Paul Cipywnyk's Blog

Short Video on Fish Kill from Newsleader

Found this video on BC Daily Buzz, and am assuming that since it's got embed links, it's OK to reproduce. This was shot by Mario Bartel of the Burnaby Newsleader a couple of days ago. It's me at the pond near Edmonds Skytrain Station where the deadly spill was first noticed on March 4, 2010.

Media Interest in Byrne Creek Kill Has Legs

The strength and duration of media interest in the recent fish kill in southeast Burnaby's Byrne Creek after someone illegally disposed of a chemical, likely down a drain on a street, is intriguing. The kill happened late Thursday afternoon, yet I was still receiving multiple calls for interviews and tours on Monday. Usually three- to four-day old local news is as appetizing to mainstream media as, er, rotting fish, but somehow this story had legs.

And we didn't send out a single press release or email, we didn't make a single phone call - we simply tried to keep up with the requests that poured in. We have no staff, streamkeepers are 100% volunteer. If anyone still doubts the power of Twitter, well, that's how this story started. . .

Perhaps it had something to do with public outrage. This story struck a chord. The creek is in an urban area, it is surrounded by public parks, and I think people are really getting the message that it's not only fish,  it's about the entire ecosystem and our health, too.

I've been monitoring the online versions of stories, and people have been responding with anger and disbelief that such a tragedy could happen - yet again - in a beloved creek. People have also been scathingly skeptical that anything will really be done by the federal agencies that supposedly are tasked with protecting our environment and our health.

The outrage is palpable, and I think that's what has kept this story alive.

Streamkeepers are making lemonade from the lemons handed to us by the thoughtless polluter - we've been getting calls from concerned citizens reporting suspicious substances on streets and in ditches, we may have a few new faces at our monthly meeting tomorrow (Thursday, March 11, at 7:30pm - coordinates here), we've been getting requests from businesses to come speak to employees about the watershed and how we all connect to it.

I hope interest remains high, but I understand that we have to get on with our busy lives and attention will quickly fade. Unfortunately, I've seen this cycle several times on battered Byrne Creek, and I hope that my sense that this time the response is noticeably stronger isn't just wishful thinking.

Thank you to all the media who covered the kill! And thank you to the public for expressing your feelings. If you really want change to happen, if you want to see enforcement, I urge you to write your local MLAs and MPs, and the federal and provincial environment ministers - without strong policy direction agency staff's hands are tied.

Sample Density of Fish Killed in Byrne Creek

Sometimes it takes death to reveal how much life there is.

Would you believe that on average there was a dead fish less than every 2 meters along a sampled section of Byrne Creek the morning after someone poured a toxin down a street drain in the upper watershed on March 4, 2010? Most people never see fish in the creek - it takes patience, stealth, and knowing where to look to spot them when they are alive. My wife and I counted 231 dead trout, coho smolts (yearlings) and coho fry (this spring's babies) in an approximately 400-meter section of the creek. For those interested, here's the breakdown:

182 - Small cutthroat trout (say less than 15cm)
20  - Medium cutthroat trout (say 15-20cm)
1   - Large cutthroat trout (over 20cm)
Total 203 cutthroat trout

16 small-to-medium dead fish visible inside the culvert, too dark to ID
1 - large trout, very dark, no cutthroat markings on chin, near footbridge

8  - Coho smolts
3  - Coho fry
Total 11 coho salmon

Grand total dead fish in that stretch: 231

And that's likely lower than the actual number due to several factors: dead fish get wedged under rocks and drop deep in pools, the tiny fry are difficult to spot at all and we know that before the kill there were schools of dozens in the area sampled. In addition, opportunistic predation starts almost immediately after the toxin is quickly flushed down the creek: we found several fish partially eaten, and only strings of guts and bits of flesh too small to ID here and there.

The coho were found around T518 to T516 (lower end of the lower ravine). The coho fry were found in the vicinity of T517 where we photographed live ones a few days ago... See the entry below "Video of 2010 Salmon Fry in Byrne Creek."

The above photo shows dead fish ranging from coho fry at the bottom left,
a coho smolt a the bottom right, and an adult trout above. There was a
surprise to come, as you'll see in the next photo. . .

The big trout had a fry in its mouth. It's not hard to imagine what
happened - it spotted a little fish in distress from the chemical,
thought it an easy meal, and then before it could even finish
swallowing its target, the bigger fish also died.

Counting the Dead

Imagine walking down a street, and every few steps that you take, you come across a body.

A few more steps, a cluster of bodies. Every step, another body. Another group of bodies.

You approach an area where yesterday you saw small children playing - and you find small, inert bodies.

Small bodies, ranging from babies recently born, to midsize ones -- kids going to school. Further on, large ones, adults.

All with bulging eyes, gaping mouths.

Staring. At nothing. For they do not see any more. They do not breathe any more, for they died gasping for breath.

They choked to death.

That's what it was like today, carefully walking down Byrne Creek, counting the dead.

The dead that died when someone unthinkingly, uncaringly, or, despite decades of educational efforts, perhaps unknowingly, poured a chemical down a storm drain.

The bodies were fish. Just fish.

But we'll drink what went in that water someday, too. Or perhaps swim in it. Those toxins don't just disappear.

If we eat fish or other seafood, we will eat what went in that water someday, too.

All drains lead to fish habitat.

People habitat.

Every living thing's habitat.

I fear I'll dream tonight about counting the dead.

The bulging eyes, the gaping mouths.

The horrifying, constricting feeling of being unable to breathe.

We found fish today that in desperation had thrown themselves into the air, up onto the banks of the creek - to breathe, please let me breathe!

That would be like me throwing myself under water to escape foul, poisoned air - to breathe, please let me breathe!

Yes, I'm emotionally attached, because for days recently I eagerly patrolled Byrne Creek, looking for baby coho salmon, baby chum salmon, hoping against hope that the few salmon spawners that made it back last autumn succeeded in creating a new generation.

I saw baby fry, and I rejoiced. My heart soared. I took photos. I took videos.

I blogged, I Tweeted, I Facebooked. I did all that social media, cyberspace stuff.

But real life intervened

And now they are all dead.

And all that I can do is

Count the dead.

Fish Kill in Burnaby’s Byrne Creek March 4, 2010

A chemical entered Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby in the mid-to-late afternoon today, killing fish. Someone called Environment Canada [CORRECT: in fact the City of Burnaby received the call from the BC provincial enviro ministry after a youth called the Provincial Emergency Program], who then called the City, and streamkeepers also noticed the kill around the same time. City staff took samples and worked on tracing the source, which likely came from a storm drain, while streamkeepers took photos for documentation and sampled pH in the creek at several points. Both City staff and streamkeepers plan to follow up tomorrow. Here are some photos:

The fish ladder at the pond west of Griffiths Dr.
Water is covered with foam and slick to the touch.
There was an ammonia smell coming out of the pipe.

Dead fish on bottom of pool.

Dead cutthroat with hazy water visible. That's a size 12 boot
toe beside it for comparison.

Just a few days ago, streamkeepers were excited to see baby salmon
fry popping out of the gravel. We are concerned that they may also have
been affected.

I find it hard to believe that after decades of education efforts, such
kills still happen.

Please, folks, remember that all drains on roads and parking lots lead to fish habitat!

Re-Inventing Rainwater Management

Ran across this study today (pdf doc): Re-Inventing Rainwater Management: A Strategy to Protect Health and Restore Nature in the Capital Region by the  Environmental Law Centre at the University of Victoria. While I have yet to read all of it, it appears to be an excellent take on issues that streamkeepers in Burnaby and all over BC have been concerned about for years. An excerpt from the introduction to the problem:

We don't normally think of rainfall as pollution. However, over the last 150 years we have built cities in a way that transforms rainwater into an agent of considerable environmental harm: urban stormwater runoff.

Changing pristine rainwater into pollution occurs in stages. The first step is the creation of pollutants from driving and fixing cars, using chemicals on houses and yards, and commercial and industrial processes. Heavy metals, PCBs, oils, grease, antifreeze, solvents, pesticides, herbicides, fertilizers, paint chips, PAHs, road salt, and detergents fall to the ground across the urban landscape.

The second step involves our construction of impervious surfaces such as roofs, paved streets, sidewalks, and parking lots. As a city develops, the vegetation and natural soils that absorb and filter rainwater are replaced by impervious surfaces. When we pave over nature's absorption and filtration system, the next heavy rain sweeps across the landscape's hard surfaces picking up pollutants.

In the final step, the storm sewer system rapidly conveys all this polluted water to the nearest water body and flushes it at high speed into a sensitive aquatic ecosystem. In addition to the pollutants from the landscape, the water often contains paint and motor oil that people have dumped into the storm sewer. To make things worse, in older municipalities, this stormwater often contains sanitary sewage.

Video of 2010 Salmon Fry in Byrne Creek

I shot this video at 640 X 480 resolution with my Canon SD780 digital still camera handheld with the zoom at max. I processed the file in Windows Live Movie Maker, a free download. Not bad for such a cheap, on-the-fly setup :-).

It's always great to know that at least some of the few salmon that managed to return to this urban creek in southeast Burnaby last autumn successfully spawned, and that their eggs survived through the winter.

Learn About Salmon-Friendly Gardening

From our friends at LEPS, via the PSKF message board:

Make your neighbourhood a better place and start something healthier for you and for salmon, in your backyard!

On Saturday March 13, join Langley Environmental Partners Society from 10am-3pm at the Fraser River Presentation Theatre, 4th floor, 20338- 65 Ave Langley, for the 3rd annual Salmon Friendly Gardens Seminar.

This workshop style seminar will have speakers present practical solutions for:

• Converting Lawn into a Vegetable Patch ~ Ward Teulon, City Farm Boy
• Rethinking Weeds as Wild Edibles ~ David Catzel, Glorious Organics
• Gardening for Wildlife ~ Jude Grass, Birds on the Bay
• Pesticide Alternatives That Work ~ Martin Harcourt, Mainland Landscaping and Gardening Ltd
  

Event includes refreshment break. Pre-registration is required, to register email kgreenwood@tol.ca

Why grow a salmon-friendly garden?

Every Langley home is located in the middle of salmon habitat. Each of Langley's twelve watersheds collects runoff from our backyards and directs it into one of our salmon-bearing streams. The Fraser River salmon run - the largest in Canada - depends on these small tributaries for spawning and the healthy development of young fish.

The upshot is that what we put on our gardens ends up in our streams, including pesticides and fertilizers. In addition, the majority of Langley's tap water comes from aquifers, meaning that our drinking water originates directly below our feet. When you consider that 95% of pesticides used on residential yards are considered probable or possible carcinogens by the US Environmental Protection Agency, there's good reason to cut back on the chemicals we use in our gardens.

This worrying evidence doesn't mean that your garden has to go to the bugs. LEPS presents this full-day seminar on how to grow a beautiful, healthy and productive garden without chemicals.

The event also launches the Township of Langley's pilot Grow Healthy ~ Grow Smart Program.

Salmon Saturdays are supported by the Fraser Salmon and Watersheds Program.

Dawn, Dusk on BC Ferries

The 7:00 am BC Ferries run from Tsawwassen to Swartz Bay, and the return 5:00 pm run produced some moody sunrise and sunset photos today.

The dawn run:

And coming home at dusk:

New Fry in Byrne Creek, Signs of Spring

Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby, BC, is sporting new babies! I spotted two salmon fry in pools in the creek today - not many, but it's a start. There were also lots of other signs of spring.

Hard to ID for sure, but it may be a coho, judging by
orange-ish colour.

This backlit strider was making explosive flashes of light
on the water with every step.

Robins, Fruit at Stewart Heritage Farm

Though it was overcast, I checked out the Stewart Heritage Farm in south Surrey today - it's a great place for birding and nature photos.

Cattails in a marsh

Last autumn's apples

An inquisitive robin.

Who gets a worm!

I got some good shots of waxwings eating berries at the farm last October.

Sunset Near Byrne Ravine Park

Late this afternoon I got out for a loop of Byrne Creek Ravine Park in SE Burnaby, and got a few sunset shots on my way back up the hill.

The view down the hill over the Green development.

Along Byrne Park Drive.

Eagles, Crows on Marine Way

While my wife was picking up some cat food I got some shots of eagles and crows near Marine Way in Burnaby. At one point there were six bald eagles soaring overhead, with some sort of hawk or harrier joining in for a moment. There were also several crows patrolling the parking lot.

Warmest January on Record in Vancouver, Eh?

Well, look what I found outside our door today:

I also did a quick patrol for salmon fry in Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby. Didn't see any yet, but back in 2005 we spotted fry on Feb. 8, so with this year's warm winter they ought to be popping out of the gravel soon!

BC Artist James Koll Posts New Works to Website

I received an email from BC artist James Koll today about new pieces posted to his website. Coincidentally, the topic of art came up on the Editors' Association of Canada email list recently, with people sharing info about artists whose works they'd bought. I mentioned Koll and his website, and here are a few comments:

"Koll's work is beautiful and, from the photos, exceptionally well crafted. The next time I'm back in B.C. I'll make it a point to see some of his work; I'm in love with it, even via the Internet. A new slant on Internet dating?"

"Thanks so much for sharing this link."

"I like his Burrard Street at Night--lovely."

"Ooo--another great site."

Cleaning Bird Boxes at Burnaby Lake

A call for volunteers appeared in the local papers to help clean out bird boxes at Burnaby Lake Regional Park for the spring nesting season, so Yumi and I drove over this Saturday morning to check out what the Burnaby Lake Park Association was up to.

Led by the irrepressibly passionate and knowledgeable Joe Sadowski, the 30-40 folks who showed up were divided into three or four teams and spread out to do some housecleaning. Despite the overcast, drizzly conditions, people's spirits ran high.

And a lovely Wood Duck couple, perhaps looking to move
in to the newly cleaned housing :-)

Collapse of Soviet Union Put Danube, Dnieper Rivers on Diverging Courses

A sobering article in the Washington Post. While many countries have come together to clean up and revitalize the Danube, there has been little progress on the environmental devastation to Ukraine's Dnieper perpetrated under the communist regime.

Frosty Ramble 'Round Deer Lake

Combating the seasonal overeating, Yumi and I trundled all the way to Deer Lake and back, doing the route in a bit less than three hours. It was a frosty, cloudy day, but I worked up a good sweat, fell on my butt on the icy Sperling stairs, and got a few decent shots, too.

View from the canoe dock

Frosty mooring cleat

Yumi testing the ice near the beach

Frozen cattails near the beach

Foggy view of Metrotown from the north shore of the lake

Spotted this little furball sneaking through tunnels of grass
near the trail - a vole?

Frozen dew

We were surprised to see a salmon carcass in
Buckingham Creek near the beach parking lot.
We've never seen salmon in the Deer Lake area.
Unfortunately, we were unable to get at it to ID it.

Foggy New Westminster Quay, Boardwalk

A stroll along the quay and boardwalk in New Westminster on a socked in, foggy afternoon produced some moody photographs.

Christmas Jaunt up the Sea to Sky, Squamish, Brackendale

A Christmas daytrip up the Sea-to-Sky highway to Squamish and Brackendale resulted in some nice shots, though there were few eagles to be seen.

Stonework pattern on washroom at Shannon Falls

Spawning salmon, green water, stones make for an impressionistic shot
near the Tenderfoot Hatchery

Great Blue Heron watches salmon near the Tenderfoot Hatchery

An American Dipper keeps a sharp eye out for wayward salmon eggs

Lots of people at the Eagle Run at Brackendale, but few eagles

Squamish River with mountain background

Heading back home we stop at Porteau Cove - Yumi against the sunset

Moon at bottom with Porteau Cove pier structure

Rocks and ripples at the ocean's edge

Chains anchor the sunset

Bench and rails frame the setting sun

Trees, sunset along the Sea-to-Sky highway

The sun dips in to the sea beyond the mountains

Byrne Creek Ravine Sunset on Christmas Eve

We did a quick loop of Byrne Creek Ravine Park in SE Burnaby late this afternoon as the sun was going down.

Foggy, Icy Rice Lake in North Vancouver

The Rice Lake trail in North Vancouver is a short, flat walk that's refreshing even on a rainy day.

Birds at Blustery Boundary Bay

It was just above zero Celsius and the wind was a'blowin' as Yumi and I checked out the bird action on Boundary Bay around the south end of 72nd St. in Delta, BC, this afternoon. We saw lots of Northern Harriers, Gulls of several kinds, Northern Flickers, Robins, Herons, lots of waterfowl, etc.

This bold Great Blue Heron was blithely hanging around the side
of the road about a hundred meters north of the end of the road.

Mt. Baker in Washington State visible to the southeast
across Boundary Bay.

There were lots of raptors, mostly Harriers.
Now that I'm looking at this photo, is it a Harrier?
We definitely saw Harriers, but dunno about this one. . .
Another photographer said he'd seen a short-eared owl.

I believe this is a female Downy Woodpecker.

A Northern Flicker of the "red-shafted race."

There were lots of American Robins eating berries.

Water Act Forum Stimulates, Educates

Thanks to Watershed Watch for putting on a forum yesterday "to discuss how NGOs can work together to move the Living Water Smart (LWS) agenda forward, and how groups can help to modernize the BC Water Act." I enjoyed the presentations, learned a lot, and was impressed with the knowledge represented by the people in the room.

The organizers are asking for input so here goes: I'm not sure if "getting groundwater in" came up much in discussion, and that's crucial, particularly in urban watersheds like the creek that I volunteer on as a streamkeeper. The focus seemed to be on sucking groundwater out, which of course is very important, but we shouldn't neglect the "letting it soak in naturally" part of the cycle.

I'm not sure if a water act can include things like impermeable vs permeable surfaces, swales, rain gardens, infiltration ponds, biofiltration, street-edge alternatives, etc., but rainwater infiltration > groundwater infiltration is crucial in urban watersheds. Otherwise too much water is dumped into creeks through rain drains (trying to reshape the debate by getting away from "storm drains") during moderate-to-heavy rains, and not enough gets into the ground to maintain base flows in long, hot, dry spells.

I know we don't want to get too detailed or prescriptive, so perhaps as part of the preamble, or guiding principles, there could be something about the permeability-groundwater issue in regard to promoting watershed-friendly development and redevelopment guidelines?

Salmon Return to Japanese River

From the The Yomiuri Shimbun

This article is about salmon returning to the Chikumagawa river as flows improved after East Japan Railway Co. was directed to stop taking illegal amounts of water from the river to power trains in Tokyo.

Wow, amazing how one's life can change. When I rode the Yamanote Line in Tokyo on a daily or weekly basis for well over ten years from 1985 - 1999 I had no idea that some of the power was coming from a dam that was impacting salmon. Mind you I knew next to nothing about salmon, and nothing about streamkeeping back then.

Fur Ball Reveals Vertebrae, Claw

A ramble along Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby is always stimulating and refreshing, and if you keep your eyes open, you can spot all sorts of interesting evidence of the animals that live in the ravine. I'd love to spend a few days in the ravine with some First Nations elders, and plant and animal biologists, to really learn what to look for and how to interpret it.

While on spawner patrol, Yumi found a fur ball. Something had regurgitated it - a coyote? Spreading it apart with the tip of a walking stick, we could see vertebrae and a claw inside, but we don't have the knowledge to ID what beast ended up in the stomach of another one!

Claw at top left, vertebrae scattered near middle.

OK, if you'd like something more pleasant to look at to end this post, here's a raindrop sloughing off a berry :-).

Coho Spawning in Byrne Creek

The day was dark and gloomy following a week of rain, but my wife Yumi and I decided to check out Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby for spawning salmon. We volunteer with the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers, and spawner returns have been low this year, but we're always hoping.

It's tough to see fish when the water is high and dirty, and the light is low, but to our surprise we ran across a pair of coho spawning. In fact, the poor conditions likely worked in our favor, for on a bright day with clear water, the notoriously shy coho would have quickly spooked and hidden themselves. While we never saw them that clearly, it was still a thrill when we'd catch a flash of these magnificently muscular fish, with their scarlet-streaked copper-green sides.

A swirl of dark green, brown-gold and red as one of the coho moves up the creek. They had chosen to spawn just above a fast riffle, and moved up and down, battling the current.

