Winter Life of a Ranger
WINTER LIFE OF A RANGER
Loren E. Lane
Often as a permanent ranger goes about his many duties connected with the supervision of summer activities along the highways, and at the campgrounds, and in his visits to the hotels and chalets, he is asked by many interested visitors "What do you rangers do here in the winter time?" The ranger's answer would follow closely the following story.
With the passing of the last red bus down the highway with its load of hotel help, and the last few hardy park dudes on their way to the train, a new phase of park activity begins.
Rangers are trying vainly to catch up on the odds and ends of many varied activities they were unable to get done while the park tourist season was in full swing. This work, coupled with the closing of campgrounds, comfort stations, lookout stations, checking stations, pulling out trail camps, and many other odd jobs, keeps us very busy until we receive our new winter station assignments.
Glacier National Park is the third largest park in the National Park System. Because of its size and its position astride the backbone of the Continental Divide, with its ribs of long narrow valleys flowing off to the east and west, it necessitates the maintaining of so-called summer ranger stations which must be vacated each fall. The rangers from these stations are re-assigned to ranger stations along the park boundary line, where they are put in charge of certain areas to see that no hunters or trappers enter the park to kill or capture its wildlife. These changes in assignments come out of the Chief Ranger's office in October. More busy days follow as moves are made, and rangers are getting acquainted with the one hundred miles or more of area they are to patrol and look after in the long winter months to follow.
Each ranger station is strategically located along the park boundary, in or near one or more important valleys. In some of these valleys, about ten or fifteen miles from the ranger station, are located small one-room cabins called patrol or snowshoe cabins. The ranger uses these cabins for over-night stops as he makes his patrols through the winter; consequently, one of his first jobs is to see that the cabin is in good shape for winter use. Snowshoe rations and fresh bedding are brought in, usually by pack horse, and stored in the cellars and bedding boxes in the cabins.
Heating and cooking wood is split and piled in the cabin, as is a box of fine wood shavings. A man's life may depend on his ability to get a quick, hot fire started sometime during the winter. It is recognized as northern courtesy to always leave kindling and wood shavings in a cabin for the next man. Chinking that has fallen from between the logs in the walls of the cabin is replaced, and the cabin is made as tight as possible. Windows are washed and the heavy shutters are made tight and fast, so no pilfering bear, not yet in hibernation, can break in and destroy the winter supplies stored there.
Meanwhile, the ranger and his wife have spent many evenings making out a list of all the grocery and staple items they will need for the next six months. Winters in Glacier are often severe, and rangers may be snowed in for months at a time; consequently, grocery and other lists are checked and double-checked to see that nothing is forgotten. Non-fertile eggs are bought by the case and put down in a solution of water-glass to keep them fresh and usable during the winter. Butter is put down in a weak salt solution to keep it sweet and fresh until it is used up. Carrots are buried in moist sand, which will keep them fresh for several months. Sacks of flour and sugar are stored away in mouse proof containers in the station attic. Hams and bacons are bought and stored outside in the meat boxes.
During the past summer the ranger's wife has probably put up jars of jams and jellies, and perhaps chicken and beef have also been canned for winter use. The cellar of a ranger station is an interesting place to visit, what with its sacks of potatoes, onions and cabbages, shelves loaded with cans of different kinds of vegetables and fruits and canned meats. Fresh meat will be hard to get as the nearest butcher shop may be forty miles away, so the ranger and his family must be satisfied with canned meats, ham and bacon. Lists of medicinal supplies, clothing, and other equipment must be thought of and bought. The ranger's personal radio, which is his newspaper and chief source of entertainment, will be fitted with new tubes and batteries. Usually books and magazines have been purchased throughout the past busy summer and laid away to be read during the long winter evenings when darkness comes at four-thirty in the afternoon.
If there are small children in the ranger's family, careful consideration must be given to their probable needs and desires. Toys and books must be purchased and brought forth as the winter progresses to help provide enjoyment for the little tots. Certain medicines and a good home medical book are of first importance in case of sickness. Luckily, the isolation of most ranger stations does not expose the ranger's family to many of the diseases that are prevalent in towns and cities in the winter.
If there are children of school age in the family, the ranger's wife may have to move into the nearest town to put the youngsters in school, while the ranger batches at his station during the winter.
As the fall season progresses, travel over the park roads dwindles away, and then some night in late October or early November, Logan Pass snows in and becomes blocked with snow for the rest of the winter. Large flocks of geese and ducks fly in from the north and rest on the lakes overnight, before spear-heading on to the southland. Bull elk are trumpeting and fighting in the upper valleys, as they gather their harems of cows together for the winter. Later, with the coming of more snow, the elk will be forced down the valleys until they can be seen in the meadows along the park highways. With the coming of deep snow and constant low temperatures, the fur-bearing animals' coats are in prime condition. Then the ranger must make longer and more frequent patrols, because it is at this season of the year that some people living outside the park try to slip in and kill and trap the wild life of the park.
Winter patrols in Glacier are usually made on snowshoes, because ideal skiing conditions are very seldom encountered. On the west side of the park deep soft snows, buffeted by ever changing cold and warm (chinook) winds, makes for tough going on skis, and often on snowshoes. On the east side of the park, strong westerly winds blow with gale intensity most of the time. This leaves large bare places on exposed ridges and open meadows, while deep drifts are piled up elsewhere. Skis are too cumbersome to carry and handle under these conditions, so snowshoes are almost exclusively used by rangers on patrol work. Winter storms sometimes approach and engulf the entire park in an hour's time, and sudden temperature drops of thirty and forty degrees are experienced. Often as much as twenty to thirty inches of snow will fall during a night, and the temperature may fall to forty and fifty degrees below zero. Winter patrols under these conditions are hazardous and extremely strenuous, and the ranger must call on all his stamina and resourcefulness to see that he makes the snowshoe cabin or ranger station without mishap. Several times in the past, rangers on winter patrols in Glacier have nearly met death, as was the case of Park Rangers Ness and Miller, whose experiences are given elsewhere in this manual. In the fall of 1938 another ranger was accidentally shot by an Indian hunting along the boundary line between Glacier National Park and the Blackfeet Indian Reservation. Quick action saved the ranger's leg and his life, although he will always be crippled.
Between patrols a ranger may be making a study of and writing a treatise on some particular animal, shoveling snow from government buildings, repairing and painting government buildings and boats, taking inventory of government property, or doing work on any one of a dozen different jobs.
With March, come high winds and warmer weather which melts the snow rapidly away. With the return of the geese and ducks and the appearance of the first robin, comes spring. Although the ranger's summer tourist problems are tough, he finds himself eagerly looking forward to seeing the first bus load of dudes pull up to the entrance checking station.
