Willow Valley Trophy Show

This past Saturday I had to man a display at the Willow Valley Trophy Show in Pincher Creek, this was a great opportunity for me to meet a lot of the local hunters, ranchers and folks that enjoy our great outdoors. I was asked a lot of questions I had no clue how to answer!

Here I am with Jeff Cox at our booth, there was an estimated 800 people that attended the show.

Some of the awesome mounts done by a taxidermist is Lethbridge. This is a ruffed grouse, beside it he had a couple of starlings trying to get away from a kestral, the neat thing about these was he hide the wires that held them up in stocks of grass.

A huge cougar mount between a big Cadomin Ram and a pair of Great Grey owls.

Those owls and a nice white-tail buck.

A massive Cadomin Ram, notice the white around the base of his horns, it looked like wool!

Some of the winners displayed at the front of the hall, I think the biggest elk was 373 and it was taken south of Lethbridge, near the US border along the Milk River.

The pronghorns and white-tail horns on display, there is also some cougar and black bear in there as well.

More white-tails and some huge mulies.

Only a few moose racks and some more huge elk.

This was kind of neat mount, a white-tail buck bedded down.

A cool full mount of a lynx grabbing a sharp-tailed grouse.

A full mount of a coyote laying down.

Some Winter Visitors

Besides dad visiting on the weekends, there have been a few other visitors to the ridge.


The deer seem to always be passing through or hanging out in the yard, the other night one was bedded down right by the For Sale sign in the front yard, how's that for a selling feature? Normally they like to hang out on the mound in the back yard, its quiet back there, they have good grass to eat and its usually a little warmer than the rest of the yard.


Lately we've had some Hungarian relatives visiting as well.

These little guys are really colorful and Erinn gets a kick out of how they run.

Full moon hanging right over the city.

Digging Out!

Yesterday Blair & I spent part of the afternoon digging out from our recent snow & blow. My plan was to have a trail dug out back to the cistern so I could back the truck in with a load of water, the drifts were 4 feet deep and we were in dire need of a good scoop shovel.

Well it blew all night and when I got up this morning the first thing I noticed was the spot we had dug out to the cistern was blown in again.

After going to 5 different hardware stores I finally found one that wasn't sold out of shovels. I thought it wouldn't take much since it was freshly blown in, but I was unpleasantly surprised to find the new 4 foot drift was harder packed than the last and I had arrived right after the county snow plow had made his first pass of the day so it was further packed in like cement!

After 20 minutes of hard digging, I was soaked with sweat but able to get the truck just far enough back to get my load of water in.

The drift on the south side of the road is really starting to grow. This morning it had drifted across like the other day. The bus almost didn't make it to pick up the kids today, he had to stop, back up and take a run at a couple of the hard drifts before he made it through to the house.


This is the snow pile at the east end of our lane, just before you turn north on the Range Road.

At Christmas time Blair and I were driving south up the road right-of-way to hunt coyotes, now the the drifts are like cement and the snowplow pile is just as tall as the truck!

Down the Range Road the snow had filled the ditches to the top and in places only the tops of the fence posts are visible, the kids were fascinated to see this, I remember seeing snow like this but only in Saskatchewan.

The front yard also blew in again, Carolyn made it out no problem for work but I didn't fair so well, it took me 10 minutes of rooting around before I got the truck out and was able to load the water tank and head for town.

Here's the drift in front of the garage that continues to grow & grow, its now about 3 feet high and hard enough that I can walk on it!

Carolyn's parents stopped in tonight and got stuck with their truck, which involved more shovelling! Hopefully it doesn't snow or blow anymore this week since I'm leaving for work tomorrow and Carolyn & the kids will be in charge of snow shovelling.

Dad's Turn!

Living like the Eskimos!

After the Igloo was completed we went out in the -30 degree weather to hang out in it. The kids thought it would be as warm as the house in there and wanted to sleep in it for the night! Well even though the temperature got up to -2 inside it wasn't as warm as they thought and it didn't take long before they decided to head back in to warmer climates.

It looks kind of cozy in there with the fresh snow falling and the orange glow from the candle shining out through the entrance.

Erinn crawling in.

Kirby crawling in.

The kids, all warm inside, huddled around the candle.

Even dad found it roomy inside.

Just chillin!

Erinn enjoying 'the fire'!

It was stormy & cold outside, but inside it was nice and warm; for me anyway!

Igloo Construction!

On New Year's Day we decided to make an Igloo in the back yard on that 4 foot drift, this after we realized the drift was hard enough to walk on.

Cutting the blocks out, my dad taught me how to use a handsaw at an early age!

Notice whose doing all the work?

Just the hardest part left; the roof.

It was a little frosty out this day, can you tell?

All done!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Happy New Year everyone!

I guess winter is here to stay, yesterday Carolyn had problems getting out of the yard, off the ridge and into the city with all the drifted snow. It took me 3 and a half hours to drive home from Pincher Creek, it usually takes 2 and a half, but with all the blowing snow, ice and drifts it was slow going (watch for pictures later today).

When I finally got home this is what I was greeted with, one lone track through the snow to our driveway.

Our neighbour, who usually plows our driveway out made an attempt to come do that yesterday but got stuck on the county road before he even got to our driveway. After using his 4x4 truck to pull his Ranger out he just went home, not very impressed! So last night I spent a half hour shovelling us out because it was even difficult for our 4x4 to make it through the hard drifts across the driveway.

The drift across the front yard is about 2 feet deep!

Now I'm going to have to shovel out a path to the cistern so I can get a load of water in.

The back yard was drifted even more from the southeast wind that blew yesterday, the drift behind the house is about 4 feet deep and hard enough the kids have been walking on it. I dread the mess when a Chinook arrives, but until it does I will enjoy the Northern Saskatchewan-type weather!