The Cookie guy

My manhood and my self esteem have gone to bits… what is worse, I doubt that it can be repaired.

It all started last autumn when Nadia told me that it is easy to remember my name since they sell a type of cookie called “Orjan” in Ulaanbaatar, and hence, I was the “Cookie guy”. I suppose I could live with this. Sure “Cookie guy” might not be the toughest of nicknames but what the heck, the people in the Gobi have probably not heard of Orjan cookies. Then, I realized that a few of the herders seemed amused at my nice Chinese motorbike. Turned out that it’s a “girl’s bike” according to Mongolian men… Damn it. Well, that got sorted out when we got the new dirt bike.

So, in February, Nadia dropped the bomb; Orjan is not a type of cookie… it literally means “cookie” in Mongolian… What are the odds? I had never considered moving to Mongolia–I mean it is a very nice country and all, but before I met Tom, Mongolia had never crossed my mind as a place where I might live. But even so, I moved abroad and obviously, my name has to mean something in the new country… and not something cool like “slick” or “tiger” or… whatever. Nope, it means “cookie”.

My closest neighbor at the first trap camp, Battur, came visiting at least once every week. We drank tea, looked at pictures and tried to have a conversation, but that didn’t work very well. Every time Battur saw Friday (my domestic cat) he said “baba”. I could tell from his body language that “baba” meant something bad but I had never heard the word before and didn’t find it in the dictionary. So when Bayara was in Base Camp in early April I asked what “baba” meant and explained how I had heard it. Bayara laughed and told me that “baba” is baby-language and means “bad”… baby-language??… Hi, my name is Cookie, I used to drive a girl’s motorbike and the locals talk to me in baby language… Something has to be done…

My current plan is to trade the dirt bike for a Chopper, grow long hair and keep it in a pony-tail, do some base jumping from the mountain peaks and start smoking. That’s dangerous. Maybe I should get some tattoos too… yup, a couple of tattoos can’t hurt.

The sixth snow leopard

Yeeeeeeeeeaaaahhhiiii!!

A female. We have a female. And it is a very pretty female too.

We caught her in a trap very close to Camp and since it was dark we decided to walk there instead of taking the bikes. On the way to the trap we met four horses, they turned and ran towards the trap. I had a bad feeling, thinking that I might have trapped a horse and went over drug dosages for horses in my head. The trap was placed on a trail at a corner of a cliff wall in a fairly big valley and I assume that there are other animals besides snow leopards that use the trail so there could very well be a horse in the trap. Odd enough neither Emma nor Meg understands why I put the trap there. Sure it might not look like much but it is all about what it feels like. And it felt good.

Our female behaved very different than the males, she just lied down flat in some bushes. I had to walk up close to her to even see the thigh. Well, I darted her and everything went fine. All our captures are uneventful. The drug mix and dose seems perfect and all vital signs for the cats (breathing, temperature and pulse) have been very good during all the captures.

We named the cat Suhder, it means shadow in Mongolian. Feels as if we have been chasing a shadow. She weighs just a little more than 30 kg. though she seemed to have an empty stomach so she would probably have weighed a couple more kg if she had had a good meal before we trapped her.

We are out of collars and therefore collected the traps and broke camp. I am back in Base Camp again and awaiting further orders. Or collars. Either is fine.

Oh, the desert is flowering right now. Maybe not too impressive if you arrive her now but to me that has seen it for such a long time it is fantastic! So many beautiful flowers in this harsh terrain. Extraordinary, just extraordinary.

Fifth capture

We caught our fifth snow leopard a couple of days ago. I don’t suppose that I have to write which sex it is… His name is probably Saikhan or Saihan, Mongolians use the Cyrillic alphabet and I am not sure how to spell his name, if this will be his name, I am not sure about that either. Saikhan means “beautiful” in Mongolian, this cat has the prettiest spot pattern of all the ones that we have caught or photographed in Tost Uul (so I think).

