Picture of the week

Wildflowers in the main meadow of upper Fish Creek Valley in the Carson-Iceberg wilderness. Camped here on a 3 day backpacking trip into this area.  This valley is home of the rarest trout in North America, the Paiute-Cutthroat trout.  It is a protected species and thus fishing is not allowed here. It is endangered due to other non-native more dominate species as well poachers. Talking to an ex-ranger of this area in the nearby town of Walker, he mentioned a story about a group of marines from the nearby Mountain Warfare training center about 30 miles south of here that flew into this valley on helicopters, camping overnight, and catching some of the fish illegally, and then disappearing with a pile of fish bones in their wake. Not sure if the story is true, but sounds entertaining.  On a lighter note he mentioned another story about a cowboy up on the top of the mesa on the Corral Valley trail that was struck by lightening.  The story goes his buddies thought he was dead and they draped his body over his horse and sent him back down the trail to the ranch at start.  When the horse got there, he was alive. Some speculate the bouncing of the horse resucitated him back to life :^)  

All content and images are property of Stephen Fischer Photography, copyright 2011.   Last updated: 7/12/2011