Ripeness is not “ready for eating,” no matter what the dictionaries say. Neither is it “mature.” Have a look. One definition is “sensuous and full”, as in “ripe lips,” and another “emitting […]
Ripeness
All the Bees Looking for a Home Now
Here is a grassland missing its flowers. Cows ate them. While thousands of people have been going to work in the valley below, and back, and forth, only the deer and a […]
This Land Must Burn
In the panorama of the hill, there are flashes of colour, very specific, which signify human food and the season in which they will be found. Indigenous humans spread seeds from those […]
Practical Ways to Re-Indigenize the Grasslands. Really.
Two days ago, I suggested that the former grassland hillsides of the Okanagan Valley (now large, private expanses of unproductive and water-wasting weeds), an area at least equal to the 100s of […]
Replacing Wild Harvest With Mountain Culture
100 Sustainable Paths for the Okanagan: 19 Currently, agriculture in the Okanagan Valley is industrial, in keeping with colonial models from 1858, when water was diverted through Nlaka’pamux villages in the Fraser […]
Cultural Blindness and Agricultural Practice
Culture is a powerful thing. Here is some earth, laid bare by a plow, in preparation for seeding in the spring. In the past, it has been used to grow tomatoes. This […]
The Salt-Loving Bees of the Okanagan’s Glacial Rivers
When glaciers lay in the valley, rivers ran along the side of the ice, high up, 170 metres above today’s shore. They tell a tale still of eddies, currents, and washed-out and […]
The Seasons of Fire and Water
Where water is, there is the absence of water. There is always water, hidden in life. There is never water hidden from life. Even in the absence of water, there is water. […]
A Starvation Winter is Coming
Ah, the ripening grass of Autumn. Yes, but this winter will be a hunger winter. Most awns and glumes are empty of seed. They look find, but the vast majority are empty. […]
Surfing the Island Archipelagoes of the Okanagan
In water, an island is an eye of land giving sight to water. On land, an island is a pool of water giving life to air. Grasslands are oceanic environments. Deer surf.
Okanagan Okanogan 