Rains have returned

As Caitlin said, we have re-entered British Columbia. It is raining today and thick low cloud hovers in the Sound. It's colder and damper out than it has been since the fall.

We puttered in the garden today, looking for more places to build beds on our cliff face and contemplating this year's crops. Pulled some leeks that overwintered and threw them in a soup pot tonight. Lovely!

Daffodils are peeping up, but they'll hold off for a few weeks now I bet.

Birds of the midwinter

Even though it is technically midwinter, the spring migrations have started. Yesterday down on Mannion Bay I came across this flock of black turnstones hanging out with the mew gulls stopping off here to feast on crabs and sand fleas. They overwinter here on the south coast. preparing to make their way slowly to their breeding grounds on the Alaskan coast. These ones are all done up in their breeding plumage, ready to return to the breeding grounds, but they have a few more months before things thaw up there.

Also on this little walk, a great blue heron and our resident ornery but beautiful swan. Oh and for good measure, our resident fawn, who hangs out with the feral chicken we look after. We had two chickens, but one succumbed to the red tailed hawk that was hanging around here a few weeks ago. All that is left of poor Huckleberry is a pile of feathers and some well picked over shoulder bones.

It's funny weather right now. Along the beaches and exposed roads down low the smells of summer are wafting around - dry fir needles and dust - while in the forest and the low lying meadow in Crippen Park, there is still several inches of snow. There has been snow on that meadow since December 16, and we have had so little rain - less than 30mm this month - that it shows no signs of washing away anytime soon. Usually snow like that, even in great quantities is gone in a few days, but the extended snow falls of Christmas combined with a thaw/freeze cycle and the generally dry and sunny and cold weather has prolonged winter for an extended spell.

Bowen Island advertising

When you live in one of the most artistic communities in Canada, you are bound to get creative advertising. This ad was posted outside The Snug - an artist willing to trade a watercolour for an outboard motor.

Spring is in the air

The dawn chorus this morning, while not exactly bursting with birdsong, had some minor changes in it. For one thing, on this clear calm morning, the birds were very active: Canada geese in the bay were constant, nuthatches going crazy and the juncos were making all kinds of noise. Ravens, crows, eagles, flickers, robins and mallards all joined in the fun. The towhees have started their trilling. All of this is preludes to things to come.

And another ritual has taken hold too, with the replacement of the Queen of Capilano for six weeks by the Bowen Queen. It used to be that the maintenance refits were an annual thing for the Cap, but it seems that they have become less scheduled over the past couple of years. At any rate, she's out for a spell, and the delightful little Bowen Queen is back in the fold. Commuter hell will follow, but I like her.

A crescent moon

Early this morning, about 4am, a waning crescent moon crested Eagleridge and shone with a brightness way out of proportion to it's size. The air was so clear, the nighttime outflow winds scouring the Sound of cloud and rustling the trees.

This morning, hummingbirds fought for territory, but the rest of the dawn chorus was quiet.

Midwinter brilliance

A beautiful day, bright and sunny and relatively warm. Finn and I spent the day together poking around hoe in the sun and then heading to BICS where he played indoor soccer for a bit. After that we headed outside and played together in a pick up game with some of our favourite island youth on the only uncovered spot on the field, a little strip at the north end - the rest of the field is still covered in deep packed snow.

While there we heard about a little event at Crippen Park, where a small winter festival was wrapping up. We headed down to the Bowfest field and joined the fun at a beach fire where the was chocolate fondue and stories and songs. We stayed for a couple of hours, as the sky darkened and Venus shone brightly in the western sky. The moon was low behind Apodaca Ridge and the stars popped out one after another, constellations taking shape all around us, a shimmering glitterworld above us reflected in the still water of the Cove on a low low tide. Looks like the sun will continue for the rest of the week.

A springish walk

Finn and I went for a walk down to the Cove this afternnon, turning over rocks at Mother's Beach finding crabs and gunnels. There were oystercatchers in the Bay, along with the regular flocks of mew gulls and Canada Geese and mallards. On Killarney Creek beneath ther Miller Road bridge there was a weird hybrid or escaped domestic duck. Didn't have my camera.

In the forest the ferns are all flat and emerging from the heavy snow that has squashed them for the past six weeks. The forest looks very strange - usually an undulating floor of hummocked fern piles, it's now all smooth and flat, and ready to green up for spring. Everything still seems to be wating though