My name is Captain Kirk; you may have heard that name before.
No, I'm not the Starship Enterprise Commander of Star Trek fame,
but rather the llama--of no particular fame at all. Rather than
in hyperspace, I live and work in the beautiful mountains of Idaho,
along the famous Salmon River--"The River of No Return."
I mentioned my work. That is what I want to discuss with you.
I have a dual role. I am a pack stud and a very important part
of my handlers's pack string. I'd prefer not to use the term "owners,"
because who can really say who owns whom? I enjoy both roles,
but I will not talk too much about the former because I consider
it a private matter. I love to discuss packing into the backcountry,
though. Before I do, though, I want to tell you a little more
about my background. I was bred and raised to be a pack llama,
unlike so many who come by it accidentally. I was born in Colorado
on a big llama ranch (Ebel's Great Divide Llamas) to a long line
of working llamas. I participated in my first major pack trip
when I was less than two years old. On that trip, my buddies and
I packed water sampling equipment for a joint project of the U.
S. Forest Service and Environmental Protection Agency into some
high lakes in the Comanche Peaks Wilderness area of north central
Colorado. Some of us went on into Rocky Mountain National Park.
Because of awful, wet weather, we hiked 15 miles the first day
with moderately heavy loads to a place where my handlers could
get warm and dry. The rain didn't bother me any. Although I felt
bad that I, as a new kid, wasn't carrying as much weight as my
friends, it was both an exhausting and an exhilarating experience
for me. I've loved the wilderness ever since.
After the first trip, I honed my skills on numerous other trips
into the Colorado backcountry. Two stand out in my memory. One
was the time I helped pack in tools and supplies for a volunteer
trail crew constructing a new segment of the Colorado Trail. The
other was when a bunch of us packed in equipment and supplies
for a Forest Service VIP trip--showing a Congressman, his staff,
and part of his family some of the management problems and opportunities
in a newly designated Wilderness area. The latter time that I
participated in a nine llama string, assisted by only one handler.
I think I gave her a bit of a hard time in that situation by acting
up a little, as kids will do, but she has since forgiven me. The
congressman was glad not to have to ride a horse as on previous
trips! I was sad for a short time when we left Colorado and moved
to Idaho. My sadness disappeared when I found many beautiful wilderness
areas in central Idaho. Since then we have covered a lot of miles,
but in several ways 1993 was the best year of all. Granted, I'm
getting a little older now, but certainly not "long in the
tooth" like my lifelong packing buddy Freddie (he's really
only 13).
For starters, 1993 is the first year that Freddie (a.k.a "old
ear and a half" after a pasture brawl) and I got to pack
wild game out of the woods during hunting season. We had heard
for years that we llamas generally do a fine job of that. Because
my handlers aren't hunters, we had to wait until friends invited
us to help them remove their hard-earned meat from the backcountry.
It worked like a charm. Because I am now the biggest llama in
the string (370-380 lbs), I got to haul the two hind quarters
from a moderate sized elk. They weighed about 160-170 pounds,
but it was only four miles, downhill, and on an old road. It wasn't
unpleasant, and I would like to do that again.
On the downside, for a moment, 1993 was also the year that I began
to worry about both my jobs. Another of my packing buddies, Redman,
reached maturity and my handlers brought in two new, even younger
packers from the ranch I came from for me to train. Maybe because
those two come from the same stock as I, they have been a breeze
to train and are much too eager, in my opinion, to "take
over." Much to my dismay, Redman was even allowed to spend
some time with one of my females last fall and sired a nice (I
am reluctant to admit) female baby. Although I think I can hold
my own as the leader of the packstring for a few more years, you
can imagine my relief when the veterinarian came by this fall
and gelded all three of those other guys! I may even, with time,
stop pacing the fence between us.
Also, last year, the Forest Service invited Freddie, Redman, and
me (as well as some other guys from Scott Woodruff's farm) to
help teach some of their people about low impact camping and livestock
handling techniques in the wilderness. It was good to help the
Forest Service practice what it preaches. We packed gear into
the Jedediah Smith Wilderness in eastern Idaho and western Wyoming
for about ten Forest Service people for two nights, supported
their camp with equipment and supplies, and assisted the human
instructors in demonstrating good, low-impact camping techniques
to the students. It was a great trip, even if it did rain and
snow most of the time. It was also good to hear the students praising
us llamas to the class when we returned, somewhat humbling and
quieting the "cowboys" that went out with the horse-supported
group, loudly proclaiming theirs was the only way to go packing.
I want to share some of my personal philosophy on low impact livestock
use in the wilderness with you. You may think this strange, coming
from a pack animal such as I, but I feel that the impact of humans
to fragile country is most often increased when they take us along.
Therefore, there are some very fragile places that Freddie, Redman
and I (or any other pack animal) should not go if it can be helped.
