Interagency Weeds Inventory IMS Website

Interagency Weeds Inventory IMS Website -

Last year I took Gary Johnson's GIS Design Studio class here at UNR. One of the projects that I undertook was designing a Weeds Inventory IMS site for the state of Nevada. The site is intended to serve as a tool for weed inventory specialists in Nevada and to demonstrate the utility of ArcIMS. I also gave a brief talk at the ESRI Northern Nevada Users Group Meeting held here in Reno this past December. You can view the site yourself by clicking below:

http://mapserver2.library.unr.edu/website/BLM_Weeds_Test/viewer.htm

Save the North Bowl Trees at Heavenly

Save the North Bowl Trees at Heavenly -

Heavenly has some great tree skiing, including the North Bowl! However, these old growth trees are threatened by the resort, which plans on building a high speed chairlift and cutting three to four new runs. That may not sound like much, but it will totally change the character of the place and impact the lake's clarity. Furthermore, local groups have recommended and support a "kinked" chairlift, similar to those that they have in Colorado. A kinked chairlift would allow Heavenly to build the lift without sacrificing the trees, lake clarity, slope stability, wildlife habitat, and good old fashioned adventurous skiing. I urge all of you to take a look at the following websites to get more information. I think that we can have a win-win situation, but the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency and Vail Resorts need to be convinced.

http://northbowl.blogspot.com/
http://www.tahoedailytribune.com/article/20070223/Opinion/102230069

Ice Climbing in Lee Vining Canyon -

I got my first taste of Sierra ice this winter. This past weekend I teemed up with Gwen Linde, who is a PhD student in geology at UNR, and went down to climb California's best ice, Lee Vining Canyon. Lee Vining is just outside the east entrance to Yosemite National Park. It is in a spectacular location down amidst a deep canyon. Most of the ice flows are on shady north-facing slopes, so they stay relatively cool throughout the winter. It turned out that the ice was perfect and the approach was superb. Gwen and I both led WI3 routes on Chouinard Wall and we did a bit of top roping too. With such a poor snow season and such great ice I guess it is a no brainer.

Lean Winter Ski Conditions -

This year I got my season ski pass for Heavenly Ski Resort down in South Lake Tahoe. Tim Weigel, Shasta Ferranto and myself have teemed up to make up the tele mafia at Heavenly. There really aren't too many other tele skiers on the mountain so we're probably quite noticeable. I think this has been one of the leanest snow years for the Sierra Nevada on record. Certainly it is way below last year. As a result most of the skiing is pretty restricted to groomed runs with snowmaking, and this February! Actually, we did score a few decent tree shots but that was just after New Years.

My goal for the season is to get comfortable skiing moguls on tele skis. The rationale is that moguls will force me to be quick on my feet as well as force me to ski the fall line. Hopefully these two traits will come in handy in the woods and on the steeps. To date I've clocked 11 ski days this season, although some days were on alpine skis and not every day has been a full day.