[Music]
Hello and welcome to In Wisconsin.
I'm Patty Low.
Each week we bring you stories from around the
state about the people places and issues in Wisconsin.
This week, Sora with the swans has they migrate from the
Arctic to the Mississippi.
Walk through the woods of Door County and
discover how nature can be interpreted as art.
And experience a 24 hour bike
race through a forest near Warsaw.
Stay with us for all this and more in Wisconsin.
Major funding for In Wisconsin is provided by the
people of Alliance Energy who bring safe, reliable
and environmentally friendly energy to keep homes,
neighborhoods, and life in Wisconsin running
smoothly. Alliance Energy, offering energy-saving
ideas on the web.
We begin this week's show with our continuing Where
in Wisconsin Issues series.
The series examines topics that you told us are
particularly important to you this election year.
One of those issues is health
care. So this week we ask, can you put a price on good
health? Producer Art Hackett visits a new clinic in
Ashwabanan that's giving the uninsured the
opportunity to do just that.
The InfoMade Clinic is just across the road from
Menards. That's appropriate.
They both promise big big savings.
I see this model as like the Sam's Club of
Health Care, allowing people to have the opportunity
to purchase health care at lower cost but good quality
products. Good morning Danielle.
The clinic's target population includes people
like Danielle Zyrwinski who are paying for health
care out of their own pocket.
We don't have health insurance for the place I work
and I saw the ad for informant in the newspaper and I
thought I'd give it a try.
Zyrwinski had been to the clinic once before and
went through an enrolment procedure and basic health
screening that normally costs $48 for a year.
It's marked down to 20 bucks for the grand opening
special. You know a lot of these symptoms that
you're having, they kind of intermingle.
InfoMade claims they can offer care for a last
because they make use of nurse practitioners like
Don Bullwork.
She had a very large list of things that
we could check and I tried to break it down and start
small. But they also use a computer program.
Robert calls it the knowledge coupler to help the
practitioner make a diagnosis and decide what tests
make the most sense.
We'll do your lab today.
Check you for side-way for sure
and I think that's a great starting point.
I know what do you think.
Instead of just going to a doctor's office
and saying I'm tired and then they don't know exactly
what's wrong with this computer system that seems
like it breaks it all down for them.
Anything on this list that kind of jumps out
at you that you say hey you know I've heard of that
or my grandma had that or this is something I really
want checked or okay.
Zawinski says the staff were friendly and helpful but
she was there based on the price and the fact that she
lost her insurance when she lost her old job.
The price of the thyroid
tests was $37.
After we interviewed Zawinski,
Robert told her the test was on the house.
Thank you for putting up with a
TV camera.
Whether Zawinski will become a permanent
customer is unknown.
If you had a job that had a more traditional insurance
plan, would you like that better at this point?
Yes. Why would you prefer that?
Because I could go back to see my regular doctor.
But the most recent statistics from the Census Bureau
show 593,000 people without health insurance in
Wisconsin in 2003.
That's an increase of 55,000 people
from the year before.
Clinics like InfoMed may become the way of the future
if more people turn to pricing healthcare costs
and paying for them with individual medical savings
accounts. You can tune in Friday night at 7 for the
program here and now and learn more about MSAs and
the proposed healthcare policies of the US Senate
candidates. We move now from healthcare
to what some call medicine for the soul.
Producer Lori Gorman introduces us
to Algoma artist Donal Look who weaves her walks through
the woods into inspiration for her unique designs.
A walk in the Wisconsin woodlands or some it's an
invigorating hike for others a relaxing straw.
But for Algoma artist Donal Look
a walk through a stand of Wisconsin Birch is more of
an expedition.
I don't like to purchase materials other
than thread.
I just like to collect my own materials.
I'm taking bark off of trees that will be logged.
These areas have all been marked
by logging companies.
They will be either clear cut
or selectively logged and they will be logged and
down within the year.
So I'm not going out wherever
I see a great tree and just ripping the bark off of it.
I assess the trees as to whether they're good trees,
good useful trees, meaning useful for me.
These good useful trees destined for
logging provide the raw materials for looks art.
Birch baskets that are found in
the collections of museums across the country.
But it all begins in the woods
of northern Wisconsin.
