A Good Year for Pinks
Pink Salmon Head
We took a stroll down to Puntledge Park in Courtenay the other day, to see the salmon in action. All seemed quiet at first, then with a sudden splash we spotted a salmon, swimming up through the riffles of the stream. The salmon spawn is a beautiful thing, and reminder of the natural cycles of life and death that we are all a part of. Along river’s edge, we found a freshly deceased male pink salmon, and admired the colours and markings of the fish up close. The pink salmon (Oncorhynchus gorbuscha) is the smallest and most abundant of the five species of Pacific salmon. Pinks weigh between 1.0-3.3 kg, and are 45-55 cm long. A key identification feature is the tail, which has tiny scales that have no silver, and distinctively large oval spots. Continue reading »
Meet the Bigleaf Maple Tree
Bigleaf Maple Tree
Jumping into a pile of yellow and rusty-coloured maple leaves is one of the many joys of the fall season. These huge leaves come from the “bigleaf” maple tree, which has the largest maple leaves in all of Canada. Though not as spectacular as the fiery red leaves of eastern Canada’s maples, the bigleaf maple nonetheless adds a splash of fall colour to an otherwise green and grey coastal landscape. Continue reading »
A Prickly Subject
Bull Thistle
With a baby and a toddler a lot of small jobs go by the wayside, including the removal of a large, weedy bull thistle from our front yard. It bloomed a while ago, and Dave decided to take a picture of it. Despite its thorny character, the thistle flower, with its purple crown, is a thing of beauty.
Thistles are a prickly subject. Canada thistle, in particular, is considered a noxious weed in many countries, including Canada, the U.S., Australia, New Zealand and Brazil. This pesky thistle easily takes over farm fields and pastures and can be hard to remove. Continue reading »
Hornby Island Getaway
I recently spent a lovely few days on Hornby Island at a friends’ rustic cabin. By rustic I mean no electricity or running water, and an outhouse in the woods. It was actually refreshing to get away from modernity, and live the simple life (at least for a while!)
Swiss cheese-like holes in the sandstone
There are a lot of tourists on Hornby in the summer, and the majority are “doing the rounds,” checking out deservedly gorgeous spots like Helliwell Provincial Park and Tribune Bay. We did likewise, but we also spent some time at a quiet cove at a public beach access at the end of Tralee Rd. Continue reading »
The Story of Stinging Nettle
My brother and I used to ride our red wagon down a hill, at the bottom of which was a sizeable patch of stinging nettle. Despite our parents’ warning, the inevitable happened, and we both took a tumble into the nettles. The resulting stinging rash made me carefully avoid any further encounters with this plant. Continue reading »