Not everything is about settler culture… … and its failures… A Canadian Outpost in Vernon, Cascadia … and all cultures hold an indigenous heart. Any Celt Knows What to Do Among the […]
A Lesson From Iceland
Weeds, Nature, Erosion and Hope. With a Fly, too.
Plants don’t grow in dirt. Well, maybe snow buckwheat. The old glacial river eddy (above) high above Priest Valley had its gravel bed stripped away fifteen years ago. So far, nothing has […]
An American Town in Canada
In Okanagan Falls, water is life, but doodads help. And a failed real estate development that hit a hundred feet of post-glacial sand and went back to Calgary, that’s fun. This is […]
Let’s Set the Delicious Apocalyptic Dream of Settler Culture to Rest
“Settler Colonialism” is a serious thing. In fact, in North America it is one of the most serious things of all. It should be handled carefully, like the toxic nuclear waste it […]
When There is No Monarch Butterfly Anymore, Improvise
Nine years ago, I spotted a monarch larva on the milkweed up the hill, and even saw a monarch fluttering around. That was the last one. The milkweed continues to bloom, although […]
Images of a Dramatic Science at Work and Play in Cascadia
On the principle that a science that creates linkages based on the replicable observation of an individual observer (a fine principle)… Spillyay at Work, Columbia Gorge … leads to individual observers and […]
Getting Grounded in the Okanagan
Huckleberries are nature. The old benches at Bridgeport, their sage, orchards, cheatgrass and windbreaks, are all nature, as is the controlled Columbia River. The abandoned orchard in Grand Coulee below, and its […]
Fighting a Losing Battle with the Wind in Cascadia
Here’s a cherry orchard just south of The Dalles, at the western terminus of the Oregon Trail, looking west to the Mount Hood Volcano. The rounded crests of these glacial flood hills […]
The World Beyond
Here’s the park. Why it is called a “park” is because it belongs to the Queen in the name of the people. That’s a little arrogant. This last tiny remnant of a […]
The Red Shift of the Sun on Earth
As the sun nears the horizon, the grassland reveals itself. Note the shift of colours towards red. That’s largely because cheatgrass, which has now gone to seed, dominates for a few weeks, […]