It begins there because that's where I collect
materials and the materials often dictate what I should
do with it.
Every tree is different.
I think it's it sounds silly but I think
it's somewhat like people.
We all have different skin tones and I have a lot
more freckles and someone else is dark.
Every tree has a different kind of
complexion to it.
For some pieces might have these tiny
little lines and others have really large big gross
lines. You can tell I've looked at a lot of bark.
So it's I've seen it in different
ways and I try to look at it carefully in the woods
so that I can make notes about what I might I might
use it for.
One year we were collecting and I remember
it was freezing rain and then it started snowing
and it was painful.
It was so cold and the next day I
think it was 90 in the same spot and the no-seam and
the bugs and just start swarming and biting.
It's very precious to me because
it's taken a lot of work to go out and collect it.
Back in her studio these precious
supplies are transformed into vessels that combine the
natural world and find design.
I think that originally the idea in my head is a vision
of some a certain form and some of those ideas or those
visions I think probably come from my environment
obviously. I'm a gardener.
I grow a lot of things like pumpkins and vegetable
forms. I live in a place where I have a lot of
flower gardens and natural a really naturally beautiful
environment and I see a lot of different pod forms and
leaf forms that are always inspirational and I think
that's I think that's entering into my imagination
and just that's where the original ideas come from.
Looks talent for seeing in different ways has led to
numerous honors including two national endowment for
the arts fellowships but it all begins with a few
simple tools and her woodland harvest.
I learned to sew as a child, my grandmother
and my mother both sewed a lot and I was taught how
to sew by hand before I was able to sew on a machine and
I've always really liked that process of sewing and
I've always enjoyed working with my hands so it seemed
like a normal thing to weave and sew.
I've seen myself as coming from a
basket tradition because I use materials that I collect
myself and I see that as a part of the ancient
tradition of basket weaving that is really prehistoric.
There were baskets before there was any written
word and I see that as that tradition and I'm proud to
be part of that.
I don't pay attention from start to
finish an hour by hour how much time is in anyone of
them. One piece can take very little time and one piece
can take years and never be resolved and then
some of them end up in it covered to be for years to
be someday maybe resolved.
It's just a cup full of questions.
To me it's an evolution of from one thing
to another and what I learned there I hope I can use beyond
and so I keep I see it as one long learning process.
It's something I will do as long as I can see the needle
and thread and I can work with my hands.
It's something that I really like to do.
I would hope the people see my work as art and see
that there is a quality of craftsmanship there.
The raw materials of a Wisconsin
forest crafted into art through the hands and vision of
Donal Look.
A walk through the woods for a Donal Look
is a serene and peaceful experience but for the people
in our next story a day in the woods is anything but
tranquil producer Liz Kerner took to the
trails to bring us more.
It's the middle of the night in the middle of summer
in the middle of a forest.
More than 500 mountain bikers take to the trail in the 24
hours of 9 mile Wisconsin's only 24 hour endurance race.
It's a lot of fun it's good exercise it gets your
heart pumping and so we have a blast.
It's the fifth year for this event held at 9
mile County Forest near Wassau.
It's funny at night the weirdest thing for me is
how quiet and how alone you can feel out there at 25
minutes where I didn't see anybody.
You only have this little beam of light you
know and so you if you're pretty focused.
It's a nice big deer this afternoon.
You never know what you're gonna come on out there.
It definitely pushes your endurance limits and makes you
think twice about why you're doing it in the
middle of the night when you rather be sleeping and the
racers ride through the night but the starting gun
went off at 10 in the morning.
The race begins with a sprint to the bikes.
It's called a Le Mans start named
after the Le Mans car race.
The function part of it is it it spreads the the
riders out before they get on their bikes and get
out on the trail so it's a little bit safer too.
Some riders take on the 24 hour challenge solo
stopping only when necessary but most racers join a
four or five person relay team.
The team members take turns out on the trail.
24 hour racing is not for everybody but the
competitors cite many reasons for settling up.
I'm just a glutton for punishment.
It's mostly a team camaraderie
type thing it's fun.
Every year I'm Pit Crew and
I'm sick of being on the sidelines and said it's my
turn. I mean our families come up the kids and the
wives and we all hang out.