He is the smallest snow leopard that we have caught so far, weighing about 33 kg. Meg, a vet from Seattle is here for a couple of weeks and she provided good aid during the capture.  

We have spent the last days scouting the area around Base Camp to see if there are any good trap sites in the vicinity. I will move back to Base camp in early June. Rumor has it that there is a lot of people coming to camp in mid-June. That will be a change, can’t even imagine what it will be like to have more than two people around me. I have been here for almost four months and it’s almost three months until I go home. That feels like a very, very long time right now. 

Hey, does anyone out there know anyone who works at Yamaha? I am in desperate need of one more dirt bike and thought that maybe they would consider donating one. If you have any ideas, please post them on the blog.

Fourth snow leopard

I am doing something wrong. We caught our fourth snow leopard a couple of days ago. It is a … male. Surprise eh? Don’t know what it is that I do but I don’t seem to be able to catch females. The leopard is probably a youngster, he was quite small and weighed a little less than 35 kg. We named him Shonkhor (it means falcon in Mongolian). There is a pair of falcons nesting at the trap site and falcons symbolize youth in Mongolia (according to Nadia). I checked traps at three in the night and when I tuned in the trap that we caught him in it was slow first but suddenly changed to fast pulse. Weird, don’t know if my mind played a trick with me or not due to the late hour. Seems like too much of a co-incidence to trap him when I listen to the trap…

Anyways, this guy was not as aggressive as Tsagaan, instead he used a new tactic to avoid being darted. He rolled around and laid on his back. Tricky. Very tricky. 

The teachers I have had on immobilization courses haven’t said anything about where to aim on animals laying on their back… I considered a few places but in the end I had to move in closer to make him roll around again.

The capture went smooth and Emma managed to get blood samples from him (I bow my head and admit that I have been beaten in that skill)…

I hope that Shonkhor is a youngster and that he is moving around to find an area to settle down in. Would be great to get some data on snow leopard

dispersal.   

I am doing something wrong. We caught our fourth snow leopard a couple of days ago. It is a … male. Surprise eh? Don’t know what it is that I do but I don’t seem to be able to catch females. The leopard is probably a youngster, he was quite small and weighed a little less than 35 kg. We named him Shonkhor (it means falcon in Mongolian). There is a pair of falcons nesting at the trap site and falcons symbolize youth in Mongolia (according to Nadia). I checked traps at three in the night and when I tuned in the trap that we caught him in it was slow first but suddenly changed to fast pulse. Weird, don’t know if my mind played a trick with me or not due to the late hour. Seems like too much of a co-incidence to trap him when I listen to the trap…

Anyways, this guy was not as aggressive as Tsagaan, instead he used a new tactic to avoid being darted. He rolled around and laid on his back. Tricky. Very tricky. 

The teachers I have had on immobilization courses haven’t said anything about where to aim on animals laying on their back… I considered a few places but in the end I had to move in closer to make him roll around again.

The capture went smooth and Emma managed to get blood samples from him (I bow my head and admit that I have been beaten in that skill)…

I hope that Shonkhor is a youngster and that he is moving around to find an area to settle down in. Would be great to get some data on snow leopard dispersal.

Ibex and sandstorms

Emma left today. This must be the emptiest day in the Gobi for me. We have built ten traps, put out a few cameras, checked some kill sites and enjoyed the mountains. This is a spectacular place. Oh, I have had a shower too. I am afraid that I used all the hot water in the hotel, but it was worth it. To me at least, don’t know what the other guests thought, if there were any. Tourist season hasn’t started yet.

A week ago we caught an ibex in one of our traps and after consulting my immobilization handbook for the correct dose and drug mix I darted it. Nothing happened… So I darted it again… Nothing happened… Well, shame on people who give up… I darted it again. Nothing happened…

I didn’t dare to dart it again so after consulting Emma we jumped it and wrestled it down. We got the snare of and let her go, she was a little shaky from the drugs and had some small cuts but otherwise she was in good shape. Seems as if ibex get a bit more stressed in traps than snow leopards do and therefore the recommended drugs is not enough. 

