Alasdair

Probably got a couple of feet of snow on monday and tuesday. The weather was pretty crappy up there this week.

I dont expect this to be a ton of work and effort, but I do expect it to be a little. It is purely a volunteer thing. The main motivation behind this stemmed from a fear that some biologists and land managers with birds at climbing areas have a real concern about climbers commitment to working with bird closures. I worked directly with Fish and Wildlife earlier this spring on some golden eagle nests and found that at least one washington nest has failed consistently for at least 5 years because of climbers in the area. If the climbers and the land managers had simply communicated a little better then this nest would probably have produced young. I am hoping to get a slightly better line of communication between the two groups so that some climbing areas dont get closed. If anyone here lives in Spokane and would be willing to volunteer a day or two to post signs at a climbing area next spring please let me know.

Hey folks, Next spring I am going to try to do a little work to to increase the amount of information out there about the various bird closures in WA. Right now I expect this work to include a central place where all of the bird closures can be placed and can be found easily by climbers. I also expect this work to include tracking down a few local climbers for some of the more remote crags to see if they would help me out by posting some signs at specific crags that have closures. I am working with the Washington Climbers Coalition and with the WA Dept of Fish and Wildlife raptor biologist in order to try to get the concerns of both climbers and biologists and land managers met. In general the self policing by climbers of climbers has worked in the past and as long as it continues to work in the future it is likely to be the way it will stay. That said, I would like to know from the climbing community what your concerns are about bird closures are, and get any constructive feedback on some of these issues. What will make it easier for you to learn about bird closures and what makes it difficult? I am not looking for any bird closures are BS comments, they are what they are. Keep in mind I am going to be working directly with the WDFW, NPS, and Army CoE as well as some private land owners all who have climbing with nests on land that they own/manage. The one group who seems to not have any interest in this issue is the access fund who I tried to contact but got no replies from. Right now they are out of the picture. I would love to have them be a part of it so if any of you are affiliated let me know. Thanks for any comments you have. Feel free to contact me directly with any questions you dont wish to put up for public viewing. Thanks, Alasdair

Hey folks, After way too long I have updated my web site. I have not finished adding all of the photos yet, but there are a bunch of mountain related photos up. Mostly stuff from the Alaska Range. I am still working on the climbing section of the web site. have a look and enjoy. www.alasdairturner.com

Good luck. It rains a lot there in August.

Hey folks, I am looking to contact some of the people who regularly climb at China Bend and know the area well. If anyone can put me in contact with some of those people shoot me a pm. Thanks,

Take your wife with you. I did and she absolutely loved it. Even if she does not climb she can enjoy the mountains.

Nice. Let me know if you need any advice. What you planning to climb?

Its my new favorite place to guide also. Not a good place to go sick. Never went below 11,000ft once on this trip. Being at that altitude for that long makes for a lot of feeling crappy, especially after having a few drinks.

Hey Folks just back from Bolivia. My first time there. If you have not been its well worth a visit. Great climbing, great country. As far as logistics go... It is very easy to get from point a to b no matter where a or b are. Photos on the blog... http://alasdairturner.blogspot.com/

No Im in Bolivia. Illimani yesterday

I dont agree with those that say keep the battery in your pocket. I have never had an issue with Nikon Batteries. Your D90 and two batteries will be fine. I had my d300 at 21,000 ft yesterday and had no issues with the cold. I wrote an article on this a last year for an AAI newsletter. You can find it here. http://alasdairturner.blogspot.com/2009/03/this-is-article-i-wrote-few-months-ago.html

First off I am volunteering my time. I have been at the nest twice total, and both were very short duration. In addition the visits were timed to be during a period that would not cause a major issue to the birds. A climber near a nest for one pitch would cause much more problem than the time I was there. As far as me lecturing you climbers goes, I would bet I do a hell of a lot more climbing than you. I am just trying to make sure that the areas I enjoy spending my time at dont get blanket closures.