The female flips sideways and carves the gravel with her tail to dig a nest for her eggs called a redd.

Deer, Faun, Waskesiu Summer 2009

Ran across this photo from my summer trip to Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta and am posting it now to relieve some of the Wet West Coast early winter rain blues.

Taken early one morning near the golf course in Prince Albert National Park.

Bird’s Nest, Spider, Claw Marks Along Byrne Creek

Today on a patrol of Byrne Creek my wife and I found one dead chum salmon, one live chum guarding a nest of eggs (redd), and three coho salmon, in addition to lots of cutthroat trout that gather this time of year hoping to snag a wayward salmon egg. Nature being unemotional and efficient, we've observed cutthroat poking female salmon in their bellies, hoping to pop eggs out.

Today Yumi found a nest on the ground. It looked like it had never been completed. We also ran across what I believe is an orb weaver spider. It was on the cycling/walking path on Southridge Drive, so Yumi shepherded it off into the grass, as she is wont to do with any sort of animal that she feels is in danger.

We also observed plenty of claw marks and tracks at various places along the creek as opportunists of all species gather to meet the returning salmon. That's why salmon are so crucial to the entire west coast environment - they are a key part of the food chain for all sorts of birds and beasts, in addition to fertilizing the forests.

Byrne Creek Paw Prints, Paint & Mushrooms

I ran across lots of tracks along Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby on a patrol looking for spawning salmon today. Dead spawners attract all sorts of hungry animals from skunks to raccoons to coyotes. I've even seen squirrels checking out carcasses - why not? A cousin of mine calls them "rats with bushy tails" :-). Someone also thoughtfully left a bunch of paint cans along the fence at the spawning habitat!

Prints leading toward the creek

Close-up

A rain-filled mushroom

Poster reminding people and dogs to stay out
of the creek during spawning season

What's with the paint cans? Someone even took the
time to nicely line them up, so why not the time to
take them to a recycling centre?

Burnaby Now Interviews Streamkeepers about Spawning Salmon

Thanks to reporter Christina Myers and photographer Larry Wright from the Burnaby Now. What was to be a quick photo op on salmon returning to Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby turned into a great front-page article after Christina and I "chatted" via email.

Dunno if this is a permanent link, but at least for now you can find the story here.

Face to Face with Coyote on Byrne Creek

I had a meeting at the Stream of Dreams office just off Byrne Road south of Marine Way in SE Burnaby this morning, so I dropped into the Byrne Creek artificial spawning habitat for a few minutes on the way back up the hill to check if the chum salmon I had seen on a spawner patrol the previous day were still around.

As I broke out of the path into the habitat and onto the vehicle access road, a coyote came scooting out of the bush just a few meters in front of me, trotted a short way down the road, and stopped.

A large coyote.

It was the biggest I've seen in some time. It looked at least the match of a mid-sized German Shepherd, and had thick, sleek fur, so it appeared well fed... (the above photo was snapped on the quick draw with a tiny pocket camera and enlarged dramatically, so the quality is middling. . .)

It stopped and stared at me, and I stared at it while regretting not having the long walking pole that I usually carry. It flinched first, and began loping down the chain-link fence looking for a way out, and finally wriggled under it.

Before I proceeded further, I got my knife out and then slowly walked in, making plenty of noise. (During spawning season I carry a sheath knife in my pack to process dead salmon with -- streamkeepers have permission from the Department of Fisheries to cut open carcasses to determine sex and to check if fish have spawned before they died).  The creek was still running high and dirty from the morning rain so I didn't bother searching very hard because water visibility was very poor. I have to admit I was also on edge moving through the bush, because the coyote was likely in the habitat because it was attracted to dead salmon.

Sure enough, on my way out, I found the remains of a chum the coyote had been eating on the bank at the southwest end of the overflow pond, near where I first flushed it out.

There wasn't much left, just head bones, and about five inches of body. I didn't linger, not wanting to be between a coyote and its lunch :-) . I did see salmon eggs that had spilled into the water, so it was likely an unspawned female chum.

I found the experience exhilarating, and it left me tingling all over. It's amazing how the sight of a predator sharpens your senses when you're alone in the bush -- even in an urban park.  Thank you, coyote, for that moment of clarity, focus, and connection to nature.

Silverdale Creek Wetlands

On the way home from Harrison Lake we took the slower route 7, and at one point before Mission saw trails and what looked like a spawning channel to the north of the road. We found an access road, and discovered the Silverdale Creek Wetlands. We'd heard about the project, so we set out to explore. There were "Mother Bear with Cub" warning signs all over, so we kept our eyes peeled, proceeded slowly, and made plenty of noise!

It was a beautiful area, with ponds, marshes, and a spawning channel. We found only one dead spawner in the wetland area, but saw several more dead, and one live one swimming upstream, from the bridge over the creek near the entrance.

Look closely - there, in the middle foreground, it's
a huge concrete salmon. Steamkeepers around the
lower mainland have been sharing the mold for
these beauties

Despite it being November, there were still lots of dragonflies about

Lots of bird boxes of various sizes adorn many erected perch "trees"

The only spawner we saw in the habitat

The same spawner can be seen in the foreground

And a close-up of a second concrete salmon in the habitat

Harrison Lake Colors, Aerobatics Flight

On the pretext of looking for spawning salmon in Fraser Valley creeks and rivers, Yumi and I took a day trip all the way up the valley to Harrison Lake. While we didn't see many fish, it was a gorgeous day. As we were strolling around the beach at the lake, a formation of aerobatics planes zoomed overhead.

Kayakers head out on Harrison Lake

The dock near the hot-spring hotel

Along the trail to the original hot springs pool

Heading back toward the beach area

A sudden roar, and this formation unexpectedly flew overhead

A slightly tighter shot as I banged away while zooming in

Breaking into the blue

Heading back from a loop over the lake

Salmon Pumpkin for Halloween

My wife Yumi carved this salmon pumpkin for Halloween to celebrate the return of spawning chum and coho to Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby, just behind our place.

Later: She also made a cat pumpkin.

Spawning Salmon Return to Byrne Creek

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers spotted six chum salmon in Byrne Creek this afternoon, and several of them were already digging redds, or nests, for their eggs. It was a wonderful sight to see!

Byrne is an urban creek in southeast Burnaby, and salmon numbers have been declining for the last several years.

I took the above video using the video function on my Canon S5IS camera, which tops out at 640 X 480 at 30 fps. I then used MS Movie Maker, which came free with the Windows XP operating system, to do so some rudimentary editing, titling, etc. It's a far cry from a real camcorder and more powerful software, but it's still fun to play with.

Waxwing Chows Down Berries

It was a great day to wander the Stewart Heritage Farm in South Surrey this afternoon. I'll add more photos tomorrow, but I wanted to post this series of a waxwing selecting and downing a berry before I went to bed:

Checking things out.

Going. . .

Going. . .

Gone!

All shots handheld with Nikon D300 and Nikkor AF-S 70-300mm zoom at 300mm (450mm effective), ISO 800, 1/320, f7.1

Autumn Rains Coming to Lower Mainland

We're going to savor the sun today, because look what the Environment Canada Weather Office has in store for the Vancouver area for the coming week:

It's not all bad news, though. This is about the time of year when rain triggers spawning salmon to start coming up our local stream, Byrne Creek, in southeast Burnaby.

More Autumn Colours Around Byrne Creek

A ramble from Ron McLean Park in SE Burnaby down the ravine trail to Byrne Creek.

Missing Salmon – I Think I Know Where They’re Going

I've been eating them.

I've been to three events in the last week, two of them specifically aimed at raising consciousness about the environment and restoring waterways and salmon runs, and I've been served salmon, lots of it, at all three.

And I've shamelessly, well, OK, with a twinge of conscience, indulged at all three. Heck, I had seconds at one event, because the call kept going out that there was still fish to be served.

Wild? Farmed? Endangered sockeye? "Still plentiful" pinks? I dunno, but it all tasted great. Surely it wasn't farmed, at least at the enviro events, eh?

When people organize an event to preserve, say, the Vancouver Island Marmot, do the little beasts end up on the dinner plates? Do celebrants discretely poke at bits of fur stuck between their teeth instead of fish bones?

Yeah, I know, that analogy is full of holes, but. . . it makes you squirm at bit, doesn't it?

Autumn Colours Advance on Byrne Creek

The recent rains in the lower mainland of BC have cast a chill upon the land, yet warmed my heart with excitement. Salmon will return to Byrne Creek soon.

It's a bit early, the first spawners are usually spotted in this urban creek in southeast Burnaby around mid-October, but the fish follow the rain, so you never know - and I couldn't wait to start looking.

I didn't find any salmon today, but the rain had begun washing the vibrant greens into reds, yellows, golds, and browns.

Burnaby Artists Studio Tour, Deer Lake Ramble

My wife Yumi and I spent a couple of hours today visiting Burnaby artists in their homes and studios on the Studio Tour 2009.

We started with James Koll, who lives nearby. We've bought a couple of his watercolours and a print, and he's becoming one of our favourite local artists for his lifelike renditions of landscapes. After visiting James, we hit a few other artists, and then ended up at the Shadbolt Centre at Deer Lake. After checking out the displays at the various galleries in the area, we took a slow ramble along the boardwalk at Deer Lake, where I enjoyed taking photos of the wildlife.

On the way home, we ended up raiding an ATM and going back to James Koll's to buy another watercolour -- "Still Creek Near the Lake." We volunteer as streamkeepers in Burnaby, so we have a close connection to the scenes Koll paints of waterways and parks around the city.

Here are few photos from today's walk:

The lawn below the Shadbolt Centre in Burnaby

Lilly pads in Deer Lake

Mallard framed by trees

A frog soaking up the sun

Great Blue Heron

Whack! The heron strikes

Success - a fish to swallow

No time to digest, on the hunt again

Plethora of Petals, Plants at New Westminster Quay

The boardwalk along the Fraser River in New Westminster has an amazing collection of flowers and plants. I spent a couple of hours blissfully lost in photographing the array on a lazy Labour Day. Here's a photographic ode to the end of summer:

All shots hand-held with Nikon D300 and AF-S Nikkor 18-200mm VR ED zoom at ISOs ranging between 200-400. The camera was on the "Vivid" setting. Not sure how that happened, I usually have it set on "Standard," but for the most part it worked well, with only a few shots badly over-saturated. These are all from Large/Fine JPEG files. I have the raw NEF files as well, but have yet to try playing with post-processing them.

Watching Cat’s Brain Work

Like many of us, especially those who have pets, I'm a sucker for anthropomorphizing, or attributing human characteristics to animals. Occasionally you feel a tingle of excitement at watching an animal's mind work, and you think you understand what's happening. On the one hand these flashes of empathy, that feeling of seeing something through another animal's eyes, provide a sense of wonder and mutual understanding, but on the other hand they may often be projections that stem from our species' never-satiated desire to consider ourselves the all-understanding pinnacle of development on Mother Nature's totem pole. Yet it's still a thrill when it happens.

Heck, sometimes it's a thrill when it happens between humans, but I digress.

I could swear I followed Choco the cat's train of thought for several seconds the other day, and it was fascinating to watch because she exhibited a form of reasoning that we can relate to. My wife and I were sitting in the living room watching TV and Choco was curled up on the carpet. Suddenly there was a bang upstairs as the wind blew a door shut.

Naturally Choco jumped, but what followed was more interesting. She looked at my wife, she looked at me. . . and then her eyes widened, her ears flattened, and her body assumed the classic Halloween cat "fight or flight" pose, muscles tensed and back arched. To my mind it was clear that she'd counted heads and reached the conclusion that if we were both with her, the noise must be an intruder.

Yeah, yeah, cats are said to have the intellectual capability of a two or three-year-old human, so what's so amazing about this? I dunno. It just felt cool to get into Choco's mind, and empathize with that primeval, horror-movie reaction of "if we're all here, what was that?!"

Silty Discharge Hits Byrne Creek

A "slug" of silty water hit Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby overnight or early this morning. As no dead fish have been spotted, it appears it was not toxic; however, any discharge into street drains is illegal, and City of Burnaby staff are checking for the source.

As streamkeepers repeat again, and again, all drains on streets and in parking lots lead to fish habitat.

Water in the sediment pond in the spawning habitat was still opaque many hours after the discharge, though the water running into the pond (at the lower end of the photo) is clear.

Water discharging downstream of the artificial spawning habitat was also still very murky early in the afternoon.

Foreshore Park Pond Provides Wildlife for Long Lens

I headed down to Burnaby's Foreshore Park over lunch today to do some shooting with my new AF-S Nikkor 70-300mm 4.5-5.6G IF-ED VR zoom lens. The pond near Nokia is a great place for dragonflies, damselflies, bees, tadpoles, frogs, and other wildlife.

First off, some bees on various flowers.

And a white butterfly/moth hiding in refracted light.

Next up several shots of dragonflies.

Some huge tadpoles, a couple of which were munching on a dead fish.

And some frogs. Close, hidden, and submarine surfacing :-).

And a lonely cattail among the reeds.

Cute Frogs, Ugly Trash in Deer Lake

We took some friends for a walk at Burnaby's beautiful Deer Lake this afternoon and were greeted by dozens of little frogs. Unfortunately, there were also some of those water bottles that supposedly rarely end up in the landfill because they are recycled. Hm. This doesn't look like a recycling centre to me!

There are at least four frogs hiding in this photo - the Dasani bottle is not so well camouflaged!

As the clouds rolled in over Metrotown up on the hill, we decided to call it a day.

Bugs, Mink on Deer Lake Canoeing Afternoon

We got the canoe out for an afternoon on Burnaby's Deer Lake. It was a great day and we did three or four circuits of the small lake, often stopping in the lily pads to check out the wildlife. We saw lots of dragonflies, damselflies, moths, fish, waterfowl, and even a young mink bopping along the shore.

Metrotown towers to the southwest.

A flotilla of Canada Geese.

A dead stickleback?

Sure looks like a mink -- I had to severely crop this photo taken from a distance with my teeny Canon SD780IS - wish I'd had my S5IS or my DSLR!

Duffey Lake Road Trip

A day trip up the coast from Vancouver past Squamish and Whistler and then along the Duffey Lake Road to Lillooet and Lytton had us up at 5:00 on Sunday morning. It turned out to be a great day, sunny, and not too hot. We stopped at several places along the way for short walks/hikes including Brandywine Falls, Nairn Falls, Duffey Lake, Seton Lake and Lytton.

Brandywine Creek

Brandywine Falls

View south to Daisy Lake from Brandywine

Yumi on the trail to Nairn Falls

Nairn Falls

Nairn Falls

Nairn Falls

Young black bear on Duffey Lake Road

Duffey Lake

Duffey Lake

Yumi at Duffey Lake

Seton Lake

Seton Lake

Seton Lake

Road toward Lillooet

Seton spawning channel

We came across a nonchalant herd of mountain goats between Lillooet and Lytton

The silty Fraser River

The clear Thompson River flows into the silty Fraser at Lytton

A crow harasses an osprey above the river lookout at Lytton

Sea, Sky, Clouds at Porteau Cove

Porteau Cove is one of my favourite spots to stop on the Sea To Sky highway from Vanvouver to Squamish and Whistler. With the sea, the mountains and the sky, there are always photo opportunities.

Balcony Berries, Baby Spiders

A few shots of baby spiders on our balcony - so cool, but I gotta admit they make my scalp crawl when they crawl :-). The raspberries and strawberries are on their way.

Manning Park, Princeton, Coquihalla Trip Yields Bluebirds, Jays

A daytrip east from Vancouver to Manning Park, Princeton, north on the 5A and back to the coast on the Coquihalla yielded some nice photographs.

Similkameen River near Manning Park Lodge.

Yumi snaps a photo of friendly ground squirrel at Lighting Lake.

Sure are cute!

Clark's Nutcracker at Lightning Lake day use area.

Taking a break at Allison Lake.

Heading north up Highway 5A.

A gorgeous mountain bluebird.

Bluebird in flight.

Bluebird perched.

Steller's Jay at Britton Creek rest area.

Canoing Fraser River at SEP 2009 Workshop

About 70 streamkeepers signed up for a canoe trip down the Fraser River to cap the SEP 2009 (BC Streamkeeper) Workshop, out of around 300 people attending. It was a gorgeous day for a paddle and we had a great time. We put in near the Mission bridge, and took out up Kanaka Creek, with a stop for lunch along the way.

The putting-in point near the Mission bridge.

Me in front, with my wife Yumi behind me, and Naomi from Campbell River.

Heading downstream.

Catching up in a bit of friendly competition...

Cool water, blue skies - a gorgeous day for a paddle.

Working up a sweat!

Looking east down one of most productive salmon rivers in the world, with Mt. Baker barely visible on the horizon.

Heading up Kanaka Creek to the landing site.

It was a great day with a fantastic outing with wonderful people. Thanks to all of the organizers and sponsors!

Flowers, Buds, North Vancouver

Poking around near North Vancouver cemetery:

Deer, Marmot, Hawk on Highway 5A, BC

I took a quick daytrip and got a few wildlife shots of muledeer, hawks (Cooper's? Sharp-shinned?) and a marmot north of Princeton, BC, on highway 5A.

Look up!

Spring Has Sprung Along Byrne Creek

More signs that spring is really here.

These are the same trilliums that I photographed on April 5. You can see how the pure white has shaded into pinks and purples.

Note: All of these shots, and the garter snake, were taken with my new ultra-compact Canon SD780IS that I first wrote about here. Still getting to know the little gizmo, but it's producing nice photos.

Garter Snake Heralds Warmer Days

This lovely little garter snake is a sure sign it's getting warmer. I spotted it just off Byrne Park Dr. in SE Burnaby, BC. These snakes are harmless so please don't hurt them!

Burnaby Mountain Cherry Blossoms

It's been a strange year for cherry blossoms with the cold winter and spring, but there were some nice views on Burnaby Mountain.

Vancouver as 'World's Greenest City': How About Daylighting a few Creeks?

Is there any possibility of daylighting any of Vancouver's 60-odd lost and buried creeks as part of the mayor's plan to make Vancouver the world's greenest city?

How about a truly green city with salmon spawning in dozens of creeks running through neighbourhoods everywhere? That's what we used to have....

http://vancouver.ca/greenestcity/

Coho Fry Identified in Byrne Creek

Yumi managed to net a couple of fry in Byrne Creek today. To the best of our knowledge they are coho: sickle-shaped dorsal and anal fins with leading white/black rays, distinct parr marks, orange-tinged caudal, anal and adipose fins...

Definitely not chum, and do not have the white dorsal tip of cutthroat fry, and dorsal/anal fins definitely sickle-shaped, which cuts do not have...

NOTE: It is illegal to net fry and streamkeepers do so with the permission of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans for ID purposes only. Fry are returned unharmed to the creek.

Spring in Southeast Burnaby

Here are a few more spring photos from around Ron McLean Park in southeast Burnaby:

Red-Tailed Hawk in Byrne Creek Ravine

Nice to see a red-tailed hawk in Burnaby's Byrne Creek ravine today.

Great to See Bees A-Buzzin'

Spring Photos Along Byrne Creek

Salmon fry testing the current, fogs splashing, insects buzzing, trees and bushes leafing and budding, flowers blooming... Signs of spring along southeast Burnaby's Byrne Creek.

Alder -- for some it means a streaming nose!

Salmonberry hanging over the creek.

Salmonberry blossom.

Unfortunately, the dreaded invasive Japanese knotweed was also on the rise.

We were fortunate to spot three trilliums -- these rare flowers are protected under BC law.

A strider in the creek next to emerging skunk cabbage.

White Rock Beach Walk

A beautiful sunny day found us strolling along the beach at White Rock.

Surf scoters

Snowy Rice Lake

Rice Lake on Vancouver's north shore was still covered with ice and snow on the last weekend of March. It was a bright day, and we enjoyed the short ramble through the woods.

It's an easy trail through the wonderful forest.

A reflecting pool in the woods.

Yumi checking annual rings on a stump.

Leaf embedded in the icy lake.

New growth pushes up through last autumn's dead leaves.

Tiny shoots sprout from a mossy log.

Pockets of snow in the forest.

Salmonid Fry Spotted in Byrne Creek

Yumi and I saw salmonid fry in Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby, BC, today. After checking ID books against the photos we took, they appear to be chum salmon fry.

