Wrap-up

[Photo is off a batch of wood (one of many) that we've been cutting, hauling, and peeling to begin drying for our cordwood house in the next year or so...]


This is the last blog I’m going to write for this project, just a few notes to wrap-up. I should probably mention the Bluebunch wolves, which we were following earlier this spring (see the June 16 entry). Unfortunately, I have nothing good to offer as an ending to this story. It is not over, and has turned into a large, political mess. We just learned that the female was shot (by Wildlife Services) on August second. We have not been able to get any other information. The seven pups were left to fend for themselves, which at that age is code for “starve”. Hackles are up and fur is being rubbed the wrong way, and politics seem to be taking a front seat in this age-old struggle with wolves and their management. It seems the story is long from over.
I hate to end the blog on a sad note. I wish I could now talk about our last week filming where we saw so much, the mountain lions, the black wolf pups, the bears…
But since I already covered all that, I will instead talk about what the future plans are for our film: what happens now that we’re done the filming part. We’ve finished logging all the footage, which I have to say was quite a lot! Specifically, about 70 hours of RED footage (the big camera), and 67 hours of HV20 footage (the camcorder). We sent all that logged footage first to Jackson, WY to get transcoded so that it is all in workable form, and then on to Belgium (yes, Belgium the country across the big water), where an acquaintance/friend of ours is going through it all as a pre-edit. Our plan is not to think about it for the summer while we re-orient ourselves to non-transient life, to get some space from the whole thing, and then pick it up again come fall and begin the long and potentially difficult editing process. How do you take 137 hours of footage and condense it down to one hour, or even two hours? We have been talking regularly to the folks at PBS Nature, who seem very interested, a mutual feeling as we’d like to work with them also. That’s about as far as the plan goes for now. For the time being, it is good to be thinking about and working on something new. Right now that consists of building our new greenhouse, visiting family, planning a farm, and generally catching up on life on the edge of town.
Most of all, I want to give a big THANKS to all of you who followed this blog. It was fun for me to write, and hopefully at least mildly interesting to read. I know it was a rough go, with long dry spells of no updates, and then bursts of entries that were probably too time-consuming to catch up on, but I can’t say you weren’t warned from the start! ☺ Enjoy the rest of the summer…
Bjornen