We marvel at our species’ capacity for knowledge and our feats of engineering, but before us is a jumbo-sized puzzle no human could complete or improve upon by placing a corner-piece in one place or a bit of sky in the other. Yet someone has tried to build onto this puzzle, to tame the land here. The crumpled piles of barbed wire and bleached cow skulls say this place would not go easily.

Apart from the artifacts of defeat, here are some of the things which make this cliff-side canyon a place defined on its own terms, resilient to man:

• A pair of eagles swooping down, searching for food or shelter after a long day’s flight.
• Breezes and gusts split from the prevailing wind and sent swerving around basalt obelisks that rise from the flat grassland.
• The sweetly surprising softness of soggy ground in low places.
• Frail trees holding talus slopes in place against gravity’s anxious call.
• Water that once flowed 300 feet above the escarpments.
• The neon-glow of the lichen scattershot across the eastern cliff-face.

This hanging canyon is a home, a refuge, a restaurant, a pasture. For us it will be subject to a few hour’s study. It will not change (much) before our eyes, yet our sense of what it is will expand exponentially in the finite time we have.

When we leave, this place will have changed within us more than we will have changed within this place. It has seven billion years left, in theory. The land will change, species evolve and life be renewed for another eon. We each have only our lifetime, our small pieces of the puzzle to wander around and wonder at and interpret. So far there are only smudges of humanity’s fingerprints here, leaving the view clear. Sadly it is hard to believe that our species – enfant terrible to the world— will not break this piece to fit the others tossed in a pile nearby.

The plants fought back.  They are just as alive as you and I, but we always forget that.  They start out just as small as we do: as pollen.  They grow through the years, just as we do.  These plants are tough.  They can live many months without water.  Some of these plants go into hibernation, and some of them just sit, and wait, and never change.  The structure of these plants is fascinating.  How, in an area that is so dry, can they live?  They are so close to dust as it is, when the wind blows how are they not taken away, bit by bit until only dead limbs are left?  Some of them do though.  Some are dead and gone forever.  How come they couldn’t survive?

Perhaps survival lies in being a product of the place where one grows. The shape and composition of this place is reflected in the life it gives birth to.  Tough rock, gritty soil, dusty valleys give rise to rough leaves, crisp stems, scratchy blooms, thin membranes, and desperate roots.  These plants pool together where water gathers.

There is surprising gentleness too, sage blossoms and dandelion-like wisps that blow in the winds, fluffy blue flies by the thousands.  Where do they go at night?  How can such soft life hold on in such angry terrain?  The moss too, harsh and black under noon sun, will be green and spongy after a nights rain.  What fresh relief for the eyes now adjusted to the colors of drought and fire: orange yellow, black, earthy.  How fresh and important the small gushings of life are in this vast inhospitable canyon. How sweet the taste of water in a desert.

Rain; a recurring theme in the story of life.  Rain brings life so easily.  Just yesterday this place was dying of thirst, calling to the sky for help.  The sky answered.  The land revitalized, ready for a new season.  It is hard to think that at one time this place was so overwhelmed with water that almost all the life that is here now could not survive.

Not only could the living not survive, but the inanimate could not hold on either.  The Earth as a whole was ripped apart by this flood of Biblical proportions, leaving deep scars that after 15,000 years have yet to heal.  The sheer breadth of the time is staggering.  After 15,000 years this land is still a dry, unforgiving landscape with sharp cliffs and massive granite rocks tossed about as though a child had been playing with his toys and left them scattered about the lawn.  But this force—unstoppable as it is, is the most powerful force on Earth.  It can instantly bring life, while taking it away just as quickly in this harsh world.

This is the Dry Gully. Dry Gully is about 2,755 feet from North to South, and is about 310 feet across. Talus slopes seem to surround the gully almost completely, except for the South East corner. The basin can be broken up into four areas, dried wetland, the talus slopes,  the outlet out of the basin, and dry land. The dried wet land is characterized by the alkali dirt that has dried up at the bottom of the basin. The wet land has become so dry that all of what use to be mud has lost its moisture and started to crack. The talus slope area is surrounding the edge of the gully. Over time the basalt rocks have fallen from the cliffs, and made the edges of the gully slope into the basin.  In the area that does not have talus slopes cascading into the basin, there is a large grouping of sagebrush. This area is much like the dry land. The dry land is anywhere that does not have dried alkali, or basalt rocks. On the dry land many shrubs and grasses grow.

The canyon is about 2/3 mile in length, and about 1/10 mile wide.  The canyon runs west for about 1/4 mile, then south until the mouth opens to the cliff with a 150 ft drop to Deep Lake.  The cliffs of the canyon are about 180 ft tall, with talus slopes leading to the base.

At the northwestern corner of the canyon (at the bend), there was a cave in the cliff where the cliff and the talus slope meet.  From the cave, the entire canyon is visible.  In the gave is a ring of rocks, evidence of human activity in the canyon.  Further evidence that points to human activity includes barbed wire, a cattle skull, hoof prints, and cow patties, all evidence of grazing practices.

Along with the human activity, wild deer and rodents have used this canyon as a place to eat, and possibly take shelter.  We had multiple sightings of deer and rodent feces, as well as deer tracks.

The floor of the canyon is littered with granite eratics.  The floor of he canyon is covered primarily by sagegrass.  Other grasses, including cheatgrass, bunchgrass, bentgrass, and basin wildrye have populated the canyon as well.