It's a good time.
The event can be fun for the
entire family.
There's a communal atmosphere with
a field full of tents lots of lawn chairs and
people of all ages enjoying a day outdoors.
Some groups get into the spirit of the
event when choosing a team name.
Team full and why you call that?
It's raw fools.
Lightheaded crew because that's how I feel about
that I did the first lap a little lightheaded.
The name of our team is Forest
Hump. In our motto was Hettle Forest, Hettle.
And then there's the Whistling Pigs.
Race organizers have fun with names too.
There are 20 race categories including
the Clydesdale's.
A category teams can choose to enter
if members average 200 pounds or more.
And for a team with an average age
over 45 they've created a category called older than
dirt. These guys sometimes get the last laugh.
Oftentimes the older guys are the faster guys
because they're the really committed and serious ones
about it.
The race course weaves around curves and
over the hills of a densely wooded forest.
The trail features a few technical
spots with tight turns, trees too close and rocks that
trip up riders.
Each lap is 15.6 miles long
and takes between one and two hours to ride.
It's a course for all abilities.
The better riders just ride it faster.
The beginning riders do it a
little bit slower and take their time if they're not
comfortable in a section.
If you don't they get off the bike and walk.
For the team competitors there's plenty of downtime
between laps.
Time to cure on teammates, tune up
bikes and after the sun sets enjoy some camaraderie
around a campfire.
Relay team riders waiting for their
turn may be tired enough to catch some shut-eye but not
everyone can forget the competition and fall asleep.
Didn't sleep at all.
No I tried, laid down a couple
times. It's surprising how fast time goes by.
You think about it you're you know we
are turning about hour and 15 minute laps and you
think oh you've got three and a half hours in between
but it goes by real fast.
The next morning the tents come down and sleeping bags
are rolled away and stalwart teammates head out for
one last lap before the clock rolls over
the 24 hour mark.
Winners and all 20 categories are those who complete
the most number of laps in the least amount of time.
It's exhausting but race rules
require each team to have a rider cross the finish line
after 24 hours so some riders simply wait near the
finish line for the final countdown.
After the race riders head for home.
The cash rewards for winning are small.
The real rewards come from taking
on this 24 hour challenge and while some of these
bikers return year after year that decision is far
away. Right now most are thinking about only one
thing. Sleep.
Sleep first I want to shower if there's
water left and then I'm going to sleep for a very long time.
[Music]
Fall is here and that means leaves are turning and birds
are on the move south.
For some birds the journey is
longer than others take the Tundra Swan each year these
long distance travelers fly thousands of miles from the
Arctic to the Chesapeake Bay.
Producer Joanne Garrett caught up with the birds and
some of their admirers in a small town on the Mississippi.
You can find them just off Highway 35 north of Alma
in a place called Rick Slank just listen.
These rather loud visitors like
to hang out in front of this observation deck.
It's not a very big deck but it's at
a big impact on the small town of Alma which is very
fond of these visitors.
The visitors are Tundra Swans migrating through from
the Arctic on their way to Chesapeake Bay.
Harry Buck is a retired schoolteacher and former
resident of Alma who seems to sum up the town's delight and
fascination with Tundra Swans.
Well gosh how can you not like them they're just
such marvelous creatures.
Start with the fact that the Swans can find the
city of Alma.
Their global positioning system is
wonderful. They don't have any radio and it tells them that
they're at Alma when they're above the clouds you better
circle down.
They circle down for this crucial
R&R in Alma.
They'll stay from mid-October to
freeze-up. It's a chance to rest and feed on a 4,000
mile long migration.
These birds are truly top flight
flyers. They go from here to the east coast in in one
flight and how far is it 1300 miles, 1100 miles.
They can fly up to 100 they've
been clocked up to 100 miles an hour but with a tailwind.
They have a seven-foot wind span and are described
by ournithologists as the most aerodynamic of birds.
Tundras can be found all along the Mississippi from
Alma down to Iowa but they tend to congregate here.
This confluence where the Buffalo River hits the big
muddy. And part of it is because it's close to hunting.
There are no boats going back and forth in here.
Water depth was right, the food
was there and so I think they've formed a habit of
coming here.
