birth to a single pup weighing up to 30 pounds and the pups are able to swim and dive within hours of birth. Although they primarily forage in coastal areas, harbor seals have been recorded diving to depths of over 1500 feet.
Jerry Peak, Idaho
A late-season snow blankets the lower flanks of 10,015 ft Jerry Peak as viewed from the east along Sage Creek. Here in the mid-high elevations in the Rockies, even June is a competition between seasons as trees and wildflowers leaf out while snow is still a possibility. The Jim McClure-Jerry Peak Wilderness area, managed by BLM Idaho, also includes the upper Herd Creek watershed with one of the most intact native plant communities in the state. This patchwork of riparian willows, abundant bunch grasses, forbs, aspen and conifers provides critical habitat for fish and wildlife species in the area. Farther downstream, Herd Creek is also one of the farthest inland and highest elevation spawning streams for Columbia River salmon. The area is in a rainshadow of mountains to the west so is not as heavily forested or glaciated as some other peaks in central Idaho. Instead, expansive areas of sagebrush and scattered patches of conifers cloak the peaks.
Cow Island, Missouri River, Montana
Cow Island in the Upper Missouri River Breaks, managed by BLM Montana, ended up being the location of both triumph and tragedy in the history of American westward expansion. Lewis and Clark first passed through the area in May of 1805 with the Corps of Discovery on their effort to explore the west and find a northwest passage to the Pacific. By the 1860s, Cow Island became an important river ford and steamboat landing location. Cow Creek offered an overland route out of the river canyon for transporting supplies when the river became too low for steamboats to continue upriver in late summer.
In 1877, a little over 70 years after Lewis and Clark traveled past Cow Island, a band of 2,900 Nez Perce began an 1,170-mile journey from Oregon to flee the pursuing U.S. Cavalry and get to Canada to avoid being forced on to a reservation. On September 23, 1877 several hundred Nez Perce crossed the Missouri at Cow Creek. A small army garrison was guarding stockpiled supplies, which had been offloaded from steamboats. After unsuccessfully asking for food and supplies, the Nez Perce fired on the garrison then raided the stockpile and took what they needed. They made a fateful mistake of resting further up Cow Creek, thinking they had outdistanced the pursuing calvary. This proved to be an error and the calvary caught up with them just 42 miles from the Canadian border forcing Chief Joseph to surrender.
Today, the river looks much like it did in the 1800s albeit with much less river traffic. Elk, mule deer and bighorn sheep abound in the uplands along the breaks.
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