It's always exciting to see fry in this urban creek, and know that the few salmon that came back the previous autumn were successful in spawning and creating a new generation.

Rainy Byrne Creek

I had to get outside despite the rain and shake my afternoon drowsiness. Byrne Creek was running high and dirty, but there were some beautiful scenes. I saw some varied thrushes -- a male and a female hanging out together -- on the ravine path, and some red-winged blackbirds at the overflow pond. Unfortunately my bird photos were all blurry today because of the low light in the woods. My Canon S5IS does not perform that well in such conditions and I didn't want to carry my DSLR in the rain.

Byrne Creek with high, dirty flow in the rain.

A mossy tree - I didn't realize there were raindrops on the lens until I viewed the photos at home!

Snow in Burnaby in March?

Yep, took a snooze this sunny Sunday afternoon, only to wake up to fluffy flakes piling up outside, and one nonplussed turtle wondering where her rays went....

Dori just came out of hibernation a few days ago, and now this :-).

The view out the front door.

Firing Up Worm Factory Composter

For years we've talked about composting, but we always shied away because we live in a townhouse with no garden. Today at the BC Boat & Sportsmen's Show I finally decided to go for a Worm Factory composter that supposedly can be used indoors with no-to-minimal odor if you've got it running right.

I bought a 3-tray kit with worms from Webster Solar Energy and brought them home from the show. After supper, Yumi and I read the instruction book and set up the system, getting our first "working tray" going. Here's hoping things go well and that as the worms get at it, and we keep adding trays, in a couple of months we'll be ready to start using rich, homemade compost in our indoor and balcony plants.

Me opening up a can, er, box, of worms.

Yumi pointing out worms. Cool!

Closeup of worms.

Choco the cat is not too sure about this...

Signs of Spring at New Westminster Quay

A stroll along the New Westminster Quay revealed a few signs of spring on a lovely day.

Protecting the Blue Heart of the Planet

Passionate speech by Sylvia Earle on saving the ocean -- a prize-winner at the TED conference.

"We are facing paradise lost."

"We have taken over 90% of the big fish from the sea."

"Health for oceans means health for us."

"I hope that some day that we will find evidence that there is intelligent life among humans on this planet."

"Auden: Thousands have lived without love. None have lived without water."

"With every drop of water you drink, every breath you take, you are connected to the sea no matter where on earth you live."

"No water, no life. No blue, no green."

Byrne Creek Fry Search

Fry have been found already in some Burnaby creeks, so Yumi and I checked out parts of Byrne Creek today. While we didn't spot any baby salmon yet, it was a lovely day to be down by the gurgling waters.

Yumi checking the creek for fry.

Some lovely fungus growing on a fallen tree.

Death scene. Feathers trailing down a tall cedar and spread on the ground...

There were over a dozen bald eagles soaring above the ravine.

I wonder if the above feathers were remnants of an eagle lunch...

CNN: Fish Migrating to Cooler Waters

"(CNN) -- Climate-driven environmental changes could drastically affect the distribution of more than 1,000 species of commercial fish and shellfish around the world, scientists say."

http://tinyurl.com/dn9ksn"

This echoes some of the discussion at the recent State of the Salmon 2009 conference that I attended. Could the day come when the Fraser, the world's greatest salmon river, could no longer support runs?

Summary of State of Salmon 2009

The State of the Salmon 2009 conference over the last three-and-a-half days has left me stunned -- long days and lots of information to process. I documented it as best I could in a running collection of Tweets on my Twitter account, and I've posted that entire flow of jottings to my blog here.

First let me say that the conference organizers did a tremendous job. I don't know if there was ever any panic behind the curtains, but there was nary a glitch to be seen by the audience. And thanks to the simultaneous interpreters who mediated the flow in English, Russian and Japanese.

This was the second State of the Salmon conference, and my first. It's mostly aimed at scientists and bureaucrats, but we had a pretty good volunteer presence from lower-mainland streamkeepers and First Nations from the west coast and north. I think such broad representation greatly added to the conference, but of course I'm biased :-).

One of the threads that flowed throughout was the need for more research on how to protect and conserve wild salmon, and there was excitement about the new approach to science under the new Obama administration. The research dollars may start flowing again!

It was interesting to see the rifts occasionally bubble to the surface between the geneticists, the hatchery promoters and hatchery critics, the "stronghold, or protect the best" advocates and those who feel all habitat deserves protection. As a streamkeeper working on the ground, I was part of perhaps a minority that felt that any available $$ need to go toward action and habitat protection. We know what the problems are, yet we continue to study the patient while he's dying. Any knowledge we gain in the end is still, as one participant put it, "looking at a construction site through a hole in a fence -- and we're standing ten feet back from the hole."

There was also an underlying sense that perhaps with climate change leading to ocean warming and acidification, there is no way to prevent the loss of southern salmon spawning areas. Which to my mind made the groaning buffet tables laden day after day with salmon, halibut, shrimp, pork, bison, chicken etc. seem an indictment of the principles of having such a conference in the first place. Of course I ate everything, so I'm as guilty as anyone, but it never ceases to amaze me at how difficult it is for us humans to make our actions even approximate our pious thoughts. When it comes to human gatherings, feasting is so ingrained in all cultures that I doubt we'll ever get away from such behaviour.

At one point I was dreaming about future historians studying the progression of conferences and seeing that at the first one participants ate crab and lobster, at the second salmon and shrimp, at the third tofu and beans... and finally they were chewing on switchgrass because that was all that was left :-). Oh, rats, I've trapped myself in an illogical story -- by that point there would be, er, no point, in holding another salmon conference. I digress...

Something that was strangely absent from any discussion was pollution. I think it came up once in passing in a comment from the audience, and perhaps was glossed over by one of the speakers. Yet pollution is one of the biggest issues when it comes to habitat preservation, and is a direct and deadly killer of urban streams. And what's it doing to ocean survivability? We humans have been flushing all sorts of chemicals down our rivers and into the ocean for centuries -- surely that must have some impact on the "mystery" of declining biodiversity. Yet it was never addressed.

It was refreshing to hear from First Nations representatives who spoke from the heart, and who gave a breath of life to the proceedings. You can throw up all the PowerPoint slides full of as many charts and plots, and dense statistical calculations, as you like, but to hear the simple words "We have no fish anymore," provides much greater clarity and grounding.

Well, I have to get back to work, and perhaps I'll find time for more analysis and synthesis later.

I'm glad I attended.

Now, how about some ACTION!

Tweets From Day 3 Salmon Conference

Here are my Tweets from today's State of the Salmon 2009 conference sessions (third of three days), in last-to-first order:

Angelo: we all hope that future generations will be able to admire salmon as we have.

Angelo: we cannot forget the hope that salmon themselves represent.

Angelo: sustainability must be a primary guide.

Angelo: We need more political leadership.

Angelo: I worry about a younger generation that is drifting away from.

Angelo: need to do more to reconnect young people to the environment.

Angelo: Protecting salmon needs to be seen as a moral issue.

Angelo: need a precautionary approach to development.

Angelo: the unrelenting loss of salmon habitat is mainly due to rising human population.

Angelo: Heart of the Fraser is one of most productive stretches of river in the world.

Angelo: pollution, water extraction, development.

Angelo: but we also have to protect rivers that are still in good shape.
Angelo: urban habitat restoration leads to education.

Angelo: Protect, reconnect, restore.

Angelo: We need to better identify and manage key salmon watersheds.

Angelo: Need to incorporate local values so that people buy in.

Angelo: Instead of reacting to bad development planning, need to be proactive.

Angelo: Need to put a more preventive slant on habitat preservation.

Angelo: need to better understand and incorporate societal values into conservation.

Angelo: strive to develop ecosystem-based approaches to conservation.

Angelo: there is a need for new and fresh approaches.

Angelo: there is a pressing need for action.

Angelo: Most important is to move from discussion to being more action oriented.

Angelo: the theme for this conference was "Bringing the Future into Focus".

Angelo: Closing remarks.

Our problem is managing people, not fish.

Protected areas give society an excuse to ignore everything else.

Comment -- urban streams are so important, they bring fish to people's backyards.

Belyaev -- every citizen of every country is an integral part of the environment, their habitat.

Belyaev -- legislators won't get on side until they are informed.

Need to have an ongoing conversation with a legislator.

"Adopt a Legislator" Every scientist, every activist needs to adopt a legislator.
We're still talking about the same things we were 15 years ago -- how do get moving, doing?

We need a scale that people can relate to.

We need to change the paradigm as how we function as humans.

We need an informed public that votes differently and changes behavior.

Glaciers "make rivers work" in many places.

How long will glacier-fed watersheds continue to exist?

Groundwater flows are critical to spawning habitat and must be protected.

QA "we'll come to that later" -- later is now.

Every salmon stream must have a protected base flow throughout the seasons.

Alaska has strong laws for preserving flows in streams for salmon, but tough process.

Bristol: salmon are fun, they're food, let people define salmon for themselves.

Bristol: need to do outreach with political decision makers, and those who live off salmon.

Bristol: reframe the issue -- protected areas to pass on to future generations.

Bristol: Tongas has been a long and heated land battle in Alaska, but we're making progress.

Bristol: Grassroots concept -- bringing more and disparate people to conservation.

Bristol: what role do salmon play in modern society?

Bristol: Trout Unlimited Alaska

Belyaev: we can't accomplish anything in isolation, need all groups aboard.

Belyaev: criticizing is a favourite pastime of people.

Belyaev: different fishermen have very different opinions.
Belyaev: where can we find a compromise among all the groups?

Belyaev: salmon preservation is first and foremost human relations, scientists, fisherman, politicians.

Belyaev: How is Russia different -- no private property along rivers, so feds can protect areas.

Healey: must be thinking about salmon within context of global change.

Healey: the future is not going to be same as the past.

Healey: should we preserve Arctic areas as refuge for migrating salmon?

Healey: we have to start looking at Arctic as becoming suitable for salmon.

Healey: are there places where salmon habitat will continue to be suitable in face of warming.

Healey: In a very few decades most salmon habitat in southern range will no longer be suitable for them.

Healey: we really need to take a long-term view of conservation.

Kopchak: we are building an "electronic elder" to collate/share information.

Kopchak: Find common languages, cross jurisdictional systems.

Kopchak: H2O -- Headwaters to Ocean.

What are you going to do about long-term sustainability of salmon. YOU.

We who love salmon are not necessarily representative of the general public.

Rahr: we cannot succeed without preserving salmon strongholds.

Rahr: Russian far east has best opportunity for salmon habitat preservation.

Rahr: WWF study says 55,000 tons of salmon are poached for roe yearly in Kamchatka.

Rahr: We tend to react at the 11th hour -- we need to take the long view, get ahead of the curve.

Rahr: We don't proactively protect, we react, so good places get pounded, it's a losing strategy.
Rahr: Pacific Salmon Conservation Assessment.

Rahr: The time to be effective is before the threat is on top of you.

Rahr: we must save the best -- habitat etc.

Rahr: Pacific Rim population will double by 2050.

Rarh -- Wild Salmon Center http://www.wildsalmoncenter.

Fukushima: masu salmon are effectively protected but taimen are not.

How the heck do get an average from some of these scatter plots?

Fukushima: Japanese huchen/taimen -- http://tinyurl.com/cfo4tw

Fukushima: fish species richness falls due to damming.

Fukushima: Hokkaido protected drainages designed for salmon conservation.

Fukushima: Hokkaido has 574 watersheds of which 32 are "protected drainages"

Fukushima: Japan has thousands of dams.

Fukushima: National Institute for Environmental Studies Tsukuba Japan http://www.nies.go.jp/

Marxan: http://www.uq.edu.au/marxan

Reeves: Marxan -- a decision support system for systematic conservation planning.

Reeves: Concept of irreplaceability -- areas essential to meet conservation goals.

Reeves: We have long thought that nature can bounce back from any indignity we impose upon it.

Reeves: Livingston Stone was calling for salmon reserves in Alaska in 1892.

Salmonid Rivers Observatory Network

Do we need more vision or more implementation?
Skeena: kids learn to honour, respect and take care of the fishery.

Skeena -- these fisheries are also nurturing grounds for our children.

Skeena -- this is all for naught if we don't protect the habitat. Yes!

In-river native fisheries don't need boats, fuel, port infrastructure.

Skeena, we can catch fish in better ways, with more local benefits, while boosting biodiversity.

Russia -- we need legislation like Canada's Wild Salmon Policy, and we need more than that.

Kaev: Pink salmon need improvement of spawning conditions.

Kaev: chum salmon need further development of hatchery rearing.

Kaev: wild vs hatchery salmon in Sakhalin.

Russains are using Google Earth for some mapping -- what a change from the Cold War!

Semenchenko: Sakhalin test rivers -- Taranay, Kura, Naycha.

Semenchenko: move away from monitoring commercial fisheries to whole river monitoring.

Semenchenko: Monitoring salmon in Sakhalin.

Tabunkov: We are talking major devastation (poachers + ruthless companies).

Tabunkov: Companies will take maximum fish regardless of regulations.

Tabunkov: Poachers taking about 20% of salmon caught.

Tabunkov: I don't want to keep this photo on screen (fish gutted for roe only) -- too depressing.

Tabunkov: Problem of poachers taking roe only.
Tabunkov: problem of "heavily corrupt companies working with "heavily corrupt bureaucrats"

Tabunkov: we do not tag hatchery fish on Sakhalin so research "leaves much to be desired"

Tabunkov: hatchery chum pushed wild pink out of spawning grounds, so law was changed.

Tabunkov: these recently built hatcheries were destructive to wild fish.

Tabunkov: fishing companies are building their own hatcheries with no scientific input.

Tabunkov: Sakhalin has 15 federal hatcheries producing 900 million fish?/year.

Tabunkov: Sakhalin divided into over 700 fishing areas -- assigned to companies -- they care for enviro.

Tabunkov: no forestry, no mining, no drilling equals recovering fish.

Tabunkov: collapsing Russian economy (see prev Tweet) resulted in recovery of salmon.

Tabunkov: collapsing Russian economy some years ago impacted fisheries - no forestry, mining, drilling.

Tabunkov: Sometimes there were too many spawning fish that clogged the river - I don't get this.

Tabunkov: Fisheries Association of Sakhalin http://tinyurl.com/cegdgd

Tabunkov: I'm here representing concerns of fishermen.

Taylor: thanks to First Nations of the Skeen Fisheries Commission http://www.skeenafisheries.ca/

Taylor: looking for "fair trade" designation for Skeena salmon sustainable harvested by FN.

Taylor: all economic benefits of Babine/Skeen fishery stays local.

Taylor: conservation, biodiversity and ecological integrity paramount in all decisions.

Taylor: develop selective in-river fisheries that emulate what FN did.

Taylor: look back to move forward -- there are other ways.
Taylor: but increased abundance of "enhanced Sockeye" has led to overharvest of wild fish.

Taylor: says installation of spawning channels was a success.

BTW, by FN, I refer to First Nations, or "native Indians".

Taylor: We are trying to replicate something FN had in place for hundreds of years.

Taylor: FN principles -- reciprocal economic exchange, strict and transparent enforcement of rules.

Taylor: FN principles -- fishing property rights, sustainability, conservation for future generations.

Taylor: Babine River, FN used to harvest 3/4 million salmon a year.

Taylor: First Nations "managed" fisheries for hundreds and thousands of years – sustainably.

Taylor: there was a robust fishery on the Skeens thousands of years ago - a sustainable FN fishery.

Taylor: Skeena Wild Conservation Trust - http://www.skeenawild.org/

So LuLu says, yes we need a TV show or weekly newspaper column called "Fish Files"

Artist LuLu has a panel on her scroll called "Fish Files" -- I like that, sounds like a TV series.

Artist Lu is chronicling the conf with an art scroll.

Morning break is announced -- we now get to eat Skeena salmon with our coffee.

I'm feeling like the patient is dying and we're discussing better ways to monitor the decline.

DFO asked Tlingit to halve salmon take, elders said no fishing at all because there are almost no fish.

Tlingit have completely stopped fishing in the headwaters of the Yukon on advice from elders.

Peterman: we have data on Fraser sockeye "all the way back to 1938" - how is that "historical"?

Canada's Species at Risk Act - http://tinyurl.com/cdg9s6 9:31 AM

QA comment, no fish species has ever been listed as endangered under SARA, even the cod that 99% gone.
Holt: We suggest that risk tolerance be identified by fisheries management.

Holt: uncertainties are pervasive, but we can account for them in the model... Uh, OK

Mortality is depensatory when its rate increases as the size of the population decreases. (http://tinyurl.com/ccwwws)

Holt: depensatory mortality -- another term I need to learn

Canada's Wild Salmon Policy: http://tinyurl.com/bexba

Holt: speaking on Canada's Wild Salmon Policy

Zhivotovsky: there are some lake-spawning chum salmon in Russia - rare

Zhivotovsky: speaking about research on "south Kuril" islands - wonder how Japanese feel about this?

Thinking at the first conf they ate crab and lobster, now salmon and shrimp, next conf tofu and beans.

Tweets From Day 2 Salmon Conference

Here are my Tweets from today's State of the Salmon 2009 conference sessions (second of three days), in last-to-first order:

BTW. today's sessions wrapped up with a plea from octogenarian Pearl Keenan -- nice to have some heart instead of statistics. She's from the Tlingit First Nation in the Yukon. Her basic plea? Please stop taking all the fish at the mouth of the river -- she lives near the headwaters, and they're all gone up there. I had to find her later and thank her for speaking from the heart, and hoping we would listen to something other than "science" and PowerPoints.

Long: Washington State fisheries are dependent on hatcheries

Busack: Argument is now how serious is domestication (hatchery fish), not if it exists.

Busack: Concern that interbreeding between hatchery and wild fish reduces fitness.

Researchers find what they look for, and when you bring up other potential factors, they get defensive.

When issues arise, it's time to break for coffee. Sheesh.

One word I have yet to hear at this conference is "pollution."

Q&A: Beamish -- coho and chinook in St of Gerogia are critical and think will get worse.

Walters: But culling seals is no solution because they also keep down other predators.

Walters: Huge growth in harbour seal population in Georgia Strait.

Walters: Ocean mortality causes hypotheses - hatchery disease, ocean warming, predators??

Walters: We don't know what is causing coho and chinook ocean mortality.

Walters: South BC chinook continue to decline despite closing commercial fishing in 80s and sport in 90s.

Walters: coho spawning in south BC has collapsed even with hatchery supplementation.

Walters: Declining marine survival is the biggest hit to salmon.

Walters: there has been no substantial habitat loss since 1990. Huh?

What data? Historic salmon runs - data never goes back more than a century, so how is that "historic"?

Walters: severe coho and chinook declines in south BC - threats are other than fishing.

Some speakers really need to take a Plain English course! Jargon-itis puts the audience to sleep.

What the heck is a "mortality objective"?

Schindler: geomorphic variation in fresh water is reflected in ocean growth of salmon.

Schindler: spawning productivity of rivers changes over time -- me: so shouldn't we protect *all* rivers?

Schindler: Are doomsday scenarios the best way to get the message out to the public?

By the time this conference is over we'll have eaten all the fish in the sea.

Q&A - Hokkaido also has conflicts between agriculture and fisheries.

Q&A - salmon can quickly repopulate territory if habitat is cleaned up and access enabled.

Q&A - unfortunately, education on salmon preservation is weak.

Q&A - if policymakers would err on the side of safety, we'd have better monitoring.

Q&A - Japan considers 2nd-gen hatchery spawners to be "wild" as long as from same stock.

Walton: need to look at viability of salmon at local levels -- creeks.

Walton: hatchery reform will be crucial to the survival of wild salmon.

Walton: over-harvest and hatcheries impact wild fish.

Walton: if you want to keep salmon runs strong, don't ruin your rivers.

Walton: after a century of using salmon hatcheries, we still don't know if they benefit salmon.

Walton: challenge is to develop a concise story we can tell people about protecting wild salmon.

Walton: How are we going to change human behaviour in relation to wild salmon?

Walton: do we have a common vision for a wild salmon policy?

Walton: endangered salmon are a West Coast-wide issue.

Walton: we have been working on recovery plans for a long time, but need people's support.

