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Taylor Ranch
Wilderness Field Station
University of Idaho
HC 83 Box 8070
Cascade, ID 83611
Satellite Phone:
1-254-543-9291
Fax at Arnold Aviation:
208-382-3941
Email:
tayranch@hughes.net
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 2007 News 
See 2007 Photo Gallery for more photos of "The News".
Visiting Professionals Travel Grants Awarded
2007 Travel Grants for 5 different projects have been awarded:
Dr. Colden Baxter, ISU Biological Sciences, ISU Stream Ecology Graduate Class Field Trip (May)
Dr. Ben Crosby, ISU Dept. of Geosciences, Digital Tools for Field Science Workshop (June)
Katie Miller, ISU graduate student in Biological Sciences, Bat Ecology Workshop (August)
Lynne Westerfield, Gary Thompson and Karla Bradley, UI McCall Outdoor Science School Field Instructor Training (August)
Dr. Mazeika Sullivan, UI Fish & Wildlife Dept., American Dipper and Landscape Changes Research (June)
Digital Tools for Field Science Workshop
Dr. Benjamin Crosby, Asst. Professor of Geology at ISU, directed a workshop for summer interns, graduate students and interested researchers May 23-25 regarding the variety of digital tools available to field scientists. These tools included topographic analysis using GIS and GPS enabled field computers coinfigured to collect and visualize field data in real-time. The workshop included both classroom lectures and hands-on opportunities to utilize these map making and data collecting tools on and around Taylor Ranch. 7 student groups completed sample mapping projects including "The Spatial Distribution of Bear Site", "An Interpretative Map for Visitors to Big Creek", and "Downstream Distribution of Juvenile Chinook Salmon Near the Rush Creek Confluence."
Measuring differences in growth, density and survival of juvenile Chinook
 Kara Cromwell, Master's project entitled "Spatial variation in juvenile Chinook habitat quality; is food limiting in a wilderness watershed?" is in a 2nd year of field work at TRFS this summer. Day and night snorkeling observations will record patterns in juvenile Chinook foraging behavior. Kara's advisor is Dr. Brian Kennedy, UI Fish and Wildlife Dept. She received additional funding this spring from the DeVlieg Wilderness Research Award and will be joined this summer by research assistants, Randy Johnson and Cordel Anderson.
Kara, Ellen Hamann, Randy Johnson and Cordel Anderson research team on Big Creek.
Dr. Jim Peeks' Wilderness Ecology Enrichment Class
The class spent May 22-26 learning about ecological research, history of the area around TRFS, and made daily hikes to experience the wilderness environment and learn about the ecological relationships of aquatic systems, terrestrial animal and plant communities, and fire. Dr. Jim Kingery, Dr. Brian Kennedy, Jim Akenson and Holly Akenson participated with the class.
 Idaho State University Advanced Stream Ecology
Class Workshop
Dr. Colden Baxter, professor ISU Dept. of Biolgoical Sciences brought his advanced stream ecology class to TRFS May 9-13. Students arrived at Cabin Creek, hiked to the ranch and in the next 3 days, performed aquatic insect observations in Rush Ck, Pioneer Ck, Dunce Ck while hiking to the Middle Fork of the Salmon River. Rachel Wilkinson, ISU Master's canditate assisted with the class. Read about their visit to TRFS (pdf)
 McCall-Donnelly High School Environmental Science Class Field Trip - May 2007
Debbie Fereday leads McCall High Environmental Science
Class on 6 mile hike to TRFS
from Cabin Creek.
Teacher Debbie Fereday brings her high school Environmental Science Class to Taylor Ranch Field Station every spring for a field trip. Students earn money throughout the school year to pay for the trip. This year 12 students, teachers, and parents flew into the backcountry and hiked 6 miles to Taylor Ranch to explore and learn about natural ecosystems in the Idaho wilderness. Forest Service biologist Mary Faurot accompanied the group. The class donned chest waders and sampling gear and examined a variety of aquatic invertebrates collected at the field station. Students learned to use radio telemetry equipment that is used by Station Managers/Scientists Jim & Holly Akenson to track wolves and cougars. Wolf tracks, a cougar scat, elk rubs, and Sheepeater Indian artifacts & pictographs were seen on nature hikes around Taylor Ranch.
Delivery of Fish Screw Trap to TRFS 
Idaho Department of Fish & Game and University of Idaho/TRFS initiated a joint project to run a fish screw trap at the field station to mark fish and study migration and survival of anadromous steelhead and Chinook salmon. IDFG Technician Mike Ackerman will work the trap daily through November. Trap was delivered by helicopter on May 14th by Leading Edge Aviation, Clarkston, WA.
Mule Packing Clinic Spring 2007
 Jim Akenson put on a Mule Packing Clinic in May for Idaho Department of Fish & Game Conservation Officers who use horses and mules on-the-job in the Idaho backcountry. Participants practiced regional and classic packing hitches, and learned minimum impact horse camping. Randy Tullous, Assistant Mgr. of TRFS is shown here mantying a load during the packing class.
 2007 Bleak Wilderness Interns - Tracy Buchanan, Ecology & Conservation Biology; Luke Cerise, Rangeland Ecology & Management/Wildlife Resources; Scott Fereday, Wildlife Resources; and Melinda (Mindy) McAllister, Resource Recreation & Tourism have been choosen to participate in the Bleak Wilderness Internship program during the 2007 summer arriving in June.
Steelhead Life History Variability Research
Brian Kennedy, UI assistant professor of fisheries resources, received a DeVlieg-Taylor Ranch Masters Research Assistantship for 2007-2009. Dr. Kennedy and master's student Ellen Hamann were awarded two years of funding to conduct research on steelhead life history variability in the Middle Fork of the Salmon River drainage from Taylor Ranch Field Station. Ellen arrives to TRFS the end of May to begin field work.
 Rattlesnake Habitat Research
Chuck Peterson, Idaho State University, professor, Dept. of Biological Sciences, received a DeVlieg Taylor Masters Research Assistantship for 2007-2009. Dr. Peterson and master's student, Javan Bauder, were awarded two years of funding to conduct research titled, "Movement and habitat selection of Prairie Rattlesnakes in the Big Creek drainage of the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness, Idaho". This study will continue work accomplished by Bauder during his undergraduate research at Taylor Ranch Field Station 2005-6.
Dr. Peterson and Javan returned to rattlesnake dens around TRFS in May to capture and mark rattlesnakes for Javan's continued research. They have surgically implanted transmitters in 12 rattlesnakes to date.
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