Walk with us in the 4th of July Parade!

You can be in this picture.

To give the Town of Eatonville a proper thanks for all their support, we need park staff and volunteers, including scouts.  We need flag wavers, sign carriers, "banner babes" (banner dudes?), and folks smiling, waving, and giving high fives.  If you normally wear a uniform, please do so for the parade. 
  
If you wish to take part, we gather at 11:30 AM, usually on Pennsylvania Ave., near Lynch St., one block west of the football stadium at Eatonville High School.  The exact spot is different each year and is not known until we arrive.  Just look around for some ranger hats.  For more information contact Jim Ross at 360-569-6568.

A Special Meet-and-Greet Opportunity

Trails is hosting three groups of high-school aged SCA youth this summer; they will each be here for a 15-day period. Each group has 2 adult leaders and a different set of 8 youth from JBLM and the surrounding areas. Trails will be putting them to work, but also want to provide them a broad experience, introduce them to the many disciplines within the Park, and increase their interest and connection to this awesome place. Many people are unfamiliar with the dynamics of the Park and the inter-workings of how we function as a city, so the plan is to have at least one person from each work group make contact.

WHAT YOU DO:

Simple---Stop by and introduce yourself

WHAT YOU RECEIVE:

Admiration of youth

Warm fuzzies from the positive impact on our youth

Pride in promoting the Park and your contribution to its success

YOUR TIME COMMITMENT:

One to five minutes

YOUR TIMEFRAME:

July 1st - 13th (not July 4 or 9). Longmire

July 22nd - August 2nd. Ohanapecosh

August 12th - 24th. Longmire

(They may be inaccessible many of these days)

LOCATION:

Available in the field until 4:30

Available at their campground after 4:30

***THE PROCESS / NEXT STEP:

Contact Melody Abel at melody_abel@nps.gov to set up a date/time/location

Or, if you see them, feel free to take the opportunity to say hello

Everyone Loves A Parade!

Join Mount Rainier National Park rangers in the Eatonville 4th of July Parade! Last year the Town of Eatonville gave us the honor of leading off the parade as we remembered Rangers Margaret Anderson and Nick Hall. This year we would like to thank the folks of Eatonville for their support during that difficult year.

To give the town a proper thanks, we need park staff and volunteers, including scouts. We need flag wavers, sign carriers, "banner babes and dudes", and folks smiling, waving, and giving high-fives. If you normally wear a uniform, please do so for the parade.

If you wish to take part, we gather at 11:30 AM, usually on Pennsylvania Ave. near Lynch St., one block west of the football stadium at Eatonville High School. The exact spot is different each year and is not known until we arrive. Just look around for some ranger hats! Contact Jim_Ross@nps.gov if you'd like to participate.

Exotic Plant Removal - "Deveg"

The MRNPA will be holding its annual Exotic Plant Removal ("deveg") party on Saturday, July 13 this year. Although last year's project was done on the Westside Road, NPS leaders are currently evaluating this year's plant growth and the possibility of working at another area. The location will be announced when plans are firmed up.

Participants in the project are not required to know about native and non-native plants. NPS crew members will work with you and tell you which plants to remove, and will be happy to identify native plants for you as well.

You should bring are work gloves, a small digging tool like a hand trowel or your favorite weed removing tool. You will not be expected to use or carry larger tools like pulaskis or shovels. Also bring a lunch, plenty of fluids to drink, and dress according to the weather.
 
The crew will meet at 8:30 AM and will start work at 9:00 AM. Expect to finish about 3:00 PM.  When you enter the Park, tell the ranger at the gate that you will be working on a volunteer project and you will be admitted to the Park for free.

If  you plan to attend this work party, please reply to John Titland at volunteer@mrnpa.org.

Sky Viewing

Our stellar volunteer astronomer Don West-Wilke is back for another summer season! Don will be setting up his telescope outside Jackson Visitor Center Thursday evenings through Monday afternoons with additional telescopes and astronomical binoculars available for nighttime viewing. Daytime sessions will offer observers a chance to use a solar telescope. Any visitor, employee, partner or volunteer is invited to attend. 

If you would like to volunteer to help with night sky viewing, please reply via email to Curt_Jacquot@nps.gov. Don will provide the necessary training to assist visitors with one of our many new devices.

