Oko Wikcemna Nunpa ake Sakpe

Monday, Aug 22 to Sunday, Aug 28, 2011: high 104, low 47

This Sunday evening the wicoti is in its wintertime status. In the pre-sunset calm i removed the tipi covers and liners, and left the two resident rabbits wondering what happened to their four shelters. If you look closely, you can see them in the picture above. One is on the left [south] side of the tipi platform in the foreground, and the other is on the southwest side of the tipi platform in the left middle ground.

Here’s how the process worked to take down the tipis, using the two eastern ones as examples.

First step was to remove the smoke flap poles so i wouldn’t hit my head on them while going in and out of the tipis. The four poles are on the ground between the lodges.

Next step was to remove the doors.

After the doors were rolled up, the liner was untied. The liner has three ties [top, middle and bottom] at each of the 13 poles. Looking closely through the doors you can see the liners on the floors of the tipis, exposing the poles.

Then the liners were pulled outside …

and folded up and placed near the rolled up doors.

Next, i pulled the seven pins above the door and the two below it on the southern tipi …

in order to create enough slack to untie the tie-downs around the outside perimeter of the cover.

Once the cover was no longer tied down, it is rolled up from the door to the lift pole opposite the entry, first one side,

then the other.

The lift pole was then laid down and the cover untied.

Then the lift pole was stood back into its place without the cover which was folded and stacked near the liner and door below.

Then i shifted back to the other tipi–removed the pins and untied the tie-downs …

rolled up the cover onto the lift pole…

and laid the lift pole down, untied the cover, stood the lift pole back up, and folded the cover.

For reference purposes, it took me 42 minutes to remove the doors, covers and liners of these two tipis.

And then just before i left the wicoti with all four doors, liners and covers, one of the two resident mastincalas hopped over to me. We still cannot communicate with even the slightest degree of meaning, so i have no idea what was on his mind.