However, with a little care, we should be able to go most places
if our human handlers take care to help us keep from trashing
meadows, destroying trails, depositing our feces too close to
running water, or ruining the wilderness experience of other users.
On top of that, I think we llamas and our handlers (as the "new
kids on the block" of the pack animal world) have the obligation
to do better--to set the example for other livestock users. I
don't mind packing out trash left by others at all, nor hauling
out other now-useless evidence of past human insensitivity to
the quality of the wilderness--do you?
The highlight of my year, though, was the week we spent (ala Indiana
Jones) supporting a group of archeologists and volunteers looking
for evidence of past use of the Big Horn Crags portion of the
Frank Church--River of No Return Wilderness by Sheepeater Indians.
The human volunteers located physical evidence of both campsites
and hunting locations that will help the archeologists piece together
the ancient ways of these first Americans in the area. Nine llamas
(dare I say "led by me"?) provided valuable assistance
to them by carrying their gear, moving their camps, and generally
making the logistics easier for the team so they could concentrate
on their survey. The trip was part of what the Forest Service
calls, "Passports in Time," or PIT program. It brings
volunteers together with professionals from the agency to perform
needed historical and archeological inventory, protection, and
restoration work. The PIT literature talks only of human volunteers,
but the nine of us certainly contributed a great deal to the project,
too. I hope to continue going on those trips in the future, long
enough to help find some artifact that proves positively the oft-repeated
bit that llamas have been around as long as horses in North America.
The Frank Church--River of No Return Wilderness (or, "The
Frank" to its friends) is the largest designated wilderness
in the lower 48. The Bighorn Crags has the highest elevation,
is arguably the most beautiful, and is certainly the most heavily
used portion of "The Frank." At 8,000-10,000 feet in
elevation, The Crags is a steep, rugged, jumble of rock interspersed
with numerous high lakes and gorgeous scenery. From a llama's
point of view, it lacks some of the amenities, though--namely
abundant grass and flat places to camp away from lakeshores and
streams. The archeologists on the trip told us that it is believed
that the nomadic Indians from the valleys of the main Salmon and
the Middle Fork of the Salmon River came to this high, rugged
country in the fall, following the summer weather and the ripening
of berries along the tributary streams. It is thought they came
to gather the "nuts" of the abundant whitebark pine,
and to trap and kill the Rocky Mountain Bighorn Sheep. (Unfortunately
for them, the excellent high lake fishing didn't exist then, because
fish were introduced about 100 years ago.) Evidence of those hunting
trips was found during our survey, including stone flakes in one
of the rocky passes where a lone hunter or a small party may have
passed time watching for animals and making tools. We also found
pieces of stone tools along the lakes where people may have camped.
It occurred to me that they could have benefited by having a few
llamas to pack their sheep out, but no evidence of that was found.
Trip planning is not an area in which I excel, but the humans
had their challenges on this trip. Because of the terrain and
concerns about the impact of an anticipated 25 humans and llamas
on the fragile meadows near the lakes (the "usual" campsites),
suitable campsites needed to be located far away using aerial
photos and maps. The original plan called for a total of four
different camps and for the group to split into three sections
for two nights during the week. Logistically, that required splitting
the food and cooking gear and coolers into three bundles. What
a mess that was to see! It also required a couple more llamas
than might have been needed otherwise. As one would normally expect
of humans, some canceled out at the last minute, so we ended up
with 20 (eleven people and nine llamas). We camped in only two
sites, and didn't have to split up the group except for day trips.
None of us llamas canceled out, so we carried more of the volunteers'
gear than planned. We got extra praise and attention from them
for that.
Our six volunteers came from Oregon, Washington, and Idaho, and
none had been packing with llamas before. All of them behaved
admirably and worked hard. By the end of the trip we were all
friends. They were helpful when my friend Freddie got off his
stake and was found wandering loose around camp in the midst of
a small herd of deer in the morning. He was not anxious to be
caught. Even the hay pellets didn't interest him, so it took a
team effort to catch him in a "human corral." I voted
with the minority to leave him with his deer.
Most days, the human group split into three groups for surveying
a new portion of the wilderness, with each group taking an archeologist.
Some of us got to stay in camp and relax and eat the lush grass,
watched over by the four llama handlers who stayed behind that
day. Some of us went on hikes with the humans, taking lunches,
equipment, and even fishing poles. Except for the days when we
moved camp, it was really easy for us llamas. One day, while accompanying
a team to Terrace Lake, Redman had an encounter with a moose and
her calf. That was the same moose that had scattered an entire
string of llamas on a foggy day a few weeks earlier. Personally,
I'm glad I wasn't there, because moose are one of the few things
in life uglier than Freddie!
Judging from my past adventures, I believe that I am ready for
whatever 1995 will bring my way.
Captain Kirk's handlers are Bob and Nancy Russell, Spindrift
Llamas, in Salmon, Idaho. They both work for the Forest Service.
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