Fires update, and some photos from our neighborhood trail walk today

The heat wave has finally broken, rain has come, and the local fires have calmed down a bit. The Shovel Creek Fire on top of Murphy Dome was hit hard by over 700 personnel, including Alaska State Forestry firefighters, elite hotshot teams from both within Alaska, and flown up from the Lower 48 (Oregon, Montana, Washington, California, and more), and the National Guard. A photographer who recently moved with his wife to Alaska from Germany has been taking some really stunning photos of them at work, as well as providing canine therapy. He has not uploaded the photos to his website yet, but if you are on Facebook, you can see them here. Anyway, earlier this week, they announced that the firebreak lines they had made via dozers and backburns had joined each other at the Chatanika River, and they were well on their way to full containment. They lifted the evacuation orders, and today, the report is 40% containment.

OK I could not resist stealing a few photos from the Facebook feed of Fairbanks North Star Borough Emergency Operations. This is Gracie, the Morale Dog, who has been visiting daily and giving Love.

PatRick Initial Attack Crew from Ellensburg, Washington:


National Guardsmen (Guardspeople?):


She wants bellyrubs!


This young lady is with the Rogue River Hotshots in Oregon:


PatRick hotshots:


Kissy!


She has a husky smile!


Big State Night Shift Engine Crew:


This young man is with the Mendocino Hotshots Crew:


We are so grateful to the tough and courageous men and women who are willing to give the strongest years of their lives to helping others. I pray they will always be safe!

The other big fire, the Hess Creek Fire near Livengood, is at present the largest wildfire in the country, and is at 170,000 acres and growing, of course. It's so far from humans or structures that they are just watching it burn, but Winter will put it out!

What all of this means for us at Casa Fuzzies is that our Friends that live on Murphy Dome are safe, and the air is clearer now, and we can take long walkies again!

The raspberries are ripe now. We have a few in our yard, but they are everywhere:


Both our raspberries and our rhubarb keep producing, despite getting very little care from us (only minimal weeding, so they don't get choked out):


Highbush cranberries are already turning red. I believe this is the first time we have seen this contemporaneous with fireweed in full bloom:


We are at peak fireweed now. So beautiful!


Poisonous baneberries. I've been told that eating only a few will kill a small child:


Another shot of the fireweed:


Why hell-ooooo, my beauties! The famously delicious nagoonberries:


Aqpiks. I do not care for their flavor or gooshy texture, but I eat a few anyway:


Beauty is truth...


Starbuck-A-Roo:


Pretty yellow wildflowers:


The first few blueberries are juuuuust ripe:


Cricket enjoying her walk:


I don't know what these are. I had never seen them before, and now there are about a dozen of them along a mile stretch of trail.


Scale:


Truth, beauty...


I made the ladies "FREE HUGS" bandanas. :)