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small stature.

As each camper arrived and picked their spot, we would greet them and go into our "spiel" about bears, cougars, hiking trails and interesting nearby attractions. Within a week, my son was interrupting, informing the campers of any component I might have omitted. He knew the cleaning routine, the water routine and, perhaps most important, the time of day we allotted for exploration.

One morning, during breakfast at the picnic table, a little beetle joined us. His shape was extremely interesting, so my son reached out to touch it. Almost magically, it jumped into the air, making a popping sound, and landed next to my plate. Neither of us believed what had happened, so this time, I reached out to "pet" its back. Once again it performed this acrobatic maneuver. "What IS that?" he wanted to know.

"I have NO idea," I said, laughing.

We just HAD to knowbut the Rangers didn't have an answer, either. During our weekly visit to town, we stopped at a local thrift store. There we found National Geographic books, old nature books, even a book on bears. The next stop was the local library. We arrived just in time for their yearly book sale and procured some very interesting books on insects, forests and wildlife. Armed with these treasures we ascended the mountain with enthusiasm. The book on insects proved invaluable. When exploring a tiny creek, (no more than a foot wide), we saw "sticks" that floated to the top when we disturbed the water. But, if we left the water untouched, we observed that the sticks were "swimming," with the most delicate fin-type appendages that resembled shrimp legs. What were THESE? Turns out they were Mayfly pupae. And the beetle that went "POP?" He is a click-beetle and his amazing stunt is a defense mechanism to protect him against birds who might otherwise eat him!

We discovered that squirrels are very fastidious creatures. When they pull apart the pinecone to get at the pine nuts, they drop the shells in the same spot every time. This reddish mound is very important to the ecosystem, making the ground rich with humus for emerging baby pines.

Thunderstorms would come BOOMING over the mountains and we would count the distance between lightning and thunder. We learned that the storms would increase in intensity as they arrived and that the center of the storm contained heavy rains that would fall hard and fast with very little thunder. Then, as the rains decreased, the
thunder/lightning combination once again come fast and furious,

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