Saturday

Today, 1/04/02, I spent half the day at Hi Mountain lookout, with good
views to the coast of Point Sal and Point Arguello and inland to the
snow-covered southern Sierras. All afternoon a sustained wind more than
20mph blew from the north. Red-tailed hawks and turkey vultures
occasionally sailed by. The weather station recorded about 6 inches of
rain during the month of December and a maximum wind gust of 82mph on
Dec. 16th! Unfortunately, the smaller of the two cypress trees near the
lookout has been broken and knocked down badly and is a smaller version
of its previous self.

“Thank-you” to Kathleen Intorf and Mike Tyner for cleaning up these past
two days after the rain leakage problems, and today Mike gave a very
helpful training session to volunteers DIck and Pat Boyd and myself
regarding lookout operations and radio tracking. Several visitors
stopped by today, by walking, mountain biking, and motorcycling.

This morning there was a non-native red fox near the Pozo Ranger
Station, and when driving by again at dusk a striped skunk was rambling
around. Looking back up to the lookout ridgeline, there was a crescent
moon suspended low over the Santa Lucias.

Steve Schubert
Coordinator, Hi Mountain Condor Lookout Project