Show eereat:on IL it gaffe Ztibunr rJjt I k : Dark Canyon Offers Hidden Ski Mecca buildings with propane heat wood cook stoves and sleeping lofts as well as Nyland's personal cabin are on a hill overlooking Dark Canyon Lake There isn't any running water in the winter and there is one double-sea- t outhouse for all the cabins Nyland offers a rugged mountain experience without some of the distractions of pampered city By Craig Hansell Tribune Sports Writer DARK CANYON San Juan County — Nestled near the crown of the La Sal Mountains Jim Ny' land's four cabins provide a good base for cross : country skiing The La Sal Mountains were covered in cloud durdrive from Moab to the Geyser Pass : ing the trail head It was an ascent into a gray environ' ment Snow began falling as we pulled into the trail head for a rendezvous with Nyland and Tom Shellenberger Nyland has a pair of snowmobiles and Shellenberger who operates La Sal Adventures uses a Thiokol Imp snow machine to transport gear into the cabins The La Sals are a popular pillar of k canyon country It is skiing surrounded by a growing attraction for Moab now that Grand County is plowing the Geyser Pass road to the trail : head The limited parking area was almost filled by early Saturday morning We were the second group skiers scheduled to spend : of Salt Lake - the weekend at Dark Canyon Gary Bilger together with friends Sandy El- dredge Bob Richey Dan Grice Kipp Greene John : Greene Jane Townsend Nia Sherar and Bob Gree ley made the trip into Dark Canyon earlier Satur: day morning Nyland's four rustic cabins are on part of a section of ground which has been in the family since 1890 when it was purchased for $5 an acre as a summer range for cattle The cabins three rental living Up canyon is the expansive bowl formed by the 25-mi- trailer-equippe- Mount Peale range's highest peak 12721-foo- t a as snowstorm began Saturday's style frozen mist The classic stellar snow flakes were no where to be found Somehow the dust-lik- e mist added about 17 inches of snow to the existing snowpack According to avalanche forecaster Mark Yates who can be reached at 259- SNOW it had been a full month since the last storm snow machine Shellenberger's heavily-loadecrawled toward Geyser Pass barely staying ahead of Moab skier Mary Cunningham Cunningham who is also training to run the Moab used climbing skins for her quick trip from the trail head to the pass She said this was her sixth day of skiing this season At the pass we sent the gear on ahead with Shellenberger and skied down the packed track into the cabins The snow mist obscured the summits of and Tomasaki Mount Wellenthin 12646-fee- t 12239 as well as Peale It was like skiing into a hall of giants you knew were there but couldn't see Pacific-Northwe- d cross-countr- y red-roc- st d City-base- d n I Thursday Morning—February 21 1991 61 : Section D Page 'Me— 4Aii-- - k-- 1t !zPA "We have rented the cabins to about 60 people since June" said Nyland who is the sheriff of Grand County as well as the owner of Dark Canyon Recreation which rents the cabins "The nearest town La Sall is 12 miles away" Sunday Bigler and company broke trail through the new snow and skied up the road toward the large buttress on the northeast flank of Mount Peale They reached the ridge and and tested the powder on a slope which was burned in a 1960s forest fire The stark weathered stumps littered the hillside like so many misplaced slalom poles But the open slopes were welcome It would have been a difficult task to descend through the tangle of trees in many spots "It is a great backyard" said Bilger "The accommodations were great very comfortable It has been a great trip and we are thinking of coming back in the summer for mountain biking" The best skiing was on fresh snow over the old crust Skiing the untracked north-facin- g slopes was best described as a hog wallow There was so much bottomless snow you could ski straight down the fall line and still have to fight for enough speed to make progress A pair of very wide lightweight skis would have been an advantage According to Craig Bigler the Geyser Pass snow stake recorded a snowpack of 57 inches While that is well below normal there is sufficient snow for an exploration to expand your skiing in the south 4 i 4' ' z r--- - 444444-44- 1 1 ' ‘V 14 k t ik 44 boos 1 ki' N t ei 4 ' g r46 — f Iit!:"-)ie- 'trt:P31 10'5 4 -- - - i f V i a 0 ittr —4 e0P-11-''t rJ i 4 444 ri44 I 4:lt140t4ri "'' IIRAd000t - ' ow v IA4gork r- - 1 N fi k ' sIsk i 1 ' e I: et 'it As ak 04:1 ot ' b 1 A 1441M144 - '' N - 4 ::' 0004r4Nri wi ' ' e doti'S e ( 1 ji i 44440441i' ' t ' 1 1 ! -- I ' 1 :lt I 46- Tzr ' ( tiN t :7 44o 14404 444444 N—' 't 'k N' 1 v 4-1 4 ' I :"-44- ' d r7" tVr41' 1 4 C! t'' ra &ajar"' r v ' AT - 118ir"Pe'''''''"''''b'' ' tionakair lege likelpearovpaganit I i tt 0- - 1 —Tribune Stoll PhoTo by Craig Hartsell Tom Shellenberger's cat and Jim Nyland's Dark Canyon cabskiers to explore La Sal Mountains ins enable cross-countr- y Utah DWR Favors Wildlife Transplants as Management Tool By Tom Wharton Tribune Outdoor Editor ' Utah wildlife managers follow the calendar in their continuing efforts to Increase the numbers of game and non-gam- management Dwight Bunnell Since fall Utah wildlife biologists have transplanted antelope desert bighorn sheep elk moose turkeys