Summer Sky Viewing at Mount Rainier National Park

Learn about sky viewing and enjoy a truly unique wilderness experience. 

Join Park Volunteer Don West-Wilke to learn about the National Park Service's

Natural Lightscapes Program as you view the night or day sky.

Schedule through September 15
All viewing takes place in front of Jackson Visitor Center at Paradise

Day Sky viewing via a solar telescope
Friday through Monday: 3:30 PM - 5:30 PM
(weather permitting) 

Night Sky viewing via telescopes and astronomy binoculars
Thursday through Sunday
Just after dark until at least midnight 
(weather permitting)

Pre-4th of July Litter Patrol

Litter is an ongoing problem, and we want to have our gateway to the Mountain looking nice for our Fourth of July visitors. Therefore, we'll be conducting another litter patrol on Saturday, June 29 as part of our partnership with the state Dept. of Transportation's Adopt-a-Highway program. They limit us to twelve participants, so if you're interested, sign up soon! Gloves, safety vests, bags and "long-armed grabbers" will be provided. Hard hats are optional, so if you want to wear one, bring your own. New participants must watch a five-minute DoT training video, available on line at http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/operations/adoptahwy/. Please contact Crow at Petrina_Vecchio@partner.nps.gov if you want to sign up!

Stick Pickers!

Storm debris has been accumulating in the Longmire campground for many years, and the customary means of disposal (dispersal) had proven to be less than effective. A ring of downed limbs and branches was building up behind the campsites faster than Nature could accommodate. Last year, two teams worked to bring the debris forward where it was hoped crews could be brought in to load it into drop boxes for removal, or alternately, that it could be chipped and distributed into the campground environment.

For the last two weekends, Volunteers have been hard at work clearing away the piles created by last year's work parties. On June 8, geocachers participated in their annual "CITO" event at the campground, and today (June 15), another team of nine individual volunteers gathered near the platform tents at 9:30 for a second assault. Four hours later, two 15-yard drop boxes had been filled to capacity, accounting for approximately 75% of the debris.

In another move to alleviate the problem of debris accumulation, volunteers and paid employees staying in the campground have been given permission to utilize wood from the piles for campfires. Some larger pieces have been stacked at various convenient locations. Please note that gathering of other wood in the campground is still prohibited! You may only use the wood which has been piled or stacked by the work crews.

Crow's personal gratitude as well as the Park's goes out to all the hard-working folks who have pitched in (literally!) on this project. Longmire Campground is now a much more pleasant environment, thanks to you!

Chris Maser - "Forest Ecology"

Chris Maser's "Forest Ecology" talk has been rescheduled for June 20th.
The time: 8:30 until noon.
The place: Longmire Community Building.

Feel free to join us! The presentation will include a walk around the Longmire Volunteer Campground.

All-Park Safety Meeting - Volunteers Are Invited

Any interested Volunteer is invited to attend the annual All-Park Safety Meeting on Wednesday, June 26th. It will be held in the gymnasium of Columbia Crest School from 12:30-4:30 PM. Featured speakers will include David McEvoy and Jay Satz.

From the Safety Committee release: "There are causal factors that come up again and again when looking at why employees get hurt or die on the job. Two of these factors are risk normalization and understanding the difference between personal safety and standards of professional safe work habits while on the job...This presentation, led by two park partners who are career professionals with expertise in safe work analysis and accident prevention, will help employees define and mitigate these common human factors."

During the meeting, participants will be broken into work groups to engage in facilitator-led risk assessment exercises pertinent to their divisions. There will also be an optional fire extinguisher training at the end of the session. You must sign in at your division's table upon arrival for assignment to a group.

Blog access is back!

As some of you may know, we've been locked out of administrative access to this blog for about the past six months, due to a snafu in the conversion of our e-mail system to gmail over the winter. Some of you have noticed and commented that elements in this blog are out of date and haven't been updated, that links are broken, or that comments weren't being moderated and posted.

Well -- we're back! Administrative access has been restored, and I will spend the rest of this morning cleaning up the old errors. My apologies to everyone for the inconvenience. And if you have a blog of your own, here's the Lesson Learned: make sure you have more than one "administrator"!