This is the Arrow Lakes Reservoir, where Columbia River water is collected and held in Canada under the Columbia River Treaty, for use downstream in the U.S. One of the tell-tale signs of a reservoir is trees having fallen like soldiers along the unstable shoreline from the raising and lowering of the water for hydro-power […]
A remarkable encounter
I came across this bear skull set on a cedar stump in a selectively logged forest in July, 2015. Over a foot long, the skull’s front fangs are gone. The back molars, made for chewing up berries, grubs and vegetation, confirm the jaw of an omnivore. The stump and the skeleton may both be […]
Have dog, will travel
A golden afternoon on the Slocan River in late June, paddling a prototype of the traditional Sinixt sturgeon-nosed canoe with my dog Dellie in pursuit. In the evening, I spoke to a bi-national group of students from Hamilton College in upstate New York and our local Selkirk College about the Columbia River Treaty. They are […]
My constant companion
She is a coyote crossed with sheltie, a gift from the dense woods on the east shore of Kootenay Lake. Dellie goes everywhere with me, and picks up many friends along the way, even some who gift her with crowns of woven Hawk’s weed. This invasive plant has never looked so good.
A summer office beside Kootenay Lake
I sit here in early morning, watching the swallows dance across the water’s surface, dipping close to harvest bugs, rising up again to deliver them into a waiting nest of young.
Fairy Bells
On a springtime walk, along a path I have followed so many times, I came across a lush, knee-high forest of Fairy Bells (Prosartes hookeri), spreading beneath the shade of an evergreen forest. How could I have missed this charm and beauty, all these years?