2019 Camp Baker Montana Eagle Watch Project start date postponed

I wanted to provide an update on our progress with the logistics of our project as well as our decision to postpone the start date. 

Steve and I have had several productive conversations with Colin Maas of Montana Fish Wildlife & Parks about the current conditions at Camp Baker.  As of this past week there was 1.5 feet of snow on the last .75 mile of road into Camp Baker.  Apparently, the road is maintained and plowed, but the final .75 mile of road into Camp Baker isn’t maintained.  As such we have needed to hammer out parking and another location to camp at until the road becomes passable.  Both Steve and Colin have a local contact that lives in the area who has been very helpful in providing real time road conditions to us so that we may make an informed decision as to how to proceed with starting this year’s count.  Fortunately, we have secured both parking and a camping alternative.  The last thing we are still working on is a loaner portable river toilet for the alternative camp site.

Considering the forecast and amount of snow already on the ground Steve and I decided to push the start date back this year to 10 March.  Steve believes some of the Bald Eagle migration may be missed, but that should still allow for me to be in position to observe the bulk of Golden Eagle migration.  After speaking with our local contact, we were reassured that this late winter weather in February is unusual.  Typically, the road and Camp Baker should be accessible by 1 March.  As such we hope this springs weather is just an outlier and that 2020 won’t present this kind of difficulty.  An article from the Great Falls Tribune on the near record-breaking weather may be read here.

In my conversation with Colin I became aware of the fact that there is no Wi-Fi or cell service at Camp Baker.  As such from 10 March through the end of March data entry onto our HMANA page will be limited and spotty at best.  Data will be kept on our standard paper data sheets and will be backed up by scanning the sheets into my phone.  Since this is the situation at Camp Baker, I will apologize in advance for very little real time data coming across here nor will there be many updates by way of the blog.

In other news we have continued to attempt to raise funds for the project.  Check out the How to Support page with detailed instructions on how to donate.  I have all of our current donors on the page now and an update on the funds we have currently raised.  That being said we still have a long way to go to reach our fundraising goals for the three years of the project.  At the bare minimum it would be nice to at least have our first year’s goal of 4,000$ reached ASAP.  There are other ways to support the project though.  One way is to share this page and the project through a social media platform of your choice.  Currently we have only received about 60-page views so it would appear that very few people are even aware of the project this spring.  I don’t use social media at all, so if anyone is able to share this blog through the platform of your choice that would be greatly appreciated.  Another way to help is I am still on the hunt for raptor photos in Montana.  You will note this blog post has no photos.  Photos are interesting and engaging.  So, if anyone you know may have photos of Camp Baker or of raptors in Montana that would be helpful.  Also, make sure and follow the blog by subscribing to the blog on the right navigation bar.  Thanks!!!