Just a note to say that I'm currently also blogging at One Day Bowen, a website dedicated to sustainable living here on the island. Go there and join the conversation!

This is the traditional beginning of the summer season here in Canada, and typically on the west coast the weather varies from being quite summery to reminding us of the winter that has yet to entirely lose its grip on us. There is still a little snow on the mountaintops, and the temperatures are cool at night, but mostly we have just come through a week of lovely sunshine and shirtsleeves.

And then, yesterday around noon something cold rolled in and this morning it has been positively pissing rain. The fire is blazing away here and my efforts to find some moments to cut the grass have been dashed. That is the way May goes around here.

The salmonberries are plentiful this year although not yet ripe. Some of the bushes on our usual haunts seem to have twice as many berries on them as usual and there are a few down in the cove that are starting to develop some colour. It won't be long until we are cruising down the cove with containers in hand to harvest the bounty of the land.

In news around the house we have been making a few changes here. The front deck fell off the fascia board it was flimsily nailed to, a result of water damage and poor construction and so we are getting that redone, looking to build a new deck along to front of the house that opens on to the bottom of our lot. Aine had the idea to put a small patio down there which might be nice, among the salal and the blackberries. At the same time we are strengthening the support for the house, which could use a seismic upgrade. Also, we are going to build some supports into the back deck to be able to hold a hot tub, which should arrive this summer. And to complete our outdoor work, we bought a trampoline for the kids and built a firepit in the back of our place which already has proven to be a nice spot for late night conversation in the chill air of spring.

May begins...can you believe it?

I have been travelling so much away from this place that I love. When I am here I have been so present on the land, enfolding myself into Island life. Yesterday the kids and I had a great day, log hopping and building a small beach fire at September Morn beach on the east side of the island, checking the status of the emerging salal and salmonberry patches around there (and they are some healthy!) and then heading to Snug Cove filed to catch a baseball game, as the men's fastpitch season has started.


Nice to be home, for a short time, to touch down and feel the balance on this place. I'm son to travel again, but every moment I am on Bowen, I savour.

A beautiful day here. Finn and I went out with our friends Paul and Calder Stewart to steward some trails on Mount Gardner. We were working on Hand Logger's Trail which runs from the top of a cul-de-sac of West Side Road over to where a trail ascends from the end of Windjammer Road in Bluewater. Hand Logger's Trail is part of a trail network that encircles the mountain at around the 400 metre level, meaning that it is relatively level for most of the way. We were out today clearing some branches that had fallen during the winter, moving around some bucked up timber and working on a couple of really wet spots that benefited from having the water channelled to avoid it pooling on the trail. We built a small new section of trail around a persistent swamp and started to clear a new trail beside a significant creek that flows on the west side of the mountain past the old mine shafts.

Calder and Paul have been stewarding the trails around there for the past few years. It's a quiet job they do, largely out of the sight and knowledge of most anyone who uses those trails, but you can really see their work on sections of the path that seem welcoming, or especially aesthetically lovely. We're not slashing and burning roads up there, but rather working in concert with the land itself to build very natural places where flow wants to go, whether that is the flow of water or the flow of feet and bike wheels.

It's just a gorgeous way to spend a Sunday.

On the way home as dusk was falling, the spring air rang out with the referee whistles of Varied Thrushes calling to one another. Spring is truly here.

A warm and wild wind blew through here last night and today the skies are clearing today. It is spring now and the news from the hatchery is that the chums have started to emerge. If you want to see them in the wild, trek down to the base of Bridal Veil falls and see if you can spot the little ones in the pools at the bottom of the fish ladder. They're not easy to spot, but it's a lovely sign of spring when you can see baby salmon.

The stupidest fence on Bowen Island is the one at the end of Whitesails Drive where the trail down to Cape Roger Curtis starts. It's just about 100 meters of chain link fence that doesn't go anywhere and is basically the security version of pissing on a fire hydrant. It seems that its only function is to hold up a couple of "No Trespassing" signs.

Out for a walk this afternoon. SInce I am spending so little time here these days, I'm taking more time to walk deeply in the forest around my house, to visit the land and sea and stay quite connected to the rhythms of this place. So for your edification on this misty late winter afternoon, here are a few things I noticed...

• A few early signs of spring, including new growth on the salmonberries and some skunk cabbage growing in the swamp.
• An accounting of some of the carnage of the winter storms which felled hundreds of trees in Crippen Park, including these three giants.
• The fallen trees will open up much new light in the forest and allow for more growth of food plants like berry bushes and ferns. I was lucky to harvest these licorice fern rhizomes from a fallen maple log. You can see in this photo how thick the moss is that they grow in. So lush. After picking through the moss my hands smelled like rich, wet life. Fantastic!