It's just a nice place.
It is a nice place especially if you're a
swan. Rick's Lake is a swan smorgasbord.
Chuck Fulg, one of their favorite foods,
Arrowhead which grows a tasty tuber down in the mud.
They love it.
This place is perfect for swans.
They first started soaring in here in the
late 60s.
Their arrival sparked another migration of
tourists and bird watchers which in turn sparked an Alma
swan watch.
It's a group of volunteers.
People like Buck and Grant sites who
working for the watch.
Have turned the observation deck into a place where
people can not only look but also learn about tundras
swans. A place where they can look and learn about all
their wildlife.
It calls this place home.
From the 15th of October until Thanksgiving or the
first part of December we have people on the platform every
day from 10 o'clock and they stay there until dusk.
The beauty of it is that you don't have a railroad track
in front of you.
You don't have a highway in front
of you and you're close and you look through the
scope and you can look right into a little black eye.
The swan watch began in 1992 when Buck, a
retired teacher, saw an opportunity for education.
When we first were building the platform there was a
person on the platform and there were about 2,000 swans
in front of him and they were making the noise that
you hear the swan noise.
He was talking to his tape as
he recorded and he said that sound you hear is coming
from all those snow geese that are out in front of me.
That man's misidentification sparked a mission.
Buck guessed that there might be some interest
in tundra swans.
He didn't guess how much.
The retired teacher and his wife offered to
be on deck on a Sunday to answer questions about the birds.
So one of the merchants, MimioGraft, 100 pages
of this information and we took it out there
on the Sunday afternoon and 700 people showed up.
We find that people absolutely are fascinated
by this bird.
They have hundreds and hundreds of questions
about, well how does it do this?
How does it find its way?
Is there any fox or anything like that?
Like natural enemies?
Oh sure.
Information. Questions.
They pack the place.
10 to 20,000 people a year seeking swans, which in turn,
flutters through Alma in tourism and trade.
What this does for the area, for the communities up and down the
river, is extends their tourist season by about six weeks.
All was going swimmingly, but as
anyone who lives along the river will tell you, there is an ebb
and flow here.
Things come and go.
And what is gone from Rick's Lake is water.
We have maybe a foot of water and average six inches to a
foot of water in the open areas.
It's a long time story of rivers.
It's the story of silt.
And silt creates complications.
We're looking at one, the Burr Reed, a brown clumpy plant
that infests shallow waterways.
It limits the number of swans it can come in because they
need open water because they have to take off into the wind
and they have to have a run-go.
They need their runway.
The birds are bailing and the numbers are
down from the peaks of just a few years ago.
There were 6,000 swans one day counted by the Fish and Wildlife
Service. And if you were standing on the deck, it looked
like the water was covered with popcorn.
You could hardly see the water.
Now if we have three, four hundred
there, that's a big day.
But this story has a happy ending in the form of a national
scenic byways grant.
Fed our money for Rick's
Lake. Think if you dredge it, they will come.
Either next summer or the summer after they will take silt
and the Burr Reed out of there to a depth of about three feet,
which is the depth that the swans can reach with their
long beak.
And so hopefully that area in front of the platform
will be weed free again.
And therefore you should see many, many more swans.
We'll probably be counting swans
in the thousands rather than the hundreds.
It's remarkable now.
It should be even better.
Look forward for next year's migration wings in, passing
through the Mississippi River.
It's our good fortune to be their restite before they make
their way east and they're gone.
Since we first brought you that report, the U.S.
Department of Transportation has started
testing the soil in the proposed dredge site and anticipates
that dredging will take place in 2005.
If you'd like to see the tundra swans for yourself,
the almost swan watch begins October 16th.
You can find more information on our website at
wpt.org/inwisconsin. The watch lasts until it freezes or
the swans leave generally after about six weeks.
That's our program for this week.
For In Wisconsin, I'm Patty Low.
We'll see you next time.
[crickets chirping]
Major funding for In Wisconsin is provided by the people of
a lient energy who brings safe, reliable and environmentally
friendly energy to keep homes, neighborhoods,
and life in Wisconsin running smoothly.
A lient energy offering energy-sitting
ideas on the web.
[music fades out]
[crickets chirping]