We as climbers have a responsibility to avoid disturbing these birds in any way. They are protected under federal laws and those laws cover any sort of disturbance. Climbing anywhere near a nest is not just an asshole thing to do, it is illegal. You are probably right that these peregrines have adapted quite well to humans near the nest, but this could just be luck. These birds often will leave the nest if there is a threat or disturbance. If you go climbing at the wrong time (when there are eggs, or when the birds are very young) the parents leaving the nest which can cause the eggs or chicks to die. The closures are there for a reason. The peregrine in particular has been studied about as much as you can study a bird. I am currently working with the WA Dept of Fish and Wildlife on Golden Eagle research. Climbers have had an impact on golden eagles in both washington and Oregon. When a climber gets near the nest the parents leave. They sit a long way from the nest and wait till you are gone. If you are not aware that there is a nest close to you and climb all day that nest could very easily fail. I was at two eagle nest sites earlier this year and as soon as I got to the nest the mother bird left and I never saw her again. She was across the valley watching us. The Fish and wildlife folks do not have the budget to find all the bird nests and monitor them. If you see a nest go somewhere else. We are not going to get the state to hire more biologists they are just going to do blanket closures unless we regulate ourselves. Oh and if you want to see some photos of some eagle chicks I have some on my blog: http://alasdairturner.blogspot.com/2010/05/second-trip-to-eagles-nest.html http://alasdairturner.blogspot.com/2010/05/yesterday-i-went-out-to-yakima-area-to.html

Ryan, was that you in the party of two camped next to my group? Did you follow a guided group up the colman demming? If so that was me in front of you.

The route is no different this year than it is any other year. I was up on the north side two days before you guys and shot a couple of photos of the ice ramp on the the upper ridge. I have never had to climb a chimney, and in the photos I can clearly see the chimneys you guys were on. The standard way of climbing this step is on the far left side, climb a single pitch of 75ish degree ice until the rope runs out. Climb a second pitch at about 60 degrees. At that point you can basically walk to the top of the route on 55 degree snow slopes. I have looked at the right side of the ice step before and always decided it looked crappy.

If so send me an email. I have some photos of your team you might like. I will post them on my blog in the next day or so. http://alasdairturner.blogspot.com/

Oh dont PM me I never check them. Send me an email. alasdairturner@hotmail.com

Ok so I am almost positive that the people who this thread is talking about is a group I was with. Now that there are numerous other people who support the fact that there were no signs I will admit it was me. First off there were NO signs posted. We started hiking at 6am and we were out for the day. We got back to the car at 12:30ish. In addition the notification email that DOT sends out to people did not arrive till the morning of the incident. I agree there needs to be a better way of working with the climbing community on this one. I was on Polar Circus several years ago and had a shell or two lobbed over my head so I do not want to repeat that. Not only that, for me to ignore warning signs about avalanche control would be a career ending move. I like my job and would like to keep it. If I saw signs, there is now way I would ignore them. Hope this incident helps climbers and DOT work together in the future.

Hey if you lost one of those nice OR gloves with the zipper on them on the N side of baker let me know. I have it here. It says "Tapp on it in sharpie. So if you know a person who marks his gear with Tapp then let him know.

Im in seattle. You can paypal me and I will send them to you.

Ok here is another one. When ever I see an anchor that is questionable I shoot a photo. This next one was not seen this weekend, it was seen somewhere on the east coast.

This is a photo of a top rope anchor I saw in Leavenworth this weekend. This was built for use by one of our favorite local climbing clubs. It was being used by them entire day. Granted it was a back up for another anchor, but I could have dislodged both of these chockstones with a light kick. There is no way this should have been used as a part of any anchor system. Even as a back up. If you are going to be TEACHING climbing classes please make sure your teachers are competent. If this anchor had been weighted it would have sent one or maybe both of these blocks down on the group below.

I have a few items for sale. full set of cascade alpine guides $40 Snow peak titanium stove $40 Metolius cams #4 four cam I have two In very good shape. $20 each DMM Purple cam good shape $15 1.5 L titanum pot and lid $15 Alpinist #18 $10 or trade for #29 or a bunch of the latest climbing magazines. I am willing to trade any of this stuff for interesting climbing books or magazines.

Hey Mark, Thanks. I think you might be correct. I remember doing a couple of passes on that because the light was good, and I have flown past that a hell of a lot in the last 5 years.