WTD#21 - Falling Into Winter

It's been a rainy fall, but there has been the odd sunny break to brighten things up for a while.  The low angle of the sun this late in the year makes for warm, rich colors on the landscape.

This is some moss along the Selkirk College loop trail.  I have been reading Patrick Lane's beautiful memoir, "There Is A Season", and in one chapter he identifies some nineteen mosses and as many lichens which inhabit his half-acre garden in Saanich.  So now I've been shamed into learning my mosses, and have added "Some Common Mosses of BC" to my Christmas wish list.

These tiny mushrooms were growing among the mosses.  I may have to wait until my next lifetime to learn the names of all the mushrooms and fungi.

Rose hips provide a reliable source of rich colour in the late fall and winter.

I'm not sure what this plant is - seed heads from a vine of some sort, growing along the Selkirk College trail.

I was amazed to still find buttercups in bloom on November 26, also along the Selkirk trail where it follows the Kootenay River.

These Barrow's goldeneye ducks apparently overwinter here at the confluence of the Kootenay and Columbia rivers.

Some fall leaves against a very dark background.

Slocan River, late November.

These cottonwood trees by the river seem to be dancing or gesturing.

Thimbleberry leaves.

Snowberry, aka waxberry, along the Slocan rail trail.

Snowberry with a droplet.

Wet Oregon grape leaves.

Bracken fern.

Cottonwood leaves with frost.

Cottonwoods and conifers along the Kootenay River near the canal.

Beaver pond near the Kootenay canal.

Ice crystals are forming on the pond.

And on these wetland grasses.

A bulrush silhouetted against a rare blue sky.

"We'd best soak up some rays while we can!"

WTD#20 - Fall Again

Yes, I guess it is still fall, technically, and we are enjoying a mild spell for early December, but I'm sure the snow is not far off.  Dawg and I have been enjoying our walks in the hills and valleys around home, when we can find time between those last minute chores that always seem to pile up against the impending winter.

These trembling aspen were in full autumn regalia on a hillside in the Pass Creek area.

Aspens provide a brilliant backdrop for a solitary lodgepole pine sapling.

Inside the aspen grove.

Aspen leaves with water droplets.

Ocean spray with seedheads and a few remaining leaves.

More ocean spray.

I'm a sucker for backlit thimbleberry leaves.

Like I said.

The elders have lost their leaves but not their berries.

Leaves and berries along the rail trail, with the Slocan River in the background.

Poison ivy on the edge of the rail trail.

The trumpeter swans have returned to the Slocan River up near Lemon Creek.  This family of two adults and four juveniles allowed me to get quite close for some photos.

It was encouraging to see that four cygnets had survived in this family.  Altogether we estimated forty or fifty swans in the river here - just a guess though.

There is something magical about these birds - they figure so prominently in our mythology and art for a reason, I suppose.  Something almost archtypical about them that reaches a deep region of our being.  What do you think Dawg?

I think you must be some kind of swannabe - arf, arf, arf!

WTD#19 - Island Adventure - The End!

OK, time to wrap this thing up!  It's been a busy fall and our lovely time on the island is fast becoming a fading memory.  We spent our last few days on the north end of the island visiting some of the more remote communities in the vicinity of Port McNeill and Port Hardy.

Our base was one of these cabins at the Cluxewe Resort.  It was very cosy and we enjoyed having the ocean as our front yard.

This crow (in our front yard) found some kind of morsel in the intertidal zone.

We were able to walk from our cabin along a strip of shore between the ocean and this salt marsh, which was rich with seals, geese, herons and other critters.

This is the view looking north toward Port Hardy

A Common Loon in the salt marsh

A beautiful fall afternoon on the seashore

We spent a day in Alert Bay which is a small community on Cormorant Island, about a half-hour ferry ride from Port McNeill.  I took two photos at the totem pole park, but then my camera battery died, so I had to use my phone for the rest of the day.  I still haven't retrieved those pics (It's on my list)

There is a large First Nations community in Alert Bay, and we spent a good part of the day going through the U'Mista Cultural Centre, which has an exensive historical photo collection as well as artifacts and art works including a lot of carvings and masks. 

We also visited Telegraph Cove, a restored historical fishing village on pilings.  It is also a working marina and kayaking and whale-watching departure point.

There is a great whale museum at Telegraph Cove.  Very informative and lots of impressive skeletons, including this Fin Whale (I think) that is suspended from the ceiling and stretches the entire length of the building.

While we were in the museum someone called in from outside that there were dolphins passing by, so we hurried out in time to see a dozens of Pacific White-Sided Dolphins racing past the mouth of the cove.  I'm sure there were 30 or 40 of them, just flying through the water and leaping into the air, in what seemed to be pure exhuberance.

After a minute or two it was all over as they disappeared around the point on the far side of the cove.  We felt so lucky to have been in the right place at the right time to witness this amazing spectacle!  (Well, amazing to us interior landlubbers, anyway)

On our travels to a couple of other villages on inlets of the West Coast we found that all the rivers had salmon gathering, preparing to spawn.  We would stop on bridges to watch them leaping out of the water.  After capturing a dozen or two spashes, I finally managed to get a photo of one in the air.

This Belted Kingfisher was perched on the mast of a fishing boat in Coal Harbour.

Spawning was well underway in the Quatse River, which enters the ocean at Port Hardy.  The dead salmon were attracting all kinds of critters for the annual feasting.

Along with black bears, seagulls, kingfishers and more, there were quite a few bald eagles on the estuary.

This immature bald eagle was scavenging in the shallows while a salmon leapt out of the water just beside it.

And as the eagle flew off into the sunset, so we too bade goodbye the wonderful, wild north island and headed down for a few days of visiting in Victoria before making our way back home to the wild and wonderful Kootenays; feeling a bit sad to leave, but greatly enriched by the wonderful experiences we had there.