Last US administration (Bush) gave little support to conservation.

Bowles: fish only care about action -- what are we doing to fix things?

Bowles: "plan" has become a four-letter word, but plans are essential for salmon recovery.

Bowles: hatchery fish are not a replacement for natural populations.

Bowles: key threat to salmon is apathy.

Bowles: public becoming more disconnected from fish and their watersheds.

Riddell: conservation of wild salmon and their habitat is the highest priority.

Riddell: in BC/Yukon there are 8300 combinations of streams/salmon species.

Riddell: diversity is key to preserving salmon.

White: all groups that harvest salmon have a sense of entitlement.

Kulikov: sounds like Russia also has jurisdictional and bureaucratic issues.

Kulikov: First protected area in Khabarovsk area was created in 1920s.

Nagata: Japan looking at zone management for coexistence of hatchery and wild salmon.

Nagata: Commercial and game fisheries in rivers are prohibited in Hokkaido.

Nagata: Hokkaido fishery needs to change to wild salmon management objectives.

Nagata: calls native salmon spawning "traditional management", hatcheries "modern management".

Nagata: Hatcheries in Japan were established in 1888 from US.

Rawson: Pogo - we have met the enemy and he is us.

Rawson: we can't be doing things the same way that we have been doing them.

Rawson: habitat protection is the key contributor to saving the salmon.

Rawson: there is little public confidence in process for protecting habitat.

Rawson: Spawner return in some Puget Sound rivers is less than 10% of historic figures.

Rawson: lost 75-90 % of estuary habitat in Puget Sound.

Rawson: Habitat loss is the key factor for decline of Puget Sound chinook salmon.

Rawson: Hatchery risks - genetic, ecological, disease, etc.

Rawson:hatcheries are our arrogant assumption that we can do better than Mother Nature.

Rawson: causes of chinook decline - harvest, hatcheries and habitat.

Rawson: Skagit chinook have declined dramatically over last 50 yrs.

Rawson: Puget Sound chinook listed as threatened.

Quinn: larger fish may enter spawning grounds ealier than small fish.

Quinn: in some cases, middle of run is fished hard, with early and late less exploited.

Quinn: so we might be hitting more "early" fish, and more "late" fish.

Quinn: human exploitation appears to affect timing of spawning runs to some degree.

Quinn: fishing rates (exploitation) vary widely during run timing due to management.

Quinn: fisheries are less size-selective than they used to be.

Quinn: intermediate sizes of fish are most vulnerable to being caught.

Quinn: expected that gillnet fishery is selective against large fish.

Quinn: salmon have been declining in body size -- selective effects of fishing?

Quinn: humans have an impact on evolution of animals through hunting.

Quinn: humans have a long history of affecting the evolution of animals.

First nations comment - science must work with first nations knowledge.

Audience comment - global warming is a symptom of overpopulation.

Williams: Aldo Leopold - humans must change from conquerors of land to members of it.

Williams: to save salmon - land ethic, multiple scales and political boundaries, restoration economy.

Williams: hatcheries alone cannot solve problem of declining salmon, declining biodeversity.

Williams: artificial species restocking is not biologically viable without addressing causes of decline.

Williams: impacts - rising temps, reduced snowpack, variability in flows, fires.

Williams: Stressors - human pop growth, resource consumption, invasive species, climate change.

Williams: reconnect rives to their floodplains, do not channel them.

Williams: Protect remaining habitat, Reconnect to other areas, Restore urban waterways.

Williams: we must protect remaining habitat.

Williams: 29% of Pacific northwest salmon stocks are extinct

Williams: Laws and regulations are not enough. We are destroying Earth -- ecological footprint.

How the heck do you "increase salmon resilience to climate change"? Isn't that evolution?

Sun: Canadian Fisheries Management 'A Mess'

Vancouver Sun: Canadian fisheries management a mess.

Tweets From Day 1 Salmon Conference

Here are my Tweets from today's State of the Salmon 2009 conference sessions, in last-to-first order:

Fedorenko: Pacific Rim nations release 5 billion hatchery salmon/year.

Fedorenko: Total value of Pacific Rim commercial salmon catch $1 billion/year.

Beechie: Dams are the big story in extirpation of salmon in US lower 48, along with development.

Irvine: 50% or more of all BC salmon species are red/amber status (ie not good) in conservation units.

Irvine: In Canada general catch declines for all salmon species, 2008 one of lowest years.

Disappointed that reports from different countries are measuring different things so can't compare.

Hilsinger: Alaska salmon catches for all species have been good in last thirty years.

Radchenko: Russia releasing over half a billion hatchery salmon into Pacific annually.

Radchenko: Russian sockeye and chum catches are way up in the last ten years.

Kang: Korean salmon returns in 2000s fell to a third of returns in 1990s -- also warming?

Nagata: Focus on biodiversity of wild salmon and restoration of freshwater environments.

Nagata: Japan chum returns have fallen dramatically in south, more stable in north (Hokkaido) - warming?

Nagata: Japan stocking hundreds of millions of chum and pink fry.

Vladimir Belyaev: Important to improve national and international reporting to set reserves for salmon.

Vladimir Belyaev: Protecting entire watersheds is crucial to protecting salmon.

Vladimir Belyaev: Ocean survivability is moot if we don't protect spawning habitat -- rivers, estuaries.

Vladimir Belyaev: Russia is looking at setting up protected areas for salmon.

David Anderson: Concerned that Canada will fall behind US under Obama on climate change.

David Anderson: Major uncertainties about the impact of hatchery fish on ocean survival of wild stocks.

David Anderson: Strong opposition to change. People understand existing systems and fear the unknown.

David Anderson: The dead hand of the past protects the status quo.

Nathan Mantua: Humans are the primary drivers of change in salmon ecosystems.

Looking at Ecology and Society journal website: http://www.ecologyandsociety

Resilience Alliance http://www.resalliance.org/

David Suzuki -- World Scientists' Warning to Humanity, back in 1992 - http://deoxy.org/sciwarn.htm.

Suzuki: State of Salmon -- we invented the economy, we gotta change it.

Suzuki: State of Salmon -- all that humans can do is manage themselves, not other animals.

Suzuki: The most important lesson we have is the extent of our ignorance.

Suzuki: The future of salmon is bleak as long as politics and economics are the major drivers.

Guido Rahr fate of salmon will be determined in our lifetimes.

First Nations start by pointing out that side channels and creeks in the lower mainland are being destroyed.

Birding Bonanza at Reifel Sanctuary

Yumi and I spent three hours ambling around the George C. Reifel Migratory Bird Sanctuary in Delta, BC this morning. We had a great time, and I took 572 shots with my Nikon D300... Yikes! When I got home I winnowed that down by about half.

Got some good shots of lots of different species of birds, and today was a sandhill crane special -- to our surprise they were even eating out of people's hands! Not sure if it's such a great idea to get them that acclimatized to humans...

Ocean view from the sanctuary.

Walking along one of the dikes.

Swans in foreground against the north shore mountains.

The first of several shots of sandhill cranes.

You can see grains of wheat in this one's beak.

Head closeup with eyelid open... next shot same bird, eyelid closed.

Eyelid closed.

Eagle.

Cooper's Hawk (?) hunting the marsh.

Female mallard walking on ice.

Male mallard.

Female mallard eating grain.

American coot.

I believe this is a ring-necked duck.

Northern pintail.

Red-winged blackbirds mobbing a feeder.

A closer look at a blackbird.

This towhee appeared to be injured or ill.

What's a bunch of birds without a pigeon?

Yumi tempting chickadees with sunflower seeds and chopped walnuts.

A chickadee lands on Yumi's hand.

And one snags a sunflower seed.

Here's a little cutie... I'm still terrible at IDing these small ones...

And a closing shot of the lovely surroundings.

CBC Story on Invasive Plants in BC

CBC has run a story on invasive plants in BC. It's about time the mass media began covering this issue. Streamkeepers and other groups have been putting in thousands of collective volunteer hours battling these non-native plants that overpower and kill native species, leading to monocultures that destroy habitat.

Cool NFB Streaming Video Website

The National Film Board has a new streaming video website to which they've posted many NFB films from over the decades.

You can search by category. For example, under "environment", I found this 1975 salmon migration and spawning documentary.

You can also search by keyword, and a few that I found useful as a streamkeeper are "salmon," "fish," "fishing," and "fisheries."

Once you're watching a film, lists of related films pop up.

Very cool! Potentially hugely time-wasting, er, I mean educational.

Yikes! As I watch the above salmon movie, it's bringing up issues that we're still nattering about nearly 35 years later...

You could spend hours deconstructing these films. For example, in the 1949 film Red Runs the Fraser, there was no mention that the slides that blocked fish passage in the Fraser River at Hell's Gate were caused by railway construction.

Byrne Creek Patrol Jan. 18, 2009

Yumi and I walked the ravine portion of Byrne Creek this afternoon for the first time in over a week. As we suspected, there was some significant erosion following the melting of the heavy snow we've had over the last few weeks.

Heading down the stairs into the ravine.

Tree fallen into creek at eroded bank.

A closer view.

Wild looking fungus on a fallen log.

Misty Burnaby Lake Wildfowl

Following the wildlife tree workshop, Yumi and I spent some time on Piper Spit enjoying the spooky view of Burnaby Lake in the mist, and the variety of ducks and geese.

Eagle in the mist.

Photographer on the spit in the mist.

Another view...

A kaleidoscope of ducks and geese.

A stylish wood duck couple.

Yumi and Canada Goose ogle each other.

From the end of the spit the shore was barely visible in the mist.

Metro Vancouver Habitat Tree Workshop

The Metro Vancouver Wildlife Tree Stewardship Workshop this morning was educational and fun. It was held at Burnaby Lake Park as part of the Metro Van Parks Partners Program.

The workshop was run by the Wildlife Tree Stewardship program of BC Nature. Participants learned about the importance of wildlife trees -- trees in various stages of death and decay -- as habitat and food sources for many animals including bugs, birds, and mammals. We also learned to identify stages of tree decay, and how to fill out and submit forms about wildlife trees, their locations, and wildlife using them.

The group discussing a likely wildlife tree.

Examining holes in a wildlife tree.

Four Byrne Creek Streamkeepers attended the event, and perhaps we can put our new knowledge to use in mapping wildlife trees in Byrne Creek ravine.

Looking Forward to Wildlife Tree Workshop

As of this morning (Wednesday 1/14) Metro Vancouver still had spaces left in its Wildlife Tree Stewardship Workshop slated for 10:00 to noon this coming Saturday (1/17) at Burnaby Lake as part of its Parks Partners Program.

Yumi and I have signed up.

Wildlife Tree Stewardship Workshops

Wildlife trees may not look like much at first glance, but these standing trees ­ dead or alive ­ have qualities that can support up to 80 wildlife species for decades. Bald eagles and osprey nest in their crowns; woodpeckers, songbirds and ducks find food or shelter; bears make dens in their bases and bats roost in their bark.

You can help ensure that these critical pieces of wildlife habitat are protected ­ and learn more about wildlife trees and the creatures that depend on them ­ by becoming a volunteer wildlife tree steward.

Metro Vancouver, in partnership with the Wildlife Tree Stewardship Program (WiTS), is offering three Wildlife Tree Stewardship workshops:

Saturday, Jan. 17, 10 a.m. to noon Burnaby Lake Regional Park

Saturday, Feb. 14, 10 a.m. to noon Campbell Valley Regional Park

Saturday, March 14, 10 a.m. to noon Deas Island Regional Park

Each includes a 45-minute classroom component and hour-long field session in a regional park. Participants will learn how to identify wildlife trees, monitor active nests, help put together an inventory and contribute to the stewardship of these important natural resources.

Workshops are free. Advance registration is required.

For more information or to register, call (604) 432-6359 or email programs.info@metrovancouver.org

Appointed to City of Burnaby Environment Committee

I've been appointed to the City of Burnaby's Environment Committee as a citizen representative. Went to my first meeting last night, and was pleased to see several familiar faces among senior staff that I've worked with through my streamkeeping volunteering with the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers and the Edmonds Business and Community Association. I look forward to learning the ropes and contributing toward making Burnaby a great place to live, work and play.

Human Predators Impact Size of Prey

According to this article, "WASHINGTON (Reuters) ­ Hunting and gathering has a profound impact on animals and plants, driving an evolutionary process that makes them become smaller and reproduce earlier, U.S. researchers reported on Monday."

"Their study of hunting, fishing and collecting of 29 different species shows that under human pressure, creatures on average become 20 percent smaller and their reproductive age advances by 25 percent."

Complete article here.

Over-harvesting of fish (and other species) results not only in reduced numbers, but smaller survivors....

If you think about this, it appears obvious -- think of trophy hunting -- we're constantly culling the biggest animals.

What does this say about the long-term sustainability of species that we "harvest"?

Snow Falling on Byrne Creek

It's still snowing in Burnaby, making for an enchanting walk around Byrne Creek this afternoon.

Heron in the snowy creek.

Yumi on the creek trail.

Paul on the creek trail.

Paul and Yumi on the footbridge.

Eagles on Squamish, Cheakamus Rivers

Thousands of eagles gather every winter along the Squamish, Cheakamus and Mamquam rivers in the vicinity of Squamish and Brackendale, BC. This year's count was way down, and there were few to be seen at Brackendale Eagles Provincial Park. Yumi and I got up close to some of these magnificent raptors near the Tenderfoot Hatchery.

Along the Squamish River.

A kingfisher along the road to the hatchery.

Bald eagle surveying the countryside.

Entrance to the hatchery.

This eagle was ringed by photographers but took the paparazzi in stride.

Yumi getting closer to the blase bird in the photo above.

Raptor working on what appeared to be a coho salmon carcass.

Large salmon carcass framed by chain-link fence.

There were at least six sated eagles resting in this tree.

Snow Accumulates in Burnaby

The snow kept coming overnight and there was a fresh accumulation of ten to 15cm this morning, so I went out at 6:45 a.m. to shovel. I cleared the path in front of our section of townhouse units, and the trail to the back gate, but the road can wait for the contractor to show up with his truck! I wonder if people who need to drive to work are making it out...

Yumi heading off to work.

You can see the accumulation on our balcony.

The total must be up to around 25-35cm by now with the previous snow. Not much for my Saskatchewan roots, or up the valley toward the mountains, or in the interior, but it's enough to cause huge problems here.

Choco, our indoor cat, was amused for about 30 seconds...

Snow doughnut, with icing sugar piling up beneath the hole :-).

The sun comes up, highlighting the snow.

Snowy Deer Lake Walk

Deer Lake in Burnaby was covered with ice and snow this weekend. Yumi and I walked the completed trail that now goes all the way around the lake. It was -8C to -10C and I was happy to find that my Nikon DSLR stood up fine to the cold for the hour-long ramble.

Gulls on the swings at the beach.

Yumi with ducks congregating in the only open water near the beach.

A gateway to the new "official" trail on the south shore.

Yumi edging her way onto the ice. More adventurous, or foolhardy, souls were skating on the lake despite the warning signs saying not to.

Deer Lake has numerous streams running into it that can undermine the ice, and temperatures rarely get cold enough, long enough, for safe skating. Thereby the prohibition...

Me bundled up on the shore.

The Shadbolt Centre across the frozen lake.

Puffed up against the cold.

Circling the west end of the lake on the boardwalk.

A hardy heron.

A semi-frozen stream enters the lake.

Snow Scenes Around Byrne Creek

It was fun crunching through the recent snow taking photos along Byrne Creek this afternoon.

It's actually a heron, but I like to call this "Two Cranes" :-)

Short Water Videos From CWF

The Canadian Wildlife Federation has a good series of short videos on water. Check them out!

Report Says DFO Not Monitoring Enough Salmon Streams

According to this Globe and Mail article, a new study shows that Canada's Department of Fisheries and Oceans is not monitoring enough salmon spawning streams to preserve salmon stocks.

Stocks may be even more depressed than previously feared, and without adequate monitoring, Pacific salmon could go down the road toward oblivion as have the Atlantic cod. It also appears that the DFO has a pattern of dropping monitoring of streams that are in trouble, potentially skewing results.

Mapping Multiple Benefits of Marine Ecosystems

Interesting article on a joint project between Stanford University's Woods Institute for the Environment, the Nature Conservancy, and the World Wildlife Fund to develop software to assist in mapping the economic benefits of marine ecosystems.

I like the following quotation:

"'People tend to look at nature in one of two ways,' added Michael Wright, managing director of the Natural Capital Project. 'We either ignore the values it provides altogether, or we focus only on one specific commercial value, such as fisheries,' he said. 'We see individual pieces, not the whole. As a result, the collective value of nature is diminished. Through this grant we want to develop tools that do not just maximize the fisheries but capture all of the interests that depend on the oceans.'"

Any effort to broaden the way we calculate the "value" of nature is to be applauded.

The Tyee on Fraser Salmon

"All of BC has a stake in better managing once massive salmon runs. Third in a series."

Part of the Exploring the Fate of the Fraser River series in The Tyee.

Collective Apathy, Amnesia

'Crisis puts climate fight back on the back burner'

'Public is tiring of climate change fight, poll finds'

The above two headlines ran together on the same page in today's Vancouver Sun.

To some extent I understand the apathy and amnesia about what is happening to the environment as the global financial and economic crisis hits home. What I don't get is why the old economy always seems to trump the environment. Without clean air and water, without productive land, we cannot survive. We are talking about our health and well-being, not only that of some nebulous "environment".

Let's take a look at a few more headlines from the last week:

'Complete fishing halt won't save cod: study' -- in today's National Post. Do you like fish and chips? How about 'Gulf cod are doomed, DFO finds' -- the same story in the Sun.

'Aquatic food webs at risk' -- on the same page as the two headlines that started this blog post.

Yesterday's Sun -- 'Abbotsford mushroom farms fined for dumping toxins: Waste caused destruction of salmon-bearing stream'

Well knock me down with a feather! It took nearly two years, but enforcement and fines actually happened. What about the guy who was caught wet-booted pouring chemicals into John Mathews Creek in the watershed that I live in? How many more years will we wait for action on that blatant poisoning?

'Boy died from spraying too much deodorant: Solvent in can most probably cause of death, coroner finds' -- Vancouver Sun, Nov. 21.

So you think all those cleansers and beauty products in your house, and pesticides in your garage, are fine because they are "approved", eh? Think again...

'Declining gas prices could derail surge in transit use' -- Vancouver Sun, Nov. 21.

'Way cleared for farmed fish to be labeled as organic' -- Vancouver Sun, Nov. 21. And what about all those chemicals used in the process?

'Scientists assail easing of rules for natural gas exploration: Planned changes cited as path to ecological crisis in boreal forests' -- Vancouver Sun, Nov. 21.

I've got more articles cut out of the paper in the last week or two, but I think the trend is clear. So why don't we get it? Are we so self-absorbed and selfish that we'll just continue to consume and spray and clear cut and mindlessly "develop" and the hell with our own health and the prospects for our children and their children?

Seattle Coho Dying Before Spawning

Coho are dying in restored streams in Seattle before they can spawn, according to this Seattle Post-Intelligencer article. The cause is speculated to be polluted runoff from roads. We have noted the same effect here in the lower mainland of British Columbia, with many coho dying unspawned in "our" stream, Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby. While Byrne has received few coho in the last few years, it's even more tragic when the few that do come back do not spawn before they die.

According to the Seattle article, coho in rural creeks are fine, it's urban creeks and restored city waterways in which the fish are struggling -- precisely the creeks that suffer most from pollutants.

Thanks to streamkeeper Joan for pointing out the article.

Streamkeepers on CBC Radio

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers were interviewed by CBC radio reporter Terry Donnelly today. Joan Carne and I spoke about the trials and tribulations facing urban creeks, and the positive news that this year's run of chum and coho spawners in Byrne Creek had at least matched the new low set last year. Why is that good news? Well, it's the first time in several years that the numbers had not declined!

We covered some of the issues affecting urban creeks including scouring and erosion caused by massive runoff during rains due to the buildup of impervious surfaces (roads, parking lots, roofs) in urban watersheds, pollution from road wash that goes down storm drains including gas, oil, antifreeze, brake dust, rubber dust, etc. Terry was also curious about efforts to daylight creeks, or bring them back to life from the pipes that they have been buried in.

