It was a sunny, hot, blue-sky morning for a nature tour of Fraser Foreshore Park in Burnaby. Thanks to Pamela Zevit of the South Coast Conservation Program who led the informative tour, and who brought along a show-and-tell kit of cool animal stuff!
All posts by Paul Cipywnyk
Met the Otter at Deer Lake Again
After our Deer Lake canoe shakedown cruise two days ago, we were going to canoe Burnaby Lake, but discovered there was a regatta in progress. So it was back to Deer Lake where we saw the otter again, and what appeared to be a juvenile bald eagle.
This little fella was hanging around right where we saw him/her two days ago.
Hide and seek among the lily pads
This kingfisher was too far away for a good shot with my teeny pocket Canon PowerShot 520HS, so rather grainy in this blowup.
I am loath to take my DSLRs and big lenses canoeing!
Canoeing Burnaby’s Deer Lake
We dusted off the canoe and went for our first spin this year. Just been too busy to get out with Yumi both working full time and taking classes.
It was a lovely morning for a shakedown cruise, and we paddled leisurely around the lake a few times.
Heading out with Yumi in the bow
Yumi is always in the bow, seeing as I outweigh her by about 100 pounds : -)
Lots of Canada Geese on the beach and lake
Metrotown skyline
This furry water beastie approached us, coming quite near before turning away
Otter?
Some years ago Burnaby designated the west end of the lake as a no-go wildlife area. People, please respect this haven.
A cormorant and three herons
You can clearly see the importance of this small area of urban biodiversity
An escort of mallards
A visit from a damselfly
Yumi doing her best to keep invasive Himalayan blackberries in check : -)
This pretty mallard was pretty used to people, perhaps overly so!
Gliding toward Arthur Erickson’s Baldwin House
Back ashore at the east beach
Lovely Afternoon Walking Campbell Valley Regional Park
We fed the chickadees and enjoyed a multitude of other flora and fauna in Campbell Valley Regional Park, part of Metro Vancouver’s wonderful parks system.
You can see some of my photos in a Flickr album.
Goshawk vs Snake Fight — in Tokyo?!
I just saw an NHK (if you’re Canadian think CBC) clip of a snake trying to snatch a goshawk chick from a nest way up a tree — in Meiji Jingu park in Tokyo. Mom GH intervened…
I used to walk through Meiji Jingu a couple of times a week on the way to work when I lived in Tokyo. I would get off the train a few stations early to fill my lungs with somewhat naturally filtered air and enjoy this haven in a sea of concrete and pavement…
But I never imagined a goshawk/snake fight in this green oasis in a metropolitan area of some 25-30 million people!
I’m attaching this Google Earth capture, just to show how isolated this island of biodiversity is in one of the largest metropolitan centers on Earth.
The red marker is Meiji Shrine and its park. The surrounding grey area is all buildings, concrete, and pavement. The other green areas to the right are other parks, and the Imperial Palace.
Keeping Emergency Water Fresh
We completed refreshing our earthquake water supply kit tonight.
Here in Burnaby on the west coast of Canada we are in an earthquake zone. We don’t get them that often, and usually when we do they are tiny. But historically there have also been temblors that (I love this quotation, though I don’t remember where I read/heard it) have “knocked cows off their feet.”
We keep 3 X 20L containers on hand. We also rotate through them for camping, so the water gets refreshed in the course of such activities, but we haven’t been camping in awhile.
So over the last couple of days we used a container a day to water our balcony garden and some shrubbery outside the front door.
We then refreshed the containers with a baking soda solution, let them air for awhile, and refilled them.
New CPU Fan Cures Whiny Computer
Today I reached the limit of my patience with a CPU fan that had become whiny over the years. It sounded like a 1-pound mosquito, and the whine varied in pitch with the workload on the CPU, making it even more irritating.
Air blowing and vacuuming a couple of times had reduced the volume, but it always returned to distracting levels after a day or two.
The new CPU fan above the old fan. The new one is huge, stands “sideways” atop the CPU like a mini-skyscraper, and has a different mounting system from the old fan. When I was buying it, the guy asked “are you sure you have a big case?” I can see why he asked :-).
After struggling with instructions for nearly two hours (!), I laid out all the parts that came with the new fan, checked my parts bag from the original motherboard, and put together my own installation solution.
The new fan nearly touches the clear side of the tower.
Ah, the sounds of silence! The computer is now barely audible, knock on wood…
1963 Passport Photo
Some office cleaning today turned up a 4 X 5″ negative of a passport photo of my late Dad, taken in 1963.
Yep, in those days they still shot on 4 X 5, likely did a contact print, and then physically cropped to passport size.
More Dragonflies, Bees, and Moths in Fraser Foreshore Park
I love the ponds in Fraser Foreshore Park in Burnaby, BC. I get down there for photo shoots often. The previous post featured a heron chowing down on a rodent, but this post is the dreamier side of nature : -).
Heron Carries Both Fishing & Hunting Licences
I watched this heron in Burnaby‘s Fraser Foreshore Park for about an hour today. It was patiently fishing, and got a little fish or two, when it suddenly stabbed at something on the shore and came up with a small mammal.
It swallowed the beast whole, and you can see the heron’s distended neck in the third photo.
Not sure what the prey is, a large vole?
Distended neck as the prey slides down…