There’s an old Okanogan story about Eagle and Turtle. Here’s a simple version from Colville, Washington. A more complex version from the head of Okanagan Lake is embedded in an interview, here. In the […]
Eagle and Turtle
Wild Harvest
Since farmland prices in the Canadian Okanagan has been pushed to dizzy heights by the scarcity created by the International Border between Osoyoos and Oroville, and no young person can farm anymore […]
An Unexpected World
Although the British Columbia Interior is often described as a series of mountain ranges, separated by deep valleys, it’s more accurately an almost continuous plateau, cut by deep fault lines and glacial […]
Ancient River
A lot of water passed through this country once, on its way to and from somewhere else. As evidence, I present a strip of bedrock at the base of Vernon’s Turtle Mountain. […]
Snowing Fog
Now, this is a pretty fun kind of precipitation: tiny crystals of fog, that might add up to a centimetre after a day or two. But it looks pretty great on the […]
Walking Among the Stars
Sometimes I am reminded that these mountains, lakes, grasslands and forests are part of a planet spinning among the stars. I followed the coyotes up into the hills again yesterday afternoon. Coyote […]
Ice Wine Harvest
Yesterday, the grapes came in to be pressed for the 2011 ice wine vintage. The temperature dropped down to Minus 11 here in Vernon and stayed cold all day. Here’s the local […]
Terroir
Terroir is an ancient wine-making term that defines a wine by the soil and sun exposure on which it is grown. Surprisingly, it is contentious. Beats me why. Terroir for All to […]
King of the Grass
I was out on the Commonage today, south of Vernon and above Kalamalka Lake, and found some Giant Wild Rye Grass growing on the road margins of a riparian area. The tallest […]
Water Cress
Here’s some wild Okanagan water cress I found at the end of last week. It goes to prove that dry, grassland habitats are really aquatic habitats, rich in ponds and secret water […]
Okanagan Okanogan 