It was a great conversation, and I hope a decent portion makes it onto the air. I know that the vagaries and time pressures of journalism often result in at best a minute or two of a two-hour discussion actually being published...

The piece should air on B.C. Almanac on Friday, Nov. 28, 2008, and the latest we heard was that it was slated for 1:40 p.m.

You can monitor the show here.
(http://www.cbc.ca/bcalmanac/) Just look for the link near the top of the page under "Listen Live".

Female Chum Awaits Death in Byrne Creek

This female chum salmon was quietly awaiting death in a calm pool in Byrne Creek this morning. Her spawning mission accomplished, her life's purpose was done. In her deteriorating state she appeared to have gone blind, as she didn't react to my looming shape, but when I stepped in the water she sensed the movement, her shallow breathing accelerated, and she stirred her body -- battered from digging a nest for her eggs in the gravel. I snapped a quick photo and left her in peace.

Chum Spawn in Byrne Creek

Chum salmon have been returning to Burnaby's Byrne Creek over the last couple of weeks. You can check out the website for updated information on numbers as streamkeepers monitor the run.

I took a video of a few spawners today and posted it on You Tube -- my first YT contribution. The quality is not the greatest as I shot it with a digital camera, not a video camera, and I'm still experimenting with editing and processing techniques.

Calgary to Waterton to Lethbridge

I left my cousin's place on an acreage west of Calgary this morning and zipped into the city to drop off a package for a friend. Mission accomplished, I backtracked west on the No. 1 -- and ran into a near whiteout of a snowstorm! Groan. Just what I needed after two days of rain.

I persevered, heading south down the 22, and within half an hour the skies cleared, the sun came out, and I enjoyed a wonderful drive through the beautiful, rolling, ranch country with the mountains to the west. As I cruised south, view upon view pulled me to the side of the road to shoot photos. The silvers, yellows, browns and golds of the autumn landscape were amazing, with the blue, purple and gray backdrop of the distant mountains, and the white clouds scudding across the vast, azure, western sky!

When I hit the No. 3, I backtracked west to visit the Frank Slide, then it was east again on the No. 3 and then south on the No. 6 to Waterton National Park.

I arrived in Waterton to find the village literally boarded up for the season and just a few hardy tourists wandering around. The townsite was full of deer. The countryside was gorgeous and I took a pile of photos. I had not visited Waterton in over 30 years, and the short sojurn today sparked weak memories, at best. But I vowed to bring my wife Yumi to Waterton in the spring, or next autumn, to make fresh memories together.

I left Waterton reluctantly, as fragile fragments of camping in the park as a kid with my family began to form and tease over the intervening decades... Were we driving the Rambler? Did we have that huge, heavy, yellow and brown canvas tent?

It was time to head onward into the future again...

I took the No. 5 north and east to Lethbridge. I ran into another line of windmills, about 20 or so, not as many as the dozens along the No. 3... I wonder how much of Alberta's electricity comes from the wind?

Today made up for the last two days of non-stop rain. I loved cruising along the nearly deserted roads at 10 - 20kph below the limit and pulling over whenever I felt like it to drink in the views and frame a few shots.

Sorry, the photos will have to wait until I get home in about ten days -- I don't have the gear and software to get them onto this ancient notebook computer that I'm using....

Pitt, Hayward Lakes

The Thanksgiving long weekend provided an opportunity to get out of town a bit and take some photos.

Pitt Lake

Pitt-Addington reserve dike trail.

Trail near Hayward Lake.

Autumn Signs Along Byrne Creek

A ramble down the Byrne Creek ravine revealed signs of autumn, though a holdout garter snake proved it wasn't too cold yet.

An empty bench in Ron McLean Park invites contemplation of changing colours.

The return of an American Dipper to the creek is a sure sign of the impending arrival of spawning salmon.

These bouncy little birds love to dive under the water for salmon eggs.

Not the best shot of a garter snake -- but I was happy to see they were still enjoying a bit of sun as the cold comes on...

Rivers Day 2008

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers had a booth up at Rivers Day on the BCIT campus in Burnaby today. It was a gorgeous day with lots to see and do.

Hanging a temporary Stream of Dreams mural for the event.

Byrne Creek display.

Rivers Day founder Mark Angelo and BC Environment Minister Barry Penner.

VIPs release cutthroat trout into Guichon Creek.

A curious ball of fluff watches the activities.

Mother Raccoon, Kit Killed on Burnaby's Southridge Dr.

A mother raccoon and a kit were killed by a vehicle on Southridge Dr. in southeast Burnaby recently. I came across their carcasses at the side of the road today. Thanks to the kind soul who moved them off the bloody pavement and placed them side by side on the grass.

It's high time people slowed down on Southridge -- the speed limit is 50kph but I'd say the average speed is around 70, with speeds of 80 and more not uncommon. It's a wide, four-lane road, but that is no excuse. When I drive the road I feel that I'm obstructing traffic if I'm moving at less than 60-65, and I am passed regularly at that speed. I often walk sections of the road and despite the wide sidewalks, find the roaring trucks, zooming cars, and screaming motorcycles intimidating at times. It would take only a split-second of distraction for a driver doing 70 or 80 to hop the curb and mow down a pedestrian.

I was going to use the headline "Mother, Child Killed on Southridge Speedway" but felt that would be too sensationalistic.

Yet it was a mother and her child...

But I guess we won't care until it is a Homo sapiens mother and child lying at the side of the road.

And perhaps not even then.

Life in the fast lane, eh?

Canoeing, Camping Lightning Lake

We finally got away for our first camping trip this year! I'm zonked so I'll add to this later, but here are a few photos....

Osprey on a perch.

Osprey in flight.

Loon in the morning mist.

The above shots were taken hand-held in a moving canoe at my Canon S5 IS's maximum telephoto of 432mm (35mm equivalent). Not bad, though I wouldn't want to blow them up to 8 X 10s :-). They were taken within about 30 minutes of each other, showing how fast the light can change in the morning in the mountains.

Byrne Creek Foliage

A refreshing walk along Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby...

Canoeing Deer Lake

We didn't get away this Labour Day weekend, but today we did at least get the canoe over to Deer Lake, just a ten-minute drive from our place in Burnaby. As we were paddling along something was bothering me, and it wasn't until we got to the far end that I figured it out -- we'd forgotten our life jackets! Dangerous and illegal....

We got back to the beach, and I zipped home to pick up the jackets. Then we did two more laps of the small lake -- I guess it was good we hadn't gone too far from home :-).

The lillies were covered with thousands of little insects.

Whistler, Lillooet, Lytton Loop

Itchy feet and an itchy trigger finger put me on the road today to get out into the mountains and shoot some photos. I went north up the 99 to Squamish, Whistler and Pemberton, carried on past Duffey Lake and over to Lillooet. Then it was back south to Lytton, Hope, and home to Burnaby. It never ceases to amaze me how varied the landscape is in BC, and how quickly you can transition from one ecological zone to another. The weather also changes by the hour as you travel, and today I encountered everything from hot sun to torrential rain.

On the 99 north.

Near the Joffre Lakes parking lot.

Near the Joffre Lakes parking lot.

Cayoosh Creek.

Duffey Lake.

Setton Lake, just west of Lillooet.

I've stopped at this spot perhaps four or five times over the last ten years, and I have never seen this lake calm. Powerful winds funnel down between the mountains, raising whitecaps and making boats tied to the dock buck like broncos mad at being tethered.

Heading south on highway 12.

North of Lytton.

Spider Lunches On Fly

This spider had already wrapped up this fly on our balcony when I came across the scene. The spider withdrew at my presence, but when it figured I wasn't a threat, it descended back onto the fly to continue its lunch.

Taken with my new Nikon D300 with the 18-200 zoom at its maximum of 200mm. Shots taken at various ISOs from 200 - 800, resulting in exposures of around 1/250 at F stops of 6.3 - 9. The difference in background colours resulted from using the flash in some shots.

Blame Mother Nature?

People on a mailing list were discussing the damage humans do to the environment, and the "damage" that Mother Nature does. Here was my two cents:

I suppose it depends on one's definition of "damage." A lot of what Mother Nature does could also be called "renewal" or "ecosystem change or development" or.... Nature is not static by nature :-).

The kind of damage that humans do is very different from the kind of damage that Mother Nature does. Our damage tends to be more permanent. Once we've changed something, we are loath to see nature reclaim or reuse it in any shape, manner or form.

As a streamkeeper, I like to use the example of rivers. In their natural, healthy state, rivers are alive. They shift, they move, they're full of snags that provide habitat, they carry and turn over gravel that fish need to spawn in. They are constantly changing. They flood, and floods are good because the silt and accompanying biota renew the land.

Then people come along and choose to build in the flood plain. Now suddenly for one species -- us -- the annual flooding isn't all that pleasant, so then comes the channeling, the diking, the building of dams. Those snags and other woody debris are dangerous for boaters, so they're pulled out. The river is dredged to provide safe passage. The spawning gravel is mined for more construction. The river is a shackled shadow of its former self.

In addition, we choose to take our bodily and manufacturing wastes and pipe them into rivers, often with little or no treatment.

And the irony is that it is we who make rivers "dangerous" through all of our construction. The forests are gone, the meadows are gone, the wetlands are gone, so when it rains the water has nowhere to go but into the storm-drain system and then directly into the river, instead of soaking into the ground. And all that diking and channeling ends up just collecting all the force that would have dissipated in a natural flood plain. So when the levee breaks and we suffer damage.... whose fault is it? Can we blame Mother Nature?

Byrne Creek Walk

I was pleased to see many fish in the sediment pond in the Byrne Creek spawning habitat today. They ranged in size from a few centimeters to around 25 cm, and were likely this year's coho and cutthroat fry, along with larger cutthroat trout.

A dragonfly on a blackberry.

I love seeing bees, particularly as they seem to be on the decline.

I've cropped the same shot very tight so you can see the pollen on its head.

A waxwing -- they look so cute, like little punk-rocker Robin Hoods :-).

Deer Lake Sunset From Baldwin House

The Stream of Dreams Murals Society rented the Baldwin House on Deer Lake to put up some out-of-town program teams that are attending a workshop this weekend.

We had a spectacular sunset from the Arthur Erickson-designed house overlooking the lake.

Canadian Govt Reclassifies Pristine Lakes as Toxic Waste Ponds

According to this CBC article, lakes across Canada are being classified as mining-tailings waste sites, using an obscure mining regulation to apparently trump the Fisheries Act that prohibits the dumping of toxins into any fish-bearing waters.

This is insane.

Both the government and the businesses involved must be confronted on this issue. The government for failing to protect the environment, wildlife, and everyone's health, and businesses for proposing this idiocy. I run my own business, belong to my local board of trade, my neighbourhood business association, and this sort of cavalier destruction sickens me. These companies are getting a free ride with no real accounting of the associated environmental and health costs. Where does the death of a watershed touch the profit-loss statement or balance sheet?

Minister of Fisheries and Oceans Loyola Hearn should resign for failing his department's mandate to protect our watersheds and fish.

[Counterpoint, June 17] OK, I was riled and while I stand by my post, I should acknowledge that without the mining industry, I wouldn't even be able to have a blog :-). Think of all the metals in my computer... the coax cable that connects me to the Internet... the server farm that hosts my site... The electricity plants that make it all run. Not to mention the pervasive use of metals in all sorts of items I use daily. Would I give up my watch? My cameras? My shower?

Yet I do believe there is a huge disconnect between what we pay for products and what their true cost is. Some inputs into the raw-materials production and manufacturing processes are not accounted for, and neither are most unacknowledged outputs such as garbage and toxins.

Streamkeepers Tackle Invasive Plants

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers tackled masses of invasive plants that had overwhelmed native plants and trees planted by the City of Burnaby on the sides of the access ramp to the creek off Southridge Dr. Unfortunately, the City has no invasive species plan or coordinator, or apparently any budget to maintain what it has planted.

Streamkeepers to the rescue!

Thirteen volunteers put in a total of 32.5 hours this morning unearthing conifers, ferns, salmonberry, and other native plants from the clutches of Himalayan Blackberry, Morning Glory, English Ivy, and Scotch Broom. We filled two heaping truckloads of invasive plants and took them to the City's recycling centre on Still Creek.

One of the areas we worked on. It was so overgrown that these conifers were not even visible. As we cut down 2-meter high blackberry we came across more stunted trees.

Hauling the invasive plants up the ramp.

Filling the truck.

Deer Lake Wildlife, Views

Yumi and I took a 10.1 km (according to my GPS) ramble from our place in southeast Burnaby all the way to Deer Lake and back on this gorgeous afternoon. We saw lots of animals!

The view from the beach.

The turtles were out in force, soaking up the sun.

A huge tadpole -- it was almost as big as some of the frogs we saw.

Hope it's not an invasive bullfrog...

What's a carp doing in the lake? A dumped pet?

This frog seemed unconcerned at our presence.

Here's another one.

A pretty wood duck.

And here she is with her cute babies.

A waxwing convention.

Heading up toward the former prison farmland.

Dandelions ripe for blowing :-).

The marsh near the viewing tower is great for watching tree swallows.

Spectacular clouds.

Iona Beach Jetty Walk -- Planes, Birds

This gorgeous Victoria Day Sunday, Yumi and I went to Iona Beach Regional Park. The park is a favourite spot for airplane watchers, as it has a great view of Vancouver International Airport. It's also a great place for bird watching, and here are several photos of both natural and man-made birds.

We walked the length of the 4km jetty extending into the Strait of Georgia that is also the sewage outfall for the nearby treatment plant. It's funny how far 4 or 4.5km feels when it's a straight line with no nearby frames of reference!

The setting:

First the "real" birds:

We saw several bald eagles.

A gull.

One of over a dozen herons.

We also saw many cormorants.

Now here is a gallery of prop and jet passenger planes from several carriers. They are impressive coming in low and heading for the Vancouver airport. After awhile, though, as they keep coming, and coming, about every two to three minutes or so, my mind began to think of all that fuel being burned, and all the carbon emitted!

More Birds, Bugs

It's a gorgeous sunny day here in Burnaby, and I took a stroll up and down Byrne Creek this afternoon. I came across two species of woodpeckers and several kinds of bugs.

Pileated woodpecker.

I think this is a female hairy woodpecker.

An American robin with a worm.

Striders in Byrne Creek -- dunno if they're fighting or mating.

Ladybug.

A group of sow bugs.

I was also buzzed by a hummingbird and saw an unidentified raptor hovering over Taylor Park.

Byrne Creek Birds, Bugs, Snakes

I walked Byrne Creek from the top of the ravine all the way down to Marine Way today.

Shed garter snake skin.

There were lots of little garter snakes along the dike basking in the sun. I had to be careful not to stomp the harmless snakes as I walked through the grass.

The caterpillars are back attacking trees in the spawning habitat.

I don't like killing any beasties, but on the other hand, these trees provide crucial shade for the sediment pond...

I was happy to see a goldfinch in the habitat.

I also saw three bald eagles soaring high overhead.

Another Trillium in South Burnaby

Yumi and I found another trillium near Byrne Creek today. It's only the second one we've seen this year.

Byrne Creek Chum Release With Clinton School

Students from Clinton Elementary School in south Burnaby released chum salmon fry into Byrne Creek this morning with the help of DFO and Byrne Creek Streamkeepers. This is one of my favourite annual events because the kids are so excited and happy, and it connects them a bit to nature.

DFO's Maurice Coulter-Boisvert talks salmon.

Kids get chum fry to release.

My wife Yumi assists.

Kids point and marvel as silver hatchery fry turn brown to blend into the creek.

Chum schooling in the creek.

Trillium Graces Byrne Creek

A rare trillium has appeared in Byrne Creek Ravine Park. We usually spot only one or two of these flowers in the riparian zone each year. Apparently it is illegal to pick them in British Columbia. I see we spotted one on almost the same day last year and I posted a photo to this blog.

We also spotted a large bumblebee checking out a dandelion.

Choices Earth Day BBQ - Byrne Creek Tours

Choices in the Park hosted a salmon BBQ for Earth Day, and once again Byrne Creek Streamkeepers had our booth set up for the event. We also did two tours of the creek for people interested in getting out in nature and learning a bit about what streamkeepers do.

Thanks again to Choices for having donations from the BBQ this weekend and last weekend going to help efforts to keep Byrne Creek clean and habitable for all the fish and wildlife that it supports.

We presented two hand-cut, hand-painted cedar salmon to Choices CEO Mark Vickars and Choices in the Park manager Dominic Uy in appreciation of their efforts.

Me, Dominic and Mark

Pointing out park features on creek tour.

Byrne Creek 1 of 10 Best!

According to the Newsleader, Byrne Creek Ravine Park is one of the ten best places in Burnaby for a bag lunch and a walk! The story also mentions the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers and asks walkers to help keep the creek clean and healthy.

More Fry, Oil, Flicker in Byrne Creek

Yumi and I spotted more fry in Byrne Creek today, along with a flicker in the ravine park, but were dismayed by the amount of oil accumulating in the sediment pond.

Salmon fry in the sediment pond

Blue and purple oily sheen on water surface

I think this is a common flicker of the red-shafted race.

More Signs of Spring

Cherry blossoms, a plump robin, and a small school of salmonid fry (baby salmon) all pointed to signs of spring on our Byrne Creek ramble after lunch today.

Spring Salmonberry

I patrolled for fry this afternoon in Byrne Creek this afternoon and was happy to find several more spread in pools in the spawning habitat. As I was scanning one pool a curious chickadee flitted over and danced from branch to branch just a foot or two from my face. We had a little chat and then he bounced off as I moved on. More salmonberry bushes are beginning to blossom.

Reifel Sanctuary Birding Foray

The Easter weekend brought a lot of people out to the Reifel Migratory Bird Sanctuary in BC's Lower Mainland today. Yumi and I spent over three hours walking and taking photographs. I'm amazed at the variety of beautiful birds we saw today, ranging from teeny balls of fluff to impressive great horned owls and cranes. Before we even arrived at the sanctuary, we ran across a field filled with thousands of snow geese:

We could also hear killdeer, and we finally spotted three of them across the road from the snow geese:

I'll just throw up a bunch of photos from this point -- enjoy, I sure had fun taking them!

American Coot

American Wigeon

A territorial Canada Goose that took some feathers out of a mallard's butt...

Bufflehead

Female Ring-Necked Duck

Great Horned Owl -- this fellow had about $50,000 worth of huge lenses and spotting scopes locked onto him :-)

Mallard male

Mallard male face closeup

Mallard female face closeup

Lovely female mallard feathers

Lovely female mallard feathers, take two...

Northern Pintail

Wood Duck

Redwing Blackbird

Sandhill Crane

Sandhill Crane profile

Sandhill Crane closeup

Rice Lake Ramble

Taking advantage of a sunny Good Friday holiday, Yumi and I did a quick walk around Rice Lake in North Vancouver.

Boundary Bay Walk

Hoping to see Snowy Owls, Yumi and I headed out to Boundary Bay at the south end of 72nd St. but we missed them this season. It was still a great day for a walk.

We ran across a Great Blue Heron convention

Signs of Spring Along Byrne Creek

It was a beautiful sunny day today and I took advantage of it for a long walk along Byrne Creek.

Sun splashing off the water.

Red alder -- I'm allergic to the pollen -- dominates the spawning channel.

Mayfly larva in a pool -- there's a photo of a hatched mayfly in yesterday's blog entry.

Pileated woodpecker in Byrne Creek ravine. I love these flashy birds.

This was a hand-held shot in a forested ravine with my Canon S5 IS at its maximum 432mm telephoto (35mm camera equivalent), so don't look too closely :-).

Byrne Creek Mayfly Hatch

Mayflies were skipping along Byrne Creek this afternoon. Yumi and I didn't spot any salmon fry yet, but they should be popping out of the gravel soon...

We also saw many small apparent redds, or nests of eggs that fish deposit.

Premier Screening of Eagle Eye

The Fraser Valley Hatchery was the site of the premier screening of Peter Donaldson's Eagle Eye, a video based on his one-man show "of ecological intrigue about the ancient dance of interdependence between Salmon and Eagle, creating a classic teaching legend."

