#Northern Rockies

[rabbitcruiser]

Muncho Lake, BC (No. 3)

Muncho Lake Provincial Park is a provincial park in British Columbia, Canada, located on the Alaska Highway as it transits the northernmost Canadian Rockies west of Fort Nelson. The park is part of the larger Muskwa-Kechika Management Area.[2] It is named after Muncho Lake, which is in the park and is both the name of the lake and of the community located there.

Folded mountains, geological formations, are visible above the road in the southern part of the park.

Source: Wikipedia

[illustratus]

View of Kullen in Sweden. Smugglers hide their goods among the rocks. Moonlight

by Louis Gurlitt

[rjzimmerman]

Excerpt from this story from Outside Online:

On February 29, Daniel, Wyoming resident Cody Roberts allegedly ran a juvenile wolf down with his snowmobile, taped its mouth shut, transported it to the town’s Green River Bar, posed for photos with the animal, then either beat or shot it to death, depending on which version of the report you read. State wildlife officials received a tip about the incident, and later fined Roberts $250 for a misdemeanor violation of Wyoming’s prohibition against possession of live wildlife. No other charges or penalties have been brought against him. As of April 10, however, the Sublette County Sheriff’s Office announced that they—along with the Sublette County Attorney’s office—are now investigating Roberts.

“The individual was cited for a misdemeanor violation of Wyoming Game and Fish Commission regulations, Chapter 10, Importation and Possession of Live Warm-Blooded Wildlife,” says the Wyoming Game and Fish Department in a statement addressing the incident. “The department’s investigation indicated there were no other statutory or regulatory violations.”

The 206-word statement itself acknowledges the controversy that’s raging around the incident, saying: “The department acknowledges the significant concern and dismay expressed by many people from around the state and nation.”

Why was Roberts able to torture a wolf to death with no serious consequences? The answer lies not only in Wyoming’s incredibly lax wildlife regulations, but also in the violence that permeates the relationship between the state and its most famous wild animal.

After being extirpated in 1926, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) reintroduced wolves to Wyoming in Yellowstone National Park in 1995. Wolves, the villains in many childhood stories, are a locus of fear for humans. But the animal also serves a vital role in its native ecosystem, where it helps keep ungulate populations healthy by slowing the spread of disease. And it does that at a net financial benefit to taxpayers, since tourists now flock to the state to view wolves. A study conducted in 2021 found that wolf-related tourism brings over $35 million annually to areas surrounding the park.

Speaking of taxes, before all the culture warring and fear mongering, it was the goal of the Republican Party to reduce tax burdens faced by the wealthy and corporations. The Republican Party’s policy positions are widely unpopular, so the GOP instead hoodwinks voters using fear and lies. The Republican-led Wyoming Statehouse passed a bill in 2021 calling to exterminate 90 percent of the state’s wolf population—a bill based on lies and misinformation. Pushing for policies based on fear instead of science has led to regulations around wolves that are unique among wildlife laws, mostly in their encouragement of cruelty.

When management of the species transferred from federal to state control in 2012, Wyoming’s political leaders established two distinct areas with differing population management goals. Areas adjacent to Yellowstone were set aside for trophy hunting, where wolf hunting is regulated. The rest of the state was designated a “predator zone” where wolves can be killed without regulation, reason, or justification. Wyoming also classifies coyotes, red fox, stray cats, jackrabbits, porcupines, raccoons and striped skunks as predators, and permits killing them throughout the state.

“You could pull a wolf apart with horses in 85 percent of the state,” explains Amaroq Weiss, Senior Wolf Advocate at the Center for Biological Diversity. In the predator zone, there is no regulation governing how or when wolves can be killed. This stands in contrast to typical hunting regulations in any other state, where what are called “methods of take” are carefully defined to ensure animals are killed in ethical, humane ways, along with precise dates, to-the-minute guidelines on legal shooting hours, and generally universal bans on artificial light sources. The age and sex of animals it’s permissible to shoot are also written in law. But none of that is true in Wyoming’s predator zone when it comes to wolves. You don’t even need a hunting license or tag to kill one, just the opportunity.

Weiss cites “wolf whacking” as an example, and it’s how Roberts captured the wolf he would go on to torture and kill. The term describes using a snowmobile to run a wolf to the point of exhaustion. Once it slows or collapses, you kill the animal by running it over. As Roberts’ escapade demonstrates, sometimes that might take multiple impacts, and sometimes the animal is simply left to die a slow, painful death.

[inatungulates]

Northern Rocky Mountain white-tailed deer Odocoileus virginianus ochrourus

Observed by adam_kalab, CC BY-NC

[just-slightly-chayotic]

trying to figure out where we're all moving in case tumblr does get nuked in between being like yeah this is the end of my social media era you can reach me by carrier pigeon from now on

[postcard-from-the-past]

Rocky beach of Audreselles, Picardy region of northern France

French vintage postcard

[tarnishedxknight]

Fortress: A Little Directory for the Final Fantasy Game That Never Happened

{out of dalmasca} I don’t know how I missed all of this information, given how much I’ve searched for information about Basch over the years, but I recently found this set of sites discussing Fortress, the canceled sequel to Final Fantasy XII for which Basch would have been the main protagonist. They explained a lot more about the game than I ever knew before, so I thought I would pass them along to other fans who may not have seen them either.

