Well, this is a first. Oregano that has decided to go feral. Interestingly enough, it doesn’t look as burnable, in the short term, as this bunchgrass… … and about the same as […]
Fighting Fire With Weeds
The Wisdom of Rabbitbrush
Rabbitbrush defines this country in the fall. It catches the sun and shines. Well, not this year, but it still has its magic. There’s nothing quite like this showy aster that pulls […]
Sunflower Climbs the Smoke to the Sky
As you can see, as the forests burn up in all directions the new normal around here is for a sky other than blue. My sunflowers can find the Earth still, though. […]
Let Me Show You Some Water
Here’s some. Like it? Here’s some more: Thirsty for more? Sure: Well, light showers, sure. Here’s a right downpour: Or maybe a hail storm? Or a spring flood? Enough of this talk […]
Fire on the Caldera Wall
Yes, it was a volcano 35,000,000 years ago. The fire is on its rim. This is close to home. My hopes are for a safe resolution of this terrible situation. One day […]
Cattle are Burning Down British Columbia
Yes, they are. There’s a strange, elite idea that cattle grazing in forests and on grasslands is an efficient use of the land, and then we turn around and spend hundreds of […]
The Only Hope for the Okanagan and Similkameen Valleys in a Culture of Fire
I hate to say it, but the dream that has kept my family tied to the land for 91 years in this trough in the Columbia Plateau is over. Instead of a […]
After Nature, Living Water
The land is your village. This might mean that forests look a little different. This Douglas-fir grove on the Big Bar Eskers is dying, partly because of the stress of the ingrowth […]
The Fire is Us
There are fires in all directions, for the fourth year in a row. Note the smoke above, in the Okanagan, and below, in the Cariboo. Cough cough. There’s a lot of talk […]
Unsettling Fire
Here’s the Flat Lake Fire when it first really got going a few evenings back, looking north from Big Bar Lake. And here’s the Bonaparte fire, through the smoke, off to the […]
Okanagan Okanogan 