Donaldson is a breathtaking writer and performer, known for his Salmonpeople masterpiece. Tonight's event, hosted by the Freshwater Fisheries Society of B.C., was a "beta" run of the video, with Donaldson seeking input from the audience as to what parts really engaged people, what sections lost their interest, and how the project could be disseminated and used in secondary schools, colleges, universities and communities for environmental education dealing with biodiversity and systems thinking.

Donaldson's show was filmed during the Fraser Valley Bald Eagle Festival, and is an emotionally powerful performance that really gets you thinking about life and our interdependence with other species and nature.

Environmentalists Roast Run of River Power Inc.

"We want our park, we want our wild salmon, and we want you to go away," said Burke Mountain Naturalists activist Elaine Golds, to rousing cheers from the crowd at a forum on multiple run-of-river power projects planned for several streams on the upper Pitt River.

The overflow crowd jammed into the much-too-small venue was spirited and angry, with cat calls often interrupting presentations by the BC Environmental Assessment Office, BC Parks, and the proponent, Run of River Power Inc.

Although I strongly oppose the projects and the accompanying proposal to cut a power transmission right of way through Pinecone Burke Provincial Park, I was dismayed at the uncivil attitude dominating the crowd.

Yet people had reason to be frustrated. Pinecone Burke is a pristine Class A park that people fought for many years to be declared off limits to logging, mining and hydro projects. To ask that the boundary be adjusted now is crazy.

To invade all the salmon-bearing streams in the upper Pitt is crazy.

To pay private producers 5 or more times the rate for power than the province produces is crazy.

Eventually the fire marshal showed up, and said the number of people in the room had to be reduced. At that point, several hotter heads began shouting "We won't leave!" OK, act like children having a tantrum in the face of logic and safety -- I thought it best to slip away.

As I was wriggling myself out of the room, people were demanding that the meeting be rescheduled in a larger venue. I'm all for that. And while I admire the passion, I think some of the behavior tonight was counterproductive. The mandarins in the room have to follow this provincial government's restrictive policies -- it's the politicians noted for their absence who should bear the brunt.

As the cry went up: "Where are you Environment Minister Penner?"

Nooksack Dace Recovery Strategy

The Nooksack Dace is a little fish found only in a few rivers and streams in the Lower Mainland of BC. It has been listed as endangered under the Species at Risk Act, and tonight I attended a Department of Fisheries and Oceans forum on steps being taken to identify and protect crucial habitat. It was an interesting presentation on the dace and its preferred habitat. Unfortunately, the ratio of audience to DFO staff was about 10:6 -- it could have been better publicized.

Something that I found interesting was that all remaining Nooksack Dace habitat is in developed/developing areas. That's going to make it really tough to preserve this species. I asked if in the future there would be attempts to transplant dace to other streams in their previous range. They're not at that point yet, but one of the biologists said that transplanting would certainly contribute to keeping the species from going extinct.

Here is the recovery strategy for the fish, and watch the SARA public registry for a 60-day comment period after the strategy is officially posted soon.

Frosty Fotos Around Byrne Creek

An overnight frost lent some sparkle to Byrne Creek Ravine and the salmon spawning habitat this morning.

Successful Byrne Creek Fish Trapping Survey

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers found 17 cutthroat trout in the Gee traps that they placed in the creek yesterday. While far off the record, we were happy to see fish at all as the creek has been hit by several toxic spills through storm drains over the last couple of years. One disappointment was the lack of coho salmon smolts (yearlings); however, we had not been expecting much as there have been almost no successful coho spawners in the last couple of years.

We handle the fish as gently and quickly as possible as we size and ID them, and then return them to the creek. NOTE: It is illegal to trap fish, and streamkeepers do so with DFO permission.

Measuring a cutthroat.

Streamkeepers head up the ravine.

Fish-Trapping Streamkeepers Find Herons

Members of the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers set traps in the creek today hoping to catch some fish to see what species are resident. We do this every year under the auspices of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans to gather data. (Note that trapping is illegal unless sanctioned by DFO). We weren't the only ones out looking for fish! We spotted herons several times -- likely repeat viewings of two birds.

This one was fishing the big pool where the stairs come down into the ravine from Brynlor.

This one was further up the ravine.

Streamkeepers bait Gee traps.

'Porridge' Fouls Byrne Creek Again

The mystery "porridge" has fouled Byrne Creek yet again. We know it comes down the Hedley St. storm drain and into the creek, but the City of Burnaby's engineering department has not managed to confirm the source yet. This has been going on for months now in a haphazard manner. Hope they track it this time!

The stuff was pooled all along the creek. While it does not appear to be toxic, it has no business coming down storm drains into the creek.

UPDATE on Feb. 15: City staff have found the source and are dealing with it. While for legal reasons they can't tell us the details, streamkeepers are relieved that this ongoing irritant will be under control. Thank you!

Sun Splashes Byrne Creek

The sun broke out for a couple of hours today, so I trundled off to do a quick loop of Byrne Creek ravine, checking for fry along the way. Fry are baby fish, and while the coho and chum salmon returns to the creek were very poor last autumn, I'm hoping we did have some successful spawners. In the past we've seen fry as early as mid-February, though I think that is a bit unusual. Streamkeepers will be keeping an eye out for the cute little fish over the next couple of months.

Heading down the stairs into the ravine.

Review - British Columbia: A Natural History

Review - British Columbia: A Natural History by Richard Cannings and Sydney Cannings.

The western Canadian province of British Columbia is blessed with a diversity of ecosystems ranging from lush rain forests to near deserts and everything in between. This book covers the geology, and the flora and fauna of this gorgeous region of our planet. The Cannings ably describe the origins of the land, ocean, and waterways, and the animals and plants that inhabit them. The book is full of photographs that depict the natural abundance and variety of landscapes of the province.

White Rock Sunset

There was a beautiful sunset at the White Rock pier late this afternoon. We were also thrilled to get close to a Cooper's Hawk.

Water patterns as the tide comes in.

Yumi checking out the tidal pools.

White Rock pier as the sun drops in the sky.

Another view of the pier.

Yumi spotted this Cooper's Hawk in a tree and a few seconds later it swooped away and down onto the beach. As we walked along, Yumi saw it again, and we got within four or five meters of it. (If it's a Sharp-Shinned, let me know, we're still learning the bird ID business :-)

Road Oil Enters Byrne Creek Through Storm Drain

Oil that had accumulated on Southpoint Dr. in southeast Burnaby was flowing down the rain drain at the bottom end of the cul-de-sac and into Byrne Creek this afternoon as a steady drizzle washed pollution off the street.

Can you imagine the cumulative flow of this crap into drains all over the city -- all of which lead to local creeks, rivers and the ocean? Yuck!

It is precisely for this reason that streamkeepers are pushing the city to build bio-filtration swales and ponds. There are well-known, well-established ways to ameliorate the impact of such pollution on fish and wildlife habitat.

Squamish Day Trip = Eagles, Salmon, Rivers, Ocean

The Brackendale eagle run is underway (provincial park info here), so Yumi and I took a day trip up the Sea to Sky highway to the Squamish area for some nature photography.

We stopped off at the beautiful new tourist information building in Squamish to pick up a new provincial parks annual parking pass, and were pleased to discover that the price had been cut in half to $25.

Next stop was the eagle viewing area along the Squamish River. There was plenty of snow, and few eagles -- the volunteer guides had recorded only 16 adults and a few juveniles today. There wasn't much salmon spawner evidence either -- few carcasses and almost none of the distinctive odour :-).

Here are a few shots from that location:

The Squamish River on a sullen winter day.

Eagle on the shore of the Squamish.

Gulls reeling through the leaden sky.

Disappointed by the meager count we decided to head off to the Cheakamus River and the North Vancouver Outdoor School. The gate to the property was open, so we drove in. The manager was out and about wearing a Squamish Streamkeepers cap so we introduced ourselves as fellow streamkeepers, and he told us there were eagles visible from the dike on the river.

There were more spawner carcasses, and we got a lot closer to several eagles as well.

A view of the Cheakamus looking south from the bridge on the Paradise Valley Road.

The Cheakamus looking north from the bridge on the Paradise Valley Road.

Bald eagle on its perch over the river.

Here's some evidence of the lifting power of eagles: a salmon skeleton draped in a tree!

This salmon spine was around 80-90cm long, so it was a hefty fish.

A salmon jaw in the same tree -- perhaps it belongs to the skeleton above.

On the way home we stopped at Porteau Cove to take in some great views of Howe Sound.

Gull framed by pier view-tower structure.

We made one more stop, driving up to the Cypress Mountain viewpoint. It's days like this that make up for all the winter rains!

Looking south over Vancouver and Burnaby with Burnaby Mountain to the left.

And one more eagle soaring over the Cypress Mountain snow line.

Bold Chickadees, Towhees at Foreshore Park

While Yumi did some Boxing Day shopping (at the Salvation Army Thrift Store in keeping with our sustainable Christmas :-), I headed down to Foreshore Park in southeast Burnaby and found bushes quivering with friendly chickadees and some towhees that were quite bold for their usually shy species. One of the chickadees was so forward and used to being hand-fed that several times it nearly fluttered onto my head or my camera.

Chickadee on a blackberry.

Chickadee in a chain-link fence.

Towhee in the bush.

I'm still terrible at distinguishing sparrow-like birds...

Perhaps it's a wren, or a finch. Then again, if a wren and a finch had a good time, it could be a wrench! :-)

North arm of the Fraser River under looming winter clouds.

For those who are interested, all photos shot on this day were taken with a Canon S5 IS digital superzoom, usually at the Auto setting, but a few with exposure compensation. All these photos were shot with the camera on a light tripod used as a monopod to follow the birds, because even image stabilization cannot compensate enough for extreme telephoto shots on overcast days. I noticed that often the auto-focusing had trouble locking onto these small, fast-moving balls of feathers.

Fishing Birds Feast on Byrne Creek Trout

When Yumi and I arrived at the sediment pond in the artificial spawning habitat on Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby today on our weekly salmon spawner patrol, a heron struggled into the air, two rotund cormorants plunged off of the concrete lip at the lower end and into the pond, and a kingfisher chattered at us angrily.

We saw a couple of dead cutthroat on the bottom of the pond in the 25-30cm range and for a heart-stopping moment we thought there may have been another fish kill, but we finally saw a couple of live trout as well.

The two cormorants refused to fly -- they simply dove under and swam from end to end depending on where we moved to, and we finally surmised that perhaps they had gorged themselves on trout to the point that they were having trouble getting airborne. The big schools of trout were all gone, perhaps they skedaddled downstream when they came under protracted attacks from all the fishing birds. Maybe the birds had killed the large trout and then had been unable to swallow them? Or they were finally full?

(Note: By "refusing to fly" I don't mean that we were trying to drive the cormorants off -- we were being as non-threatening as possible and just observing -- I've just never gotten that close to cormorants before!)

Note: the apparently different colouring on the bottom bird is just a matter of lighting and exposure.

Heron in Byrne Creek Ravine

A heron was fishing in Byrne Creek today and I got a couple of photos of it on my ravine ramble. It had its eye on me, so as I angled for a better view, I kept talking to it in a soothing tone in an attempt not to flush it -- they can be quite twitchy. That seemed to work as I snapped a few quick ones and then quietly moved away and let the bird continue looking for its lunch.

Salmon Patrol Finds Dead Cutthroat

On our weekly Byrne Creek salmon spawner patrol, Yumi and I found no spawners but did find a dead 23cm male cutthroat trout with no visible external damage. There were live trout in the same pool, so we don't know why this one died.

Burnaby Rainbow, Sunset

A lovely rainbow graced Burnaby late this afternoon, followed by a golden sunset.

Byrne Creek Sees Few Spawning Salmon

It's been a disappointing spawning season so far this autumn on Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby, with only around 20 chum and coho salmon tallied. Another issue that has cropped up in the last few years is also being repeated -- the lack of spawning success in coho. We keep finding female coho dead before they have laid their eggs, and today Yumi and I processed another.

NOTE: My usual disclaimer -- it is illegal to disturb spawning salmon. Streamkeepers receive training and also have permission from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans to process dead spawners and record data about them. I think it is important to share our volunteer efforts with the public; however, I occasionally worry that people may get the idea that these fish and their eggs are fair game -- they are not!

Beautiful coho found in Byrne Creek today.

Unfortunately, this female did not spawn before she died.

Some people may also be confused about why these fish die. Salmon are anadromous -- that's a big word that means that during their lives they move from fresh water, to salt water, and back to fresh water again to lay their eggs. This entails major changes in their organs -- from ingesting minerals in fresh water to extruding salt in the ocean. Some species of fish can repeat this cycle, but when salmon come back to their birth creeks, streams and rivers to spawn, it's a one-way trip. They stop eating when they enter fresh water and their health begins to steadily deteriorate -- all of the energy in their bodies goes to keeping their reproductive systems and brains going as their flesh fails. If a fish cannot reach its native spawning grounds and find a partner within a set period, it will die before it can spawn.

After collecting data about the fish, Yumi and I voiced a brief appreciation for her efforts, and then we cut the carcass in half (this ensures that streamkeepers don't double count fish) and returned it to the creek where it will provide essential nutrients for the food chain.

BC Enviro Minister Visits Stream of Dreams Program

BC Environment Minister Barry Penner saw a Stream of Dreams program in action at the Oaklands elementary school in Victoria today.

The Stream of Dreams Murals Society has reached over 60,000 school children to date, teaching them about their local watersheds and creating Dreamfish to install on school fences to remind communities about the importance of clean water and healthy ecosystems.

Autumn at VanDusen Gardens

The colours were wonderful this afternoon at Vancouver's VanDusen Botanical Gardens.

Yumi checking out the pond.

We were graced by several bald eagles soaring overhead.

Spawning Salmon Back in Byrne Creek

Spawning salmon have returned to Burnaby's Byrne Creek with streamkeepers spotting both chum and coho in the last week.

I did a spawner patrol today and came across five live chum salmon and two dead ones, which I processed for length, sex and spawning status. Please note that it is illegal to disturb spawning salmon, and that streamkeepers undergo training for monitoring techniques and report their findings to the Department of Fisheries and Oceans.

If you come across spawning salmon, feel free to observe them from a distance, but do not disturb them, or their carcasses after they die. Streamkeepers check carcasses for size, sex and spawning success, and return them to the creek because the bodies provide essential nutrients to the ecosystem.

Chum salmon spawner in Byrne Creek.

Aomori Autumn Colours

The mountains near Yumi's hometown in the Japan's northern Aomori Prefecture are gorgeous in the autumn. Most of these shots come from the famous Oirase area.

Yumi's mom taking photo of Yumi and her dad.

Toxic Substance Kills Fish in Southeast Burnaby

A Byrne Creek Streamkeeper reported a toxic spill in John Mathews Creek in southeast Burnaby this morning. City staff and streamkeepers found dead fish in the creek, and also in Byrne Creek downstream of where John Mathews Creek joins it. The creek was still running a florescent yellow colour well into the late afternoon when streamkeeper Joan Carne took the following photos.

I find it unfathomable that after years of public education efforts, people still don't know, or more likely just don't care, that all street and parking lot drains connect directly to local creeks.

We will all be eating and drinking this stuff some day, for we are at the top of the food chain. It may be highly diluted by the time it enters our bodies, but eventually it will affect us, and our children...

Autumn Colours Paint Byrne Creek

Red, yellow, gold, and brown leaves are painting Byrne Creek with an enchanting mosaic of colours. I love this time of year when the air takes on an edge and the hazy days of summer are replaced with an invigorating clarity.

I also love this time of year because the leaves that colour the creek foreshadow the return of the salmon. Any day now, likely within the next week, coho and chum salmon will start swimming up Byrne Creek to spawn and die, after traveling thousands of kilometers in the Pacific Ocean. As a streamkeeper, monitoring the return of these magnificent fish is a peak experience that I look forward to every autumn.

The relaxed creekside rambles of spring and summer take on urgency and excitement as we stalk the mottled purple and green chum, and the silvery scarlet coho, making note of redds (nests of eggs), and measuring and assessing fish after they die.

Descending the stairs into the ravine.

Chilly Snake Seeks Autmn Sun

This poor garter snake was trying to catch a few rays, huddled up on a heat-attracting black garbage bag near Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby. Streamkeepers stash invasive plant species in the heavy garbage bags and leave them out in the sun to cook. We often find these harmless snakes seeking their warmth.

Cool, Green Grasshopper

Yumi found this cool grasshopper on a plant.

Red-Tailed Hawk Near Byrne Creek

We were happy to see a red-tailed hawk near Byrne Creek this afternoon, for we haven't seen many raptors in the area this summer.

Nature Illuminated at Deer Lake

My wife Yumi was interviewed about her animal lanterns that are part of the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers display at the Night of Lights lantern festival in Burnaby. Originally I posted the story and photo here with full and repeated attribution to the Newsleader because their website does not have direct links to individual stories. On second thought, I am removing that copyright material. To find the story, go to the Newsleader website and click on the "Arts" link in the top navigation bar. It should be there for at least a week or two.

Garbage Blights Burnaby's Foreshore Park, Glenlyon Development

An early afternoon stroll along Fraser Foreshore Park in Burnaby provided lots to see along the river and in ponds; however, the beauty was blighted by plenty of garbage dumped on the outskirts of Glenlyon Business Park in the vicinity of the lower reaches of Byrne Creek near where it empties into the Fraser.

First the good...

A view of the north arm of the Fraser from the park.

A small tugboat passing behind a log boom.

It's hard to believe summer is ending.

There were dozens of small frogs in the pond near Byrne Creek.

A bright red dragonfly.

An acrobatic chickadee.

And the bad, and the ugly...

I do not understand how some people can be so senseless and uncaring. I also do not understand how the tenants of the business park can drive by this crap every day and not ask the developer or the city to clean it up. At least two of these sites have smashed TVs, one of them several, and CRTs and accompanying electronics contain metals that are harmful to humans, other animals, and the environment.

I know that several of the tenants in the business park have security guards, and I've also seen mobile units patrolling the roads. As good corporate citizens, they might consider having their guards keep an eye out for dumpers and send license plates in to police.

Como Creek Wiped Out

I was saddened to hear a report from Pamela Zevit of the Como Watershed Group that the creek was hit by toxins for the second time in a month, likely wiping out any remaining fish.

I am taking the liberty of posting her initial report here, which I found on the Salmonopolis website:

Second Toxic Event In A Month Wipes Out Remaining Como Creek Fish

By Pam Zevit

It is with a heavy heart that I have to inform the community that a second toxic event has now impacted the remaining fish in Como Creek. Senior environmental emergency response, fire, the City and enforcement are all on scene at the time of this e-mail to deal with the problem and initiate the investigation. I have been on scene and have been provided some preliminary information. While there is some idea as to the cause of the event, the actual source of the toxic material which entered the creek system upstream of Millside school is still being determined via investigation. While I cannot provide any comment until such time as the information is made public, I can tell you that the last pocket of salmon and trout which were upstream of where the fire runoff entered the creek in July (just one month ago) are now dead. This basically means that while some remnant numbers of fish may have survived, for the most part the fish bearing part of the creek system from Brunette Avenue to at least the Superstore area (and possibly farther downstream) are now pretty much sterilized. Most of the dead fish will be collected as there are concerns that they may be toxic to wildlife.

If you wish further information please contact the City of Coquitlam in the coming days. I will pass on any further information when I know more.

I have toured the Como Watershed with Pamela and want to express my sympathies (and outrage) at these avoidable events. It is difficult to find the words to express the heartbreak and anger that accompany a tragedy like this, after one has invested so much time and effort into preserving a slice of nature in the concrete jungle. I wish Como Creek the best, and may nature work her wonders in bringing life back to its waters.

Byrne Creek Summer Wildlife

It never ceases to amaze me how much wildlife you can encounter in the city if you keep your eyes open. Yumi and I checked out the Byrne Creek habitat this afternoon, and I got these shots:

A great blue heron.

A colorful moth.

And a homo sapiens caught chowing down on humungo blackberries!

Byrne Creek Bug Count, Fish Trapping

Volunteers with the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers in Burnaby, BC, had a busy morning, with several setting 11 traps in the creek to assess fish populations, and others completing the last set of samples for the summer bug count. Once the trappers were done, they helped the bug team count aquatic invertebrates that give us an indication of water quality.