Not much is known about it, as it never got out of the early stages of development before the project was canceled. It was abandoned after its now-defunct production studio, Grin, and Square Enix, the makers of FFXII, had some serious creative differences about everything from the climate and type of terrain to use, to story pacing and the levels of involvement of returning characters.

Fortress was supposed to have centered mainly around a titular, highly magical fortress in northern Ivalice that would have seen Basch (as Judge Magister Gabranth), Queen Ashelia, Emperor Larsa, and others from FFXII charged with defending it from various threats, the most formidable of which was a new villain, Loemund, the King of the Sea. Unfortunately, Grin pushed for the use of a recycled world design from another previously scrapped game, including terrain and climate biomes that didn’t match with that of Ivalice in FFXII:

This was just the start of some of the catastrophic creative differences between Grin and Square Enix that, along with Grin’s studio ultimately closing, sealed Fortress’ fate before it ever had a chance.

Below are links to a three-part article (the first link is the hub and the next three are the parts of the article) that explains a great deal of information about Fortress, including clothing and enemy design, setting, gameplay, and storyboards. The last link outlines the entire story of the game, so don’t read it unless you want spoilers, although since this game is unlikely ever to be picked up by another studio, I doubt that matters very much. If you are a fan specifically of Basch, Ashelia, Larsa, or even Zargabaath, you’ll want to read the story. It... is not at all what I expected and has some twists and turns that have definitely left me... feeling some things.

If I find more information about this game in my travels, I will add to this directory, but for now, I’ll leave these here for anyone who is interested and to save them for my own reference:

Everything We Know About Fortress, the Canceled Final Fantasy XII Sequel

The Story Behind Fortress, the Final Fantasy Game That Never Was

The Canceled Final Fantasy XII Sequel: Narrative and Gameplay Revealed

The Story of Fortress, the Canceled Final Fantasy XII Sequel

Feel free to reply to this post with your comments on the story if you do read it. I would love to know what other fans of FFXII think of it.

[rainysaturdayafternoon]

AUGH

[chryzuree]

chryzure on the beach, who’s picking up seashells and who’s getting stung by jellyfish

both are picking up seashells.. they wake up at dawn specifically to walk along the beach + pick up seashells. chrysi’s always handing them to azure, so his arms are completely full. he loves her dearly but please,,, leave him a hand free to hold hers,,,

anyway, azure gets soooo stung by a jellyfish. bad luck bunny and his horrible, awful, terrible, no good day.

[rabbitcruiser]

Muncho Lake, BC (No. 1)

Muncho Lake is a highway services community in northern British Columbia, Canada, located at Mile 462 on Highway 97, the Alaska Highway, within Muncho Lake Provincial Park and on the south end of the lake of the same name. The community consists almost entirely of travel and tourism-related businesses such as lodging, game outfitting, restaurants, gas stations and fishing outfitting.

Source: Wikipedia

[mynamemeanscute]

muncho lake provincial park, bc

[dragonic-wolf-soul]

Okay so-- scrap that brown wolf identity, I found out I'm a northern rocky mountain wolf,,,,

[octal-alchemist]

the culture of the rocky mountains is hard for me to define since ive basically never left. but i feel like our weird ways of coping w loneliness & isolation definitely play a part.

we love being seen as honest, straight-forward, cowboy-type people but we also love to bluff knowledge we dont have and exaggerate negative aspects of stories as part of a neverending trauma competition. google check anything an older person says and theyll never look you in the eye again.

related, i feel like folks from east & west coast do eye contact differently from what I'm used to, but i can't put my finger on all what exactly.

also just like? i feel like we're the least passionate people in the US. lack of motivation is just intrinsic to mountain living. any club i join or event i attend, there's like 2 passionate people and 3-300 people who came bc there was nothing better to do.

any opinions or thoughts on this

[swkrullimaging]

Spirit of the Wolf

Horrific story of wolf abuse coming out of Wyoming generating national and worldwide outrage. Finally perhaps the Spirit of the Wolf will finally be respected. Wolf Abuse in Wyoming Here’s a link to the story in the New York Post. There’s plenty written about the actual story all over local news and social media already, so I don’t need to retell the story in detail. The main point is that a…

[sopha-luff]

[bevanne46]

365 Things To Do In Scenic Washington State

#345 - Did you know that the Sherman Pass Scenic Byway (Hwy-20), located in the Northeast corner of the state, is one of the highest drivable mountain passes in Washington? At 5,575 feet in elevation, this exceptional corner of the state - a point where the Columbia River Plateau meets the Northern Rocky Mountains -offers breathtaking views and year round access for traveling. In this pic by Craig Goodwin, the larch trees putting on their dazzling fall display.

Visit Northeast Washington