I always remember enjoying my astronomy class. I liked staring up at the constantly rotating planetarium ceiling, and I liked writing notes with a flashlight. I even enjoyed the weird math procedures necessary to add hours of ascension, which is almost unheard of in my “math is hard” brain. I remember one night the teacher telling us to look for the nebula near the spiral and me whispering to my classmate in a panic “What’s the spiral?” Was he referring to our galaxy? Some weird space shape newly documented? We generated anxious questions along the whole back row until a very calm person in front of us said that by “spiral” he was referring to the binding of the notebook.
Oh.
Anyway, notwithstanding that memorable bit of panicked stupidity (or perhaps because of it) I liked astronomy. I especially liked the idea that certain constellations, like the big dipper, were “circumpolar” meaning if your latitude was high enough they never set at all for you but simply rotated around the sky like the lable on a record. I mention this because one of our most important beaver friends, Mike Callahan of beaver Solutions, is this very day in Juneau Alaska under a circumpolar (but very rainy sky) and getting ready for some beaver management training next week.
You’ll remember that Bob Armstrong got together a group of volunteers to work on keeping the pathways and culverts clear when some Mendenhall Glacier beavers started to outwear their welcome. Like all problem solving involving beavers, the only solution offered was the final solution, and Bob wasn’t willing to let that happen. So he and a group of scrappy beaver-saving friends showed up on weekends to mitigate the damage. I read about this wildly familiar dedication and wrote Bob to start a dialogue. I learned that their primary concern was dealing with the beavers in a way that did not block salmon passage. I put him in touch with Skip Lisle and Mike Callahan, and talked about solutions.
Mike and Bob talked about beavers and big pictures and longer term solutions that helped, rather than hurt, salmon. They arranged for Mike to come to Juneau this week, and he’s even staying in Bob’s home and getting the inside view. Two weeks before he was leaving he got word that he had received the AWI grant, and agreed with my suggestion that Juneau training would be an ideal place to film, so his videographer friend is coming with him and will catch the training for posterity.
In the meantime beaver friend LB is happy to hear that Bob is a nice guy in person because she’s meeting him for a blitzkreig beaver tour of the Mendenhall Glacier when she visits Juneau next month.
Just in case you forgot the lovely view those beavers wake up to each evening, here’s a reminder. Imagine this with dripping rain and 50 degree weather and you’ll have some idea how it looks to Mike right now. 
Photo: Bob Armstrong from The Mendenhall Glacier Beavers