The lush ravine in early morning light.

Rusty takes a break while Bob and Dave bait traps.

Not the greatest of photos, but there's a trout hanging out in the upper right corner of the frame as the trap is lowered into the water :-).

NOTE: It is illegal to trap fish, and streamkeepers do so for ongoing research under the auspices of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans. All fish are released unharmed.

The bug team hard at work counting numbers, species and taxa. Coffee, tea and cookies help the effort.

Pink Salmon Too Cheap?

Whole fresh pink salmon (head off and gutted) were on sale today at Save On Foods at Highgate Mall in Burnaby for $2.99 each. Yes, I said "each." I was struck by what seemed to be the shockingly low price -- fishermen had to burn fuel and amortize boats and equipment to catch the fish, they had to be cleaned, and then shipped a fair distance.

The one I chose weighed in at 1.1 kg (I weighed it on a kitchen scale at home because the weights were not indicated on the packaging), or about 27 cents per 100 grams, less than the occasional sale price of 29 cents per 100 grams, and much less than the common price of 39 cents or more per 100 grams.

I wonder if our society is properly valuing this resource.

Addendum: I just discovered that Save On Foods is donating 50 cents from the sale of each salmon to the CKNW Orphans’ Fund. While I laud the gesture, it doesn't ameliorate my concern -- in fact it makes me really wonder how low the wholesale price of these fish is...

Snakes by a Creek!

A few Byrne Creek Streamkeepers went out battling invasive Policeman's Helmet in the creek this morning, and found several garter snakes soaking up the heat beneath black garbage bags in which we compost evil plants on site.

Streamkeeper Maho inspects a garter snake.

My wife Yumi checks out another one.

We handled them gently and released them unharmed.

A close-up of one of the harmless beauties.

A grasshopper posed for a portrait.

Driving Home From Jasper

We drove home from Jasper today, and got a some nice shots of elk and Mt. Robson along the way.

An elk with a magnificent rack calmly browsing beside the highway.

Me in front of Mt. Robson on an unusually clear day.

Edmonton to Jasper

Before we met a couple of fellow learners from my recently completed MA in Professional Communication at Royal Roads University for lunch in Edmonton, Yumi and I spent the morning at the Royal Alberta Museum. We enjoyed the dioramas and live animal exhibits, and wished we'd had more time to explore.

Here are some of the beautiful and educational dioramas:

Coyote family.

Wolves.

Golden eagle and chick.

Yumi is spellbound by the eagle catching a rabbit diorama.

And here are some of the live animals:

A western hognose snake -- cute! And endangered :-(

An amazing stick insect.

Yumi staring at the unnerving giant tropical cockroaches!

Brook trout.

Arctic grayling.

Northern pike -- a ghostly predator...

Relaxing by the fire with a brewskie at Whistlers campground in Jasper.

Morning at Weyakwin Lake

We went for a drive and walk in the morning at Weyakwin Lake. We spotted some mushrooms from the vehicle, so we all piled out to search for more, but they were few and far between.

The public beach.

A sleek female mallard.

"Ukrainian fire drill" -- everyone hops out of the van and checks the side of the road for mushrooms :-).

A wasp's nest on the cabin with resident emerging.

Banff Morning

We woke up early in the morning in the Tunnel Mountain campground in Banff, and quickly ate breakfast and broke camp. We had a few hours to kill before driving to Calgary, so we poked around the hoodoo trail, drove up the Mt. Norquay road, and explored the Cave and Basin historic site.

Morning view from the campground.

Hoodoo in front of mountains.

Hoodoos trail.

Another hoodoo trail view.

Banff from the Mt. Norquay road.

The Cave and Basin historic site -- the hot springs here provided the impetus for declaring the area a national park.

The famous pool, now closed to use.

Yumi carefully viewing endangered Banff Springs snails.

A trail from the Cave and Basin leads to a bird blind on the lake.

Trilingual English, French and Ukrainian signs commemorate the harsh internment of Canadians of Ukrainian descent during WWI -- the Cave and Basin was their winter camp. Such forced labourers built much of early Parks Canada facilities. They were considered to be enemy aliens because at that time Western Ukraine was under the rule of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. They were treated much like Canadians of Japanese descent were in WWII.

While none of my ancestors were interned, I am angry that such events happened in a supposed democracy. I feel it for both wars and ethnic groups for my wife Yumi is Japanese. Again, none of her family was affected for she was born and raised in Japan, but there's a connection...

Donaldson's Salmon Poetry

A friend sent me a link to Peter Donaldson's moving salmon lifecycle poems. He has a lot of excellent material on his site, and I hope to catch his Salmonpeople one-man performance some day.

Byrne Birds

More shots of our feathered friends. A wee one, and silhouettes of crows chasing a raptor.

More Byrne Creek Wildlife

Here are more shots taken in the Byrne Creek salmon spawning habitat. I'm amazed at how many species of birds inhabit the Byrne Creek area and really need to learn to identify more of them.

Taylor Park Abounds With Birds

This afternoon Yumi discovered a patch of native blackberries on one of our regular walks around Byrne Creek, so I headed up the hill from the Southpoint Dr. cul-de-sac into the as yet undeveloped part of Taylor Park, a former landfill in Burnaby. When I got to the open area surrounded by brush I saw dozens of birds of various species. It's an optimal area for birds with lots of berry bushes transitioning into an open meadow-like area. I hope the city doesn't clear it all out and turn it into a monocultural "people" landscape. I saw robins, various sparrows, a red-tailed hawk, American goldfinches, cedar waxwings, chickadees, towhees, swallows and others that I couldn't identify. I'm not really happy with these shots -- they were all taken handheld at the full 432mm telephoto of my new Canon S5 IS -- and even with image stabilization they'd be a lot better with a tripod and a closer distance to the subjects. Live and learn...

American goldfinch -- I saw at least seven species using this perch tree.

Cedar waxwing.

A hummingbird and unidentified pal.

American robin with a berry.

Lynn Valley Hike

This Canada Day holiday Monday found us zipping over to the north shore to take a hike in Lynn Valley. We did a portion of the Lynn Headwaters trail system. I was also eager to take more photos with my new Canon PowerShot S5 IS superzoom digital camera, and an encounter with a deer put the stabilized telephoto to the test.

Yumi on the trail.

Remains of old wooden water pipes.

Clear, cold Lynn Creek.

A deer near the parking lot. This was shot at full telephoto, or the equivalent of a 432mm lens on a 35mm film camera, hand held after a fairly strenuous hike, so the image stabilizer appears to work well.

Nibbling on foliage.

Big Banana Slug

We ran across this impressive banana slug today on the Byrne Creek trail.

Oh, that's inches, not centimeters :-).

Choco's Hobbit Paws

Here's a shot of Choco's hairy feet. Our cat has amazing tufts between her toes.

Early Summer Plants, Flowers

A few shots taken on a Byrne Creek perambulation.

And a dead swallowtail butterfly.

Vernon Sightseeing

After a hearty breakfast at our friends' place, we headed out to see some of the sights. Yumi and I have never spent any time in Vernon, though we've passed through on several trips, so it was nice to take a look around. There is a lot of development going on!

The first place we stopped was Planet Bee, which was very interesting. We enjoyed viewing the transparent hive and locating the queen bee who had been marked with a dab of white paint.

Yumi checking out the hive.

The queen amid a mass of bees.

Next was a visit to Davison Orchards. I enjoyed checking out all the old farm equipment while the others explored the fruit, gifts, pies and other products for sale.

Davison Orchards.

A 1949 John Deere M.

A 1946 Mercury 3-ton truck.

Next stop was the Allan Brooks Nature Centre that provides an awesome view of the Vernon area. We enjoyed the vistas, and the wildlife.

A view from the centre.

Yumi stalking a marmot.

Taking a closer look at the marmot.

A swallow brings food for its young.

Our last stop before we had to drive back to Burnaby was the Gray Monk winery. It's a beautiful setting overlooking Okanagan Lake, and we had lunch at the outdoor restaurant. The food was excellent.

The winery overlooking Okanagan Lake.

A huge hanging basket of brilliant flowers.

The sunny restaurant.

Manning Park Day 2

We had a modest campfire last night at our site at the beautiful Lightning Lake campground at Manning Park, burning wood we brought with us that we had collected from a "free firewood" pile after someone cut a few trees down on their lot near our place in Burnaby several years ago. It being nearly the longest day of the year, it didn't get dark until well after 10:00. That also meant that it was getting light by 5:00 a.m., and the birds were in full chorus by 5:30. We should have gone fishing, but instead we dozed until 7:30.

We had breakfast, broke camp, and loaded the car before we tried some spincasting from shore. I had rainbow trout following my lure several times, and even had one hang about just a meter or two offshore for nearly a minute, but we didn't get a single bite. It's frustrating to see fish jumping to feed and not get a bite. Perhaps we should learn how to fly fish!

After an hour of fishing we pulled out and hiked the short Canyon Loop on the Similkameen River. It's a beautiful walk. We then drove up to the lookout on the alpine meadow road before heading back home.

A shot of the Similkameen from the canyon trail.

Pine beetle devastation.

Yumi checking out bugs in the river.

A view from the alpine meadow road lookout with Manning Park Lodge below and Lightning lake in the background.

A Steller's Jay harassed us while we picnicked at the west gate.

Manning Park Day 1

Yumi and I took a quick overnight camping trip to Manning Park. We stayed at the Lightning Lake campground, and took a walk around the lake in the evening. We were shocked at all the pines killed by pine beetles, and wondered what the park would look like in a few years. We saw lots of trout jumping in the lake as they fed, and planned to do some catch-and-release fishing in the morning.

A view of Lightning Lake from the trail.

Canoes at the rental dock.

Inquisitive ground squirrels -- these fellers obviously expect food!

Bees Pollinate Byrne Creek Blackberries

Bees were out in force sucking blackberry blossoms near Burnaby's Byrne Creek today. I was happy to see them working away as I've been reading horror stories of how bees are disappearing and nobody knows why. They are incredibly important insects because so many crops depend on them for pollination.

One in flight and one on a blossom.

Another view.

Getting even closer.

A spit bug deposit. Dunno if that's the proper term :-)...

Burnaby Mountain

To celebrate submitting my master's project for my Master of Arts in Professional Communication at Royal Roads University, Yumi and I went shopping at Fujiya for Japanese food. We picked up a couple of bentos for lunch and sushi for dinner, and headed up to picnic on Burnaby Mountain.

The crane ecosculpture celebrating Burnaby's sister city relationship with Kushiro, Japan, was back up following a winter in storage.

Reifel Bird Sanctuary

I finally got a rough draft of my master's project in yesterday, so Yumi and I celebrated by taking a break this sunny afternoon and headed down to the Reifel Migratory Bird Sanctuary. While we're not "birders," we do enjoy walking around and trying to spot various species. The highlight today was a pair of turkey vultures soaring over the marshes.

As we were walking the trails, we spotted several plants that looked suspiciously like something akin to the poisonous giant hogweed that can cause serious burns to the skin. We've been warned to report this huge, dangerous, invasive plant to municipal authorities. The ones we saw were not huge, but could they have been baby hogweed? We mentioned them to staff, and they said they'd check them out.

When we got home and poked through Plants of Coastal British Columbia, we suspected that the smaller ones were cow-parsnip; however, we did see a stand of what was likely giant hogweed as well.

This is the stuff that may be cow-parsnip.

This looks very much like a stand of giant hogweed.

The observation tower.

Swallow building a nest on the warming hut.

Cool Fly-Bee-Wasp Thingy

On a stroll down Byrne Creek to assess the prevalence of invasive plant species, Yumi and I encountered a really cool looking bee-ish, wasp-ish beast.

Update: Yumi tracked the beastie down on the Bug Guide website. It appears to be a sawfly.

Byrne Creek Duckling Rescue!

Yumi and I found a mallard couple and five ducklings in the Byrne Creek sediment pond this afternoon.

Dad took off, leaving Mom to protect her babies. The family had either jumped in or come down the culvert, and once over the stop log the ducklings couldn't get out of the concrete basin. We hauled a debris log from the spillway and made a ramp, but it took Mom and the kids the longest time to figure out how to use it. We kept gently shooing them toward it, and Mom finally jumped out and stood near the top end of the log, and quacked to attract her kids. A couple of them figured it out and scooted up and over, followed eventually by a third, but two were left behind.

At that point it appeared that Mom was going to accept her losses and began leading the three down to the overflow pond. The two left behind became increasingly frantic, peep-peeping mournfully. Finally one of them discovered the log and scooted up, and fortunately number five saw him go and skittered on up as well.

By this time Mom and the other three were swimming down the overflow pond, and the two laggards veered off the spillway and into the habitat. One of them finally rejoined the group, but number five was lost in the spawning channel. We saw no. 5 several times and kept trying to shoo it toward the overflow pond, but it finally went to ground and stopped peeping, so we gave up. By that point we were wondering if our efforts were doing more damage than good!

Mom and the kids near the log we put in place as a ramp.

Byrne Creek Coho Smolt Relaase

Kids from Stride Ave. Community and Kenneth Gordon schools in southeast Burnaby released coho salmon smolts (babies) into Byrne Creek today. The event was a blast, and we were also graced by the presence of a bald eagle that sat in a tree watching the fun until the noise got to be too much and it flew away. Our DFO community advisor Maurice Coulter-Boisvert shows up with the tank full of fish from the Bell-Irving Hatchery at Kanaka Creek, and the kids are given plastic bags of the yearling fish to release into the creek.

Maurice speaks to the kids.

Kids watch the fish they've released.

A slightly stunned smolt gets used to its new surroundings.

Trillium Appears in South Burnaby

A couple of beautiful trilliums graced Byrne Creek Ravine Park in the last few days. We love spotting these somewhat rare flowers.

Thank You South Slope Elementary

I would like to thank teacher Gary Thompson and his students at South Slope Elementary in Burnaby for the package of thank you cards that I received today. It was totally unexpected and greatly appreciated.

Gary and his students have participated in the Salmon in the Classroom program for many years. They receive chum salmon eggs from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, and care for them in their classroom until they hatch as alevins. They feed them until the tiny fish reach the fry stage, and then the kids release them into Byrne Creek. As volunteer streamkeepers, my wife Yumi and I have had the privilege of guiding the kids to the creek for several years now.

This year's South Slope Elementary release was particularly meaningful to me, because my Mom was dying of cancer. I didn't tell Gary, but it was an uplifting moment being with his kids that morning, and seeing them so full of life and wonder.

Later that day I told Mom about the fry release, and though she was heavily medicated, she indicated that she understood, and was happy. She loved kids, she loved teaching, and she was a teacher of teachers. She died that evening, and it wasn't until today that I made the connection that South Slope Elementary is right across the street from St. Michael's Hospice, the wonderful place where she spent her last few days.

Choco, Dori Enjoy Spring Day

On a beautiful spring day, our cat Choco enjoyed the cherry tree blossoming over our deck, and Dori our turtle perked up as well. Mom really enjoyed Choco when Yumi and I would go camping and leave the cat at her place. We got Choco a couple of years ago as an adult from the SPCA, and she took awhile to settle in and warm up. Mom's lap was the first Choco curled up and slept in, and Mom was always proud of that.

Spring Blossoms In Southeast Burnaby

During Mom's illness Yumi and I still tried to get out for our regular Byrne Creek walks as often as possible to clear our minds and get some exercise. Mom loved flowers, and she would have appreciated these scenes.

Here's a potpourri of shots I took along the creek and in Ron McLean Park over several days.

Byrne Creek Shrew

This teeny shrew (about the size of my thumb) was scurrying along the sidewalk on Southridge Dr. in southeast Burnaby. Since it was heading for the busy street, Yumi gently picked it up and carried it several meters up the embankment into the park where she released it.

I doubt if Mom would have liked shrews, but she would have understood Yumi's urge to protect the wee tyke.

Cherry Trees Begin to Bloom in Burnaby

Cherry trees are beginning to blossom in Burnaby. Yumi and I took a quick tromp down and back up Byrne Creek Ravine Park this afternoon to get some exercise and some fresh air in between work and school assignments, and were enchanted to see some fragile petals.

A River Runs Through Us

Fin Donnelly, founder of the Rivershed Society of BC, gave a presentation on his work at the Fraser River Discovery Centre this evening. He recapped his amazing swims (twice!) down the entire length of the Fraser River, a distance of nearly 1,400 km, to highlight issues of sustainability. He also spoke about programs the Rivershed Society is working on including Project Rivershed which is focusing on the Brunette watershed in the Lower Mainland. Another exciting program from the Rivershed Society is the Sustainable Living Leadership Program, which takes young people on rafting trips down the entire length of the Fraser, while training them in leadership and sustainability along the way. Fin is also a councillor for the City of Coquitlam.

A River Runs Through Us is a Rivershed Society slogan highlighting the importance of healthy watersheds, and that we can all make a difference with our own behaviours.

Salmon Fry Popping Up in Byrne Creek

Salmon fry (babies) are popping up out of the gravel in Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby. I saw fry in several areas of the creek, the spawning habitat and the sediment pond this afternoon. I was elated to spot them because streamkeepers had seen fry several weeks earlier last year, and I was getting concerned. I haven't positively identified them yet, but they are likely chum. I also saw mayflies hatching and a butterfly, so spring is in the air. Last, but not least, I saw a muskrat or beaver swim into a hole in the bank of the overflow pond in the habitat.

Look carefully and you can see a school of fry above the gravel.

This mayfly has just hatched. The husk is above.

Here's one emerging. A nymph can be seen to the left.

Deer Lake in Mid-Winter

Yumi and I roamed around Burnaby's Deer Lake this afternoon for the first time in months. Five years ago we lived much closer to this beautiful park and used to walk it several times a week, so it was like visiting an old friend.

The view to the northeast from the upper meadow beneath where the penitentiary used to be.

The old ditches on the former pen farm are clearly visible amongst the flattened vegetation in the winter sun.

An old fence gradually decays next to a road.

A leaning tree extends over the lake.

A gorgeous pileated woodpecker looks for lunch.

Trout Repopulate Byrne Creek

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers were happy to tally 55 trout in their winter trapping run on Burnaby's Byrne Creek--a number that was near previous highs. The results were heartening considering that a year ago a toxin introduced into the creek through a rain drain (storm drain) killed all fish throughout most of its length. We identified species, measured them, and released them back into the creek.

NOTE: It is illegal to trap fish, and streamkeepers do so for monitoring purposes under the auspices of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans.

Streamkeepers retrieve a trap.

Measuring a fish--you have to be gentle and quick so as not to harm them.

Streamkeepers work their way up the misty ravine.

Foggy Fish Trapping on Byrne Creek

Twice a year Byrne Creek Streamkeepers set out Gee traps in the creek to check on populations of cutthroat trout and young coho salmon. We leave them in overnight and come back the next morning to identify, measure and release any fish that are caught.

It was a foggy, mysterious morning on the creek today, with a forecast for sun. I love the arduous tramp up the ravine. It's hard to believe you're in a city once you get into its depths. Well, the old tires here and there, and the garbage that washes down the creek are reminders that this is not pristine wilderness...

The foggy ravine before the sun burns through.

John, Dave, Dave, and Yumi set a trap and check water temperature and pH.

Yumi checking pH. The results were good all along the creek.

Resting on a trail as the sun tops the ravine rim.

Lovely light pours through the woods.

Dead Cutthroat Trout, Mayflies in Byrne Creek

We found a dead cutthroat trout in the sediment pond above the spawning habitat in Burnaby's Byrne Creek today. It was about 30cm long, and when we opened it up, it was a male. No signs of external damage. There were plenty of other live trout around, so it wasn't killed by a toxin. I wonder if was an early spawner near the end of its life cycle. CORRECTION: Yumi believes that it was spiked by a heron -- there was a stab wound that I assumed I had inflicted when I scooped it out of the pond with a pike, but she thinks that the size and shape of the wound were smaller than what the pike would have done.

We also saw many mayfly nymphs in pools on the spillway between the sediment pond and the overflow pond, and also found one hatched, rather bedraggled looking mayfly floating on the surface of the sediment pond. We fished it out with a twig.