chukars quail pheasants Hungarian partridge river otters and trumpeter swans Many of those efforts saw species moved from one state to another species e They worry about drought conditions check the ranges and count numbers of animals in the spring and the fall They set hunting seasons at tend seminars and chase deer and elk out of farmer's fields But in the late fall and winter one of their most satisfying missions involves transplanting game species "Transplants give us an opportunity to put our hands on wildlife and to do something that is immediately visible and productive" said Division of Wildlife Resources chief of game - These transplants often involve trades and deals worthy of a professional sports trade According to DWR biologist Wes Shields Utah moved 100 antelope from Parker Mountain to Texas this year and 106 more pronghorns from that same area to Nevada In return Nevada gave Utah desert bighorns and Texas moved Rio Grande turkeys into the state A trade between three different states resulted in Utah re mountain ceiving goats from Washington This winter Utah has also sent over 100 elk to Nevada These animals were moved from private lands where they were doing damage A recent moose transplant in northern Utah saw 10 moved to near Currant Creek Reservoir and 10 more taken to the Ute Indian reservation Another recent transplant saw 32 desert bighorns moved from the North San Rafael and Potash Management units Four rams 15 ewes and three lambs were taken to Happy Canyon a tributary of the Dirty Devil River Another three rams five ewes and two lambs were transplanted east of Arches National Park into Professor Valley Ironically the bighorns were moved from bighorn populations es- tablished due to transplants in the late 1970s and early 1980s That's one of the benefits of moving game "There are several values to transplants" said Bunnell "They give us an opportunity to establish or wildlife populations These can be used for observation and in many cases hunting A second reason is to solve localized problems For example if you have deer that are a hazard along a highway or are causing depredation problems we prefer to move them if we can rather than to exterminate a population" Bunnell lists some disadvantages as well to transplant projects The moves can be difficult physi cally on the animals expensive and sometimes controversial when landowners or sportsmen object to moving animals out of or into an area For example rarchers in southeastern Utah fought an elk transplant into the Blue Mountains for years Many organized agricultural groups object to increasing elk populations throughout the state through the use of transplants In other cases though landowners are highly supportive of the movement of animals DWR upland game specialist Dave Larson for example says pheasants were moved out of some backyard farms in Salt Lake County to a new management area near Faust at the request of homeowners A few quail were moved from the east bench ar ':Wildlife Biologist Develops Trumpeter Swan Program At first Wisconsin wildlife biologist Becky ' ' 7sibel resisted a chance to work on a trumpeter swan project "Most people like swans because they are a' ' -- -' pretty and in the beginning that's what I held a lot of 1 against swans" she said "I felt like 4 r t-' birds needed help and needed protection Swans y 4 and the other glamorous species get the most ' ' z:iff '' attention because they are glamorous not beOutdoors Editor 4 ' cause they are important" After spending time in the marsh being a sort restore trumpeters to their original range ':of surrogate mother to signets the trumpeters That is no easy task for several reasons won Abel over You can't spend hours at a time First swans suffer from lead poisoning when hiding in a float tube disguised as a muskrat nest consume lead shot deposited by hunters in they nurturing baby swans without gaining a certain marshes over the years Even though steel shot affinity for a species is now used to hunt waterfowl in most parts of r ' Abel was in Salt Lake City last week along the United States a large residue of lead rerwith about 80 other experts from around the mains Since most of the best marshes were Illnited States to participate in the 13th annual hunted finding good habitat can be difficult 1Trumpeter Swan Society Conference Second too many birds inhabited the Red The paper the biologist presented about how Rock Teton trumpets she uses decoys and recorded swan calls to es er area one of the largest populations in the tablish new breeding populations was one of lower 48 states That coupled with a drought many discussions on how the ranks of the 2000 and weather that froze rivers trumpeter swans that reside in the lower 48 caused some swans to die Biologists began lookstates might increase through different manage-:pen- t ing for new places to locate the swans One of those was Utah's remote Fish Springs National techniques overhunted and almost wiped out Wildlife Refuge where 25 trumpeters were P :After being moved last year Seventeen of those are still in the late 1800s trumpeter swans — the largest Member of the swan family — survived in a re- - alive Mote area near Yellowstone National Park and That transplant caused another problem in fairly large numbers in Alaska Biologists Tundra swans which