I have cracked or broken a rib, not sure which but it points out a little so I lean towards the latter. Not very fun when we are bouncing around on bikes and climbing mountains (and wrestling ibex) but it works. Besides I broke it in such a stupid way that I can’t really whine about it. 

Early one evening as I was typing in data on the computer, the ger suddenly got dark. We looked out and the sky was all yellow. A huge sandstorm was coming towards us. I didn’t think it would be too bad since we are in the mountains and we thought it was a little exciting at first (Yup, like two tourists). Soon it got a little more exciting, the storm ripped the ger’s cover and plastic sheet apart like nothing. We tied the ger down with our

water cans, our gas cans, the two motorbikes, everything we had, but it was still a close call. I crawled around on the roof, trying to tie ropes across the biggest holes in the ger cover and putting heavy items on the roof while

Emma tied down items along the walls. Most of our furniture got blown or knocked over as the ger moved, first the kitchen cupboard fell over, spreading broken plates and cups over the floor. Emma is a tough girl but she didn’t look completely happy as she hung on to one of the poles that hold the ger up to prevent it from going up into the air. The morning after we had a layer of sand all over the floor and our gear and the entire ger looked like a battle field. It must have been cold because there was still a layer of ice in all our water at two in the afternoon. Oyuna says that almost 20 people died in the storm. Poor herders, they probably had to tend to their animals. We were never in any real danger, if the ger had blown away we could have made a shelter with our furniture and some felt and stayed in our sleeping bags and blankets but I wouldn’t have wanted to go out in the storm for any longer time.

Emma left today. This must be the emptiest day in the Gobi for me. We have built ten traps, put out a few cameras, checked some kill sites and enjoyed the mountains. This is a spectacular place. Oh, I have had a shower too. I am afraid that I used all the hot water in the hotel, but it was worth it. To me at least, don’t know what the other guests thought, if there were any. Tourist season hasn’t started yet.

A week ago we caught an ibex in one of our traps and after consulting my immobilization handbook for the correct dose and drug mix I darted it. Nothing happened… So I darted it again… Nothing happened… Well, shame on people who give up… I darted it again. Nothing happened…

I didn’t dare to dart it again so after consulting Emma we jumped it and wrestled it down. We got the snare of and let her go, she was a little shaky from the drugs and had some small cuts but otherwise she was in good shape. Seems as if ibex get a bit more stressed in traps than snow leopards do and therefore the recommended drugs is not enough. 

I have cracked or broken a rib, not sure which but it points out a little so I lean towards the latter. Not very fun when we are bouncing around on bikes and climbing mountains (and wrestling ibex) but it works. Besides I broke it in such a stupid way that I can’t really whine about it. 

Early one evening as I was typing in data on the computer, the ger suddenly got dark. We looked out and the sky was all yellow. A huge sandstorm was coming towards us. I didn’t think it would be too bad since we are in the mountains and we thought it was a little exciting at first (Yup, like two tourists). Soon it got a little more exciting, the storm ripped the ger’s cover and plastic sheet apart like nothing. We tied the ger down with our

water cans, our gas cans, the two motorbikes, everything we had, but it was still a close call. I crawled around on the roof, trying to tie ropes across the biggest holes in the ger cover and putting heavy items on the roof while

Emma tied down items along the walls. Most of our furniture got blown or knocked over as the ger moved, first the kitchen cupboard fell over, spreading broken plates and cups over the floor. Emma is a tough girl but she didn’t look completely happy as she hung on to one of the poles that hold the ger up to prevent it from going up into the air. The morning after we had a layer of sand all over the floor and our gear and the entire ger looked like a battle field. It must have been cold because there was still a layer of ice in all our water at two in the afternoon. Oyuna says that almost 20 people died in the storm. Poor herders, they probably had to tend to their animals. We were never in any real danger, if the ger had blown away we could have made a shelter with our furniture and some felt and stayed in our sleeping bags and blankets but I wouldn’t have wanted to go out in the storm for any longer time.