Excellent Videos on West Coast Salmon

Excellent series of videos on salmon, their life cycle, their decline, and their historical relationship to people and life on the west coast. Thanks to Zo Anne (Pacific Streamkeepers Federation) and Joan (Stream of Dreams) for the links!

The last run, part 1: www.lifeonterra.com/episode.php?id=24
The last run, part 2: www.lifeonterra.com/episode.php?id=25
The last run, part 3: www.lifeonterra.com/episode.php?id=26

Streamkeepers Wrap Trees Against Beavers

Beavers have been mowing down trees in the artificial spawning habitat on Burnaby's Byrne Creek. While the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers are all for urban biodiversity, we felt we had to protect the trees in the habitat that provide crucial shade for the spawning channel in the summer, so we had a tree-wrapping session this morning. We use chicken wire, and it's effective in keeping Canada's national symbol at bay :-).

A view of some of the damage.

Here I am going at it with chicken wire and cutters.

My wife Yumi, Bob, and Rusty, one of our mascots.

Amazing 'Life Through Time' Slideshow

Amazing photos and music.

Brew a cup of tea, sit back, and watch the show...

Click "Start the Journey"

Then "View the slideshow"

I'd suggest resisting "clicking the photos to learn more" or clicking ahead until you've seen the show once. You can always go back.

www.lifethroughtime.com

Byrne Creek Patrol Finds Oil Still Seeping, Dead Cutthroat

The oil that streamkeepers saw entering Burnaby's Byrne Creek a week ago is still trickling out of a storm outfall. City environmental staff put a boom in to try to soak some of it up, but it doesn't appear to be very effective. Today we found a dead cutthroat trout a few meters downstream of where the substance is entering the creek, and while it's impossible to say there is a causal relationship, it's possible the fish blundered into a pocket of the pollutant.

This little cutthroat trout had no visible external damage and was 17.5cm long.

As we worked our way upstream looking for spawning salmon, the sun broke through.

It's beautiful moments like this that lift a streamkeeper's spirits!

Coho Spawners, Polluting Oil in Byrne Creek

Today Yumi and I did our weekly salmon spawning patrol for the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers in southeast Burnaby. We were happy to find a couple of coho, but were also dismayed to see a steady stream of oil entering the creek from a storm outlet. We called the city's environment department, and they sent staff out to put a boom in and try to trace the source.

Here's the oil entering Byrne Creek.

This outfall has always been problematic, with oily substances appearing quite often. Today the flow was stronger than usual and steady. This must be more than just road wash.

The amount of guck accumulating in the settling pond is also increasing...

A magnificent male coho that we found today.

We measured him and checked out his internals, and his milt was loose so he appeared to have spawned. We process spawners and keep records under the auspices of the DFO.

We were also happy to find a huge new redd, or nest of eggs, in the spawning channel, with a female guarding it. We found the expired male perhaps 15-18 meters downstream, and there are few spawners in the system now, so he may have been her partner.

Cold Spawner Patrol on Byrne Creek

Yumi and I did a cold, wet spawner patrol on Burnaby's Byrne Creek today -- halfway through it started snowing again. We were rewarded with one dead spawner, unfortunately it was a female coho salmon that had not deposited her eggs. Poor visibility precluded sighting any other returning salmon.

An unspawned female coho.

(Please note that streamkeepers monitor spawners under the auspices of the DFO -- please do not disturb salmon or their carcasses.)

Oily filth accumulates in the semi-frozen spawning habitat.

The blast of snow in BC's lower mainland is going to have a negative impact on local creeks. All the salt and snow melt that people use to keep their vehicles moving will eventually make its way down rain drains (AKA storm drains :-) and into local waterways.

Snowy Byrne Creek Photos

The snow in the lower mainland of BC might be causing havoc, but it's also beautiful. Here are a few shots around Byrne Creek today.

The trail to the ravine along Brynlor.

Leaves yet green covered with snow.

Ice formations in Byrne Creek.

More ice formations in the creek.

The overflow pond in the spawning habitat.

Snow Swamps BC Lower Mainland

An unusual amount of snow has hammered the lower mainland of BC. We're fortunate to work from home, but others in our townhouse complex who must drive have been having trouble. It took our snow contractors three days to show up due to their incredible work load, so as council president I found myself laying snow melt the first evening of the dump, shoveling the treacherously sloped main entranceway into the complex with my wife Yumi the second day and laying more snow melt, and clearing sidewalks today. The prerogatives of power! :-)

Here's a few shots of our complex, and a few along the way up the hill to my Mom's condo:

The view from our balcony this morning.

The pool surrounded by snow.

Trees with limbs broken by the weight of the wet snow in Ron McLean park.

Here I am beneath the Skytrain on the way to Mom's with a poinsettia.

Yumi between Nikkei Place and the Alan Emmott Centre with Mom's condo tower in the background.

A snowy pond in the gardens at Nikkei Place.

Snowy mountains with Highgate Village towers in the foreground.

City in the Park towers near Edmonds Skytrain station.

Our townhouse complex is just in front of the line of evergreens below the towers.

Salmon-Safe Certification -- Why Not in BC?

I first learned about the Salmon-Safe certification program at the 2006 State of the Fraser Basin Conference a few days ago. It's an intriguing program that certifies farms, vineyards, industrial sites and even parks as being salmon safe. I think this is a great idea, and one that would be excellent to transplant to British Columbia.

"Welcome to Salmon-Safe. Almost a decade after we first started certifying fish friendly farms in Oregon's Willamette Valley, Salmon-Safe has become one of the nation's leading regional eco labels with more than 50,000 acres of farm and urban lands certified. The Salmon-Safe retail campaign has been featured in 200 supermarkets and natural food stores."

Byrne Creek Spawner Patrol

I went on my first spawner patrol this autumn on Byrne Creek this morning, as I had been away at university for three weeks. Yumi and I found two dead coho spawners and a very dead chum. We also saw four live chum and a live coho.

Unfortunately, the two coho were both unspawned females. They were in excellent shape and had not begun to turn color as spawners usually do. Their egg sacs were still firm, and we wondered why they had died prematurely. We hope this doesn't become a recurring pattern with female coho, as it was last year on Byrne Creek.

Here's Yumi hauling one of the coho out of the spawning channel.

A close-up of the egg sacs.

Yumi found this one by smell! Not much left of it...

Streamkeepers measure all dead salmon spawners we find and check if they have spawned. We then cut the carcasses in half so we don't double count, and return them to the creek where they provide essential nutrients.

Frosty Halloween Morning at Royal Roads

It was a frosty morning at Royal Roads University in Victoria today, with the temperature at -1 C. The cold, fresh air cleared my mind as I took an early morning walk to prepare for another long, intensive day in residency. This is my second, and last, residency in the Master of Arts in Professional Communication program, and with a little over two days to go on campus, my feelings are bittersweet. I've really enjoyed it and have loved the intensive work with so many amazing people. I'm going to miss everyone. But I also want to go home. I think these wintry shots evoke that feeling a bit as they signify a changing of the seasons, death, and looking forward to rebirth...

Royal Roads Gardens

After studying for about eight hours, I took a break and walked around the gardens at Royal Roads University this afternoon. While the autumn colors were past their peak, the gardens were still wonderful.

Royal Roads Sunrise

It looks like we're heading toward several days of rain here in Victoria over the coming week, so I took advantaqe of a quiet Sunday morning during my residency at Royal Roads University to get out for a walk before sunrise.

I ran across this deer just before the sun broke the horizon. My Canon SD400 does not do well in low light, particularly at the telephoto end of its range.

Another deer was inquisitive. I spotted it 30-40 meters down a path, and as I talked to it in a low, gentle voice, it gradually ambled toward me, ears pitched and eyes ogling.

Here's the sun breaking over the lagoon.

A sailboat on the dock.

I ran into a couple of other learners and we watched the changing colors as the sun rose.

Autumn Colors at Royal Roads University

The autumn colors are gorgeous here at Royal Roads University. I took a break from studying this Saturday afternoon and took a walk around the grounds. You could spend the whole day from sunrise to sunset exploring the photographic opportunities here.

Hatley Castle -- I'm looking forward to our tour next weekend.

Canada geese in the lagoon.

Two of the famous peacocks.

A tiny garter snake. I've never seen one this small.

The trees have wonderful personalities.

And so do leaves and needles.

And Man Created Coho

There was a story in the Vancouver Sun today about coho salmon in the city. It's part of a series of short articles on urban wildlife. While I applaud the Sun's initiative in educating the public about nature, the coho story ended with a rather strange sentence that implied coho never existed in urban streams in the lower mainland until humans began stocking the fish.

"Fish in the city: Initially all the coho that swam out to sea from city streams were hatchery-born. They were transported to creeks as fry, where they remained until heading to Georgia Strait and the Pacific a year and a half later. Hatchery-born fry are still added to creeks but, over time, wild-born fry have become part of the spring mix."

There is a huge historical gap here -- human activity wiped out "fish in the city" for decades. Vancouver used to have over 60 streams, of which only a few still exist, and only a couple provide spawning access and habitat. All the rest have been paved over and piped. Where I live next door in Burnaby we are more fortunate in having a greater number of productive urban streams because development happened later here, at a time when people were more aware of environmental and sustainability issues.

But no, hatcheries and humans did not create salmon runs in the city! The best we can say is that we brought some of them back in a diminished state with a lot of hard work after realizing the error of our destructive ways.

Adams River Sockeye Run

Yumi and I headed up to the Adams River yesterday afternoon to take in the sockeye run -- 2006 is one of the peak returns that happen every four years. I checked the BC Parks website and discovered that a campground near Vernon, Kekuli Bay, was still open, so we decided to spend the night there.

That evening it was cold and windy, and we chowed down on hot ramen and hot dogs in the dark.

The next morning, we had a chat with the park operator and complimented him on the clean site. The park is on the bare side, but still beautiful in its own way. We saw loads of small fish from the dock, and enjoyed the changing colors on Kalamalka Lake as the sun rose.

We drove up to Adams Lake via the Falkland-Chase road. It's a small highway with a stretch of gravel that passes through pretty country. When we arrived at Roderick Haig-Brown park, it was already crowded even on a weekday. There were lots of schoolbuses with hundreds of kids.

DFO staff were on hand to tell people about the sockeye, and disect a few dead ones.

We headed out to the river to watch the fish. It is a breathtaking sight to see the thousands of spawners performing their final act before they die.

We were surprised to see many chinook spawners as well -- they are huge fish compared to the sockeye. We hadn't seen any chinook when we visited the Adams run four years ago. Here's a dead chinook next to a dead sockeye and the size disparity is evident.

There were several people snorkelling and taking video and still images of the spawners.

Here's one more image of a male sockeye in his full glory.

We spent over an hour walking along the river and watching these beautiful animals complete their life cycle. As a sign on the path poignantly pointed out, they're born orphans and die childless. A true wonder of nature.

We drove to Kamloops and then took the 5A south to Merrit, stopping for an hour of fishing at Stump Lake along the way. I had a couple of bites casting from shore, saw a trout following my lure, and had one on line for 10-15 seconds, but we didn't land any. We always use single, barbless hooks. Here's Yumi as the sun began to drop in the sky.

Barred Owl On Byrne Creek Path

I was hoofing it up the Byrne Creek ravine path this afternoon when I passed a bend and came face to face with a gorgeous barred owl. I slid to a halt and we stared at each other. I began speaking to it in a low, quiet voice, explaining that I was going to slowly remove my belt pack and get my camera. The owl held me in its gaze and didn't move.

I slowly moved closer, and kept snapping photos, some without flash, and some with. It was fairly dark in the forest, so the photos without flash tended to be blurry, and the photos with flash produced amazing red eye.

I got as close as a meter, and it was incredible watching this magnificent bird monitor its surroundings. It seemed to be more concerned with tracking crows and other birds than it was with my presence. It finally took off when another walker came down the path with a dog.

Jasper Lakes and Canyons

Day three of our fall camping trip dawned clear and sunny, so we took the road to Maligne Lake near Jasper.

Medicine Lake looked a bit eerie in the early morning light.

We walked some of the trails near Maligne Lake and observed a large brook trout in the Maligne River. The river runs cold and clear.

A cute chipmunk munched on some natural food.

We hiked the Maligne Canyon trails as we did two years ago. You never get tired of the magnificent views. We spotted trout in several of the deeper pools.

We took the high trail back to the main parking lot, appreciating the expansive vistas along the way. It was the first time we'd taken this trail for there was a cougar warning in the area on our previous visit and we had seen cougar tracks. Yumi snapped me at a spot popular with hikers for photos.

It was hot and we were tired so we went back to Whistlers campground for a bit of relaxation. After dinner we decided to check out Patricia Lake and Pyramid Lake near the Jasper townsite. We had not visited them before and were enchanted with their beauty. We saw lots of fry (baby fish) in Pyramid Lake. Here's Yumi cooling off in Patricia Lake.

Clearwater River to Jasper

On the second day of our September camping trip we got up early, packed up our gear and headed back to the Yellowhead highway from Clearwater Lake in Wells Gray Provincial Park. We stopped at several points of interest along the way to check out the Clearwater River and several falls. At Bailey's Chute we saw chinook salmon attempting to leap the falls after swimming up the Fraser and Thompson rivers. It's an amazing sight to see these magnificent fish strive to overcome the chute before dropping back to spawn lower in the river.

Dawson Falls are just a short walk from the road.

We came across a black bear and her cub along the Clearwater road.

We stopped at Swift Creek in Valemount on our way to Jasper to check on the world's longest chinook run, however it was over and we only saw a few carcasses and many huge redds (nests of eggs). These chinook travel 1,280 km from the mouth of the Fraser River to spawn! Further down the road we were rewarded with a magnificent view of Mt. Robson, the highest peak in the Canadian Rockies. The mountain is often obscured by mist and clouds, so this was a treat.

September Camping Trip - Clearwater Lake

With summer over, we headed out on Labour Day for an eight-day camping trip. We prefer taking a vacation after the summer rush has subsided. Day one we camped at Clearwater Lake in BC's Wells Gray Provincial Park, and the lake certainly lived up to its name.

We hiked along the trail from the campground to the boat launch and back, enjoying several marvelous views along the way.

This was the first of many days that we regretted not having brought our canoe along, but there simply isn't enough room in our Outback for all our camping gear and supplies for a longer trip, plus our canoeing gear.

Mink Spotted Near Byrne Creek

When we were salvaging fish from the Byrne Creek spawning habitat sediment pond today, a small, dark mammal about the size of large house cat trotted out of the bush, scampered along the edge of the sediment pond, checked us out, and then disappeared back into the bush. I managed to get a couple of shots from a distance, and looking at them at home, it appears to have been a mink!

Pre-Sediment Pond Cleanout Fish Salvage

The sediment pond in the Byrne Creek spawning habitat needs to be cleaned out this year, so Burnaby city staff, Envirowest staff, and Byrne Creek Streamkeepers have been salvaging fish by netting them, and releasing them downstream. It's always a fun activity, albeit stressful on the fish. Yet it's better than trying to get them as the water is pumped out -- that's really hard on them.

We were pleased to find several coho among the preponderance of cutthroat trout. Most of the fish were in the 7-12cm range, however we did get a nice cutthroat that was 21.5cm.

Rambling Cypress Park's Yew Lake Trail

We rambled the Yew Lake trail in Cypress Provincial Park on the north shore this afternoon. It was our first time to hike in Cypress and it was an easy, yet beautiful trail. We'll have to try some more challenging routes in the area.

Camping Manning Park Day 2

On the second day of our trip we hiked the canyon nature trail and then drove up to the alpine meadows.

One end of the canyon trail. We spotted several small trout having breakfast.

Boulders in the Similkameen.

On the trails at the alpine meadows.

A mountain view.

A tiny, but very cool-looking spider.

A lavender moth or butterfly.

And an orange one.

Camping Manning Park

Hard to believe with summer almost over, but today Yumi and I headed out on our first camping trip of the year. It was just an overnighter to Manning Park to get out of town and shake out our equipment.

We assumed there would be plenty of spaces on a Sunday night, however to our chagrin we found the Lightning Lake campground was full. We backtracked to Coldspring campground, and found a spot tucked under the ridge away from the highway.

After setting up camp, we went down to the Similkameen River to explore. As passionate streamkeepers, we had to check out the river, with Yumi particularly excited about looking for aquatic bugs and other creatures.

The beautiful Similkameen.

Streamkeeper Yumi checks out the river.

Success, as she finds the husk of a stonefly larva.

This tadpole was hiding under a stone.

Hike Produces Blackberries, Spiders

Yumi and I did the ravine loop around Byrne Creek this sunny afternoon and took time out to chow down on huge, luscious Himalayan blackberries. This species of blackberry is invasive and often crowds out native plant species. Its only redeeming feature is its fruit!

There were plenty of cutthroat trout in the sediment pond, with several likely in the 25-30cm range. It's good to see them repopulating the creek since the February fish kill when someone poured a toxin into a storm drain in the upper watershed.

There were also several cool spiders hanging about. I like the way the sun hitting this one's front legs make them look like gleaming sabers.

Don't Release Pets Into the Wild

I was walking along on one of my regular circumnavigations of the Byrne Creek ravine in southeast Burnaby when I passed a young boy and a man ambling along. As I went by, I overheard a snippet of conversation that made me cringe.

The boy pointed at Griffiths' Pond near the Edmonds Skytrain station and said "That's where I released my fish." The man responded, "That was nice to return it to nature."

I wanted to stop and let them know about the negative effects of releasing pets into the wild, but they were having such a pleasant chat that I bit my tongue. I know from my volunteer work as a streamkeeper on Byrne Creek that we do not release salmon in that area, nor do schools release their "salmon in the classroom" fry there, so the boy was not talking about a sanctioned fish release. I assumed he was refering to some other non-native species that he had gotten from a pet store.

While on the surface it appears to be a nice gesture to set a pet fish, or other animal, free, there are several dangerous drawbacks.

1) The pet will likely have difficulty surviving in the wild.

2) If it does survive, and it is not a native species, it could threaten the existence of local species, particulary if it manages to breed.

You are not doing your pet, or your local environment, any favors by "setting it free."

Dragonfly, Damselfly Fiesta

Yumi and I went for a walk in Fraser Foreshore Park in Burnaby late this afternoon and found a colorful variety of dragonflies and damselflies flitting about a pond near the outfall of Byrne Creek. A few photos I took:

Byrne Creek Bugs 'n Boulders

A stroll in Byrne Creek ravine today turned up lots of beasties, boulders and flowers. A few photos...

Lamprey Spawn in Byrne Creek

Yumi and I spotted nine lamprey in Byrne Creek today, and most appeared to be paired off and spawning.

This appeared to be a threesome :-).

We also saw lots of caddisfly larva -- they look so cool encased in woody debris and sand.

Turtle Scarfs Cat's Food

Midori, our red-eared slider, got up to some shenanigans tonight, stealing Choco the cat's food. I'd baked a small pink salmon for supper, and had offered Choco some as a treat. Choco is not much of a people-food cat, and has never begged at the table, but she did appreciate a bit of fish. I gave her seconds, but she left them in her bowl.

Awhile later I went down to the garage to organize some furniture that we're storing. Choco decided to accompany me, and I enjoyed watching her explore the new garage configuration. It's always fun watching cats check out changed surroundings as they poke and prod, eye distances, try new jumps, and twine themselves around obstacles. I could hear 'Dori moving around on the floor above us, but didn't give it much thought as she's been pretty antsy and mobile lately as her egg-laying season approaches.

Choco and I spent some time sitting in the car, as we're trying to get her more accustomed to driving without freaking out. She was initially nervous, but eventually checked out all the nooks and crannies before stretching out on the back seat. Satisfied that she'd done some positive acclimatizing, I gathered her up and we went back upstairs.

As we entered the kitchen, I noticed that the salmon in Choco's dish had been disturbed. Looking around, I saw bits of fish strewn about the floor. Suddenly 'Dori came motoring into the kitchen. I hadn't heard her charging across the living-room carpet, but her claws clashed on the kitchen lino as she flailed toward me with a chunk of salmon stuck to her chin.

Poor turtle! The fish had driven her to distraction, but being a water turtle, she'd been having a heck of a time swallowing it on dry land. We'd had her on a turtle-food only diet for some time, because she tends t