other than their "whoop" like Abel and the Utah Division of Wildlife Recall as opposed to a trumpeter's "honk" call are : Sources' Tom Aldrich are among those trying to virtually indistinguishable in the wild from — r 'IN4'' ( t t r4 Tom Wharton i - ' g trumpeters are hunted in Utah The DWR issues 2500 tundra hunting permits a year If tundra and trumpeter swans are mixed together some of the trumpeters might be accidently shot Aldrich says that leaves biologists with several options all of which were discussed at the conference The trumpeters can be put in a remote area — like Fish Springs or the Green River corridor in eastern Utah and swan hunting seasons closed in those areas Or they might also be allowed to intermingle with tundra swans where a few might be lost to hunters Since the bird is not on the threatened or endangered list those rare losses would be both tolerated and legal "If we can work out something Utah can play a role in managing trumpeter swans without impacting ongoing hunting programs" said Aldrich "We might be able to look at changes in seasons or closures in parts of the state where trumpeters might be flying" Of course there are those who would maintain that swans should not be hunted That's a position with which a biologist like Abel struggles She says making a decision on whether tundra swans should be hunted in places where trumpeters are being reintroduced would be difficult "A lot of my friends assume that because I like wildlife it means I hate hunters" she said "That's not true Some of the people who are most supportive of my project are the hunters Hunters are the ones who are always out on the marshes seeing things" The goal of Abel's work which is being fie nanced by the checkoff program of the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources and will result in her being awarded a master's degree is to establish 20 breeding pairs of swans in Wisconsin by the year 2000 She takes eggs from the largest trumpeter population in Alaska and hatches them in Wisconsin under conditions designed to fool the signets into thinking they are being raised by real birds so that they will learn to live and eventually nest in a new marsh Recorded calls are played to the eggs before they are hatched Then when the signets hatch Abel hides behind a blind and operates a swan decoy and plays recorded sounds If the young birds saw a human the idea would be "imprinted" that that man or woman was "mom" Then the swans could attempt to breed with humans instead of other swans Using both the decoy and recorded calls Abel can protect the swans from predators like snapping turtles or eagles and teach them to fear man and other potential threats just as parent swans would do in the wild Thus far she is experiencing a 95 percent survival rate one of the highest in the nation And in the process Abel has changed her mind about swans being too glamorous "When you bring back a swan people CPn immediately see the result" she explained "That might affect the way people feel about wetland losses Swans can represent the other birds frogs and animals which are being neglected" non-gam- eas of Salt Lake County to Emery County Ogden Bay Delta and the Sevier River Those birds weren't a problem but homeowners who liked them cooperated when it was explained that only a few quail would be trapped out of a population In the case of a transplant of 25 trumpeter swans from Idaho's Harriman State Park and Montana's Red Rock National Wildlife Refuge to Utah's Fish Springs National Wildlife Refuge the move helped to expand the range and alleviate crowding problems Similar transplants went to Wyoming and Nevada "First of all we're getting birds out of Harriman and off the Henry's Fork which is heavily used by waterfowl in the winter months which reduces pressure on the area" said Dave Moody Wyoming Game and Fish Department wildlife management coordinator and a member of the Rocky Mountain Trumpeter Swan Subcommittee "That alone could help prevent a disaster like a significant loss in the trumpeter swan population due to starvation "In addition we're trying to teach the birds to identify and use new sites during the winter" he added "It may take a while to reeducate the birds but w6 want them to expand their range and begin using new sites in place of Harriman That's the longterm intent of the program" Bunnell says biologists constantly work to refine transplanting techniques in an effort not to kill any animals in the project He cited early problems with moose transplants as an example "It's satisfying to move moose routinely" he said "It certainly wasn't like that when we first started It was very difficult both emotionally and every other way until we got our equipment and techniques figured out" The game manager said transplants don't always work nor because of their expense are they always desirable "Transplants aren't something you do lightly but they can be a good management tool when they are used at the right time and the right place" concluded Bunnell And in Utah that often means more wildlife to watch or hunt - 14 ik ' 11t : 41 : it Ilk:16 t - ' ' 1 ISA DIAY1 ktve 0 11 i :10'' 111111 1 1111111N D Dk'Sir If the other boot stores in town wanted your E business as much as we do they would sell for )04 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