Montana Panoramas

Working with some photos made me remember these Montana Panorama shots – taken in 2003.  I use the winter shot as the header for my business web site (www.beardogco.com ).  The property is a house and a bit over 6 acres that I owned previous to my current place.  I took the photos from a spot up and away from the corner of the property.  The winter photo was my first try at panorama and it was about 4 degrees in January.  My little camera (’02 Canon Digital Elph) got cold and got the slows – which softened the focus just enough to make it look a bit like a painting.  I liked shot so much that I decided to get 4 seasons and I was/am/someday??? going to have prints made that can be hung one above the other.  BUT, I missed taking Spring and then moved.

Recycling the garden

The garden which I originally looked at with excitement – envisioning fresh fruit, vegetables and herbs – turned out to be a bit of an albatross [to me] as it required a tremendous amount of work!!! to get fresh fruit, veg and herbs.   I made the decision mid-summer that I wanted it gone.  I will be a container gardener next summer… a few pots of herbs, tomatoes, peppers, onions – things easily taken care of. 

It should be easy to rig a drip watering system and some chicken wire protection from deer so I can leave them for rv trips.  Even with the garden turned into “grass” – still not much to mow and trim – probably less time as I won’t have to trim around planters and the fence.

The recycling part… my neighbors had said they would like some of the strawberry plants and as we got to talking about time to get them, they decided that they wanted the planters and the fencing – the whole kit and kaboodle!  And – happy, happy, joy, joy – they have a backhoe!! – so have the ability to pop the posts out and grade everything out after and before you know it, we worked out a trade so that everyone gets what they want… they get a complete garden kit and I get a vanished garden.   A friend of theirs wanted some strawberries also so we spread the love a bit and there were even a few leftover plants that I put in containers.  Hopefully, I’ll get enough berries for a shortcake or 2 to share next summer.

Karl has been supervising the dismantling which is going very well.  Readers will have to bear with me – I LOVE big equipment and watching it work and seeing how to do things so this is probably the first in a series of the garden recycling project.

Karl – Karelian Bear Dog

I had never heard of the Karelian Bear Dog before coming to Montana.  My first dog in Montana was a pound puppy – labeled a Lab cross.  I grew up with Labs and knew this dog was not Lab – labeled that way only because of his mostly black coat I assume.  My vet told me he, Zack, was part Karelian Bear Dog.  I looked up the breed information and was a bit daunted but as it turned out, Zack was an excellent companion, easily trained and very sociable.  He was with me nearly 24/7 for 6 years.  I put him to sleep after a 6 week ordeal with lymphoma.  By now I had read about Karelians and met several others – short story, I found Karl in a litter in Choteau (Sho-toe) Montana and he became part of my family in May of 2001, joining me and my 5 year old tuxedo cat, Gus.

Karl sit

Gus and Karl

The baby pictures…

Karl yard

Karl Bed

Karl Lake

Grown up Karl

Karl and Gus in Chair

Who's the Boss

Karl – Karelian Bear Dog

Karl

Karelian Bear Dog History

History

Summers in Somers

Somers, MT is located on the northwest corner of Flathead Lake in Flathead County, Montana.  Flathead Lake is the largest freshwater lake west of the Mississippi.  I had not even heard of it before coming to Northwest Montana. 

Flathead Lake is beautiful – surrounded by mountains, longer north to south than it is wide east to west.  It is not really developed on its shores which is nice.  There is, however, plenty of public access and much of that via state parks that are wooded and very natural.  I grew up on Lake Erie which is not the most beautiful of the Great Lakes – but I did learn to sail on that lake and on the Maumee River in Ohio.  But I’ve sailed on Flathead Lake and it is incredible – the vistas, the water, the wind and the waves – big lake sailing at its best.

Late this summer on a not too smoky day, I took Karl to Lakeside, MT which is across Somers Bay from Somers, MT and took these photos.  Somers is home to a nice little marina – I’ve sailed from there and also from Dayton, MT which is further south along the west shore of the lake.  But Somers is a bit unique – itty-bitty town mostly on a hill overlooking the lake.  It reminds me of parts of San Francisco in that the houses are small footprint houses that step up the hill with beautiful vistas of the water.

Somers Bay

Tower

Sailboats

Karl

Calendar

I had some downtime today as I was waiting for software downloads to download…and found the new calendar thing that is on the right.  Technically, the calendar in blog-speak is a “widget” – that’s just fun!!  But, I think it’s pretty cool – the dates that have posts are bold and if you put your cursor on the bold date, the title of the post should appear.  The other blog-speak thing is that the calendar is in the “sidebar”.

Boy, half the battle with computers – hardware – software is learning the lingo – cookies, widgets, sidebars, headers – and acronyms…  Widgets, though – that’s my current favorite!