White Fawn Lily is one of the native wildflowers in bloom right now on Gabriola. I found lots of these in Hummingbird Park, which is a on the waterfront in the Whalebone area, just a couple of blocks from Whalebone beach. These flowers seem to like to live on hills and cliffs overlooking the beach, [...]
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Gabriola Island odds and ends: I met another Gabriolan.ca reader today, and this one might soon be contributing interesting Gabriola blog content. Yay! Tourists are back. We’re seeing licence plates from all over North America, weekend crowds, and sometimes ferry line-ups that make one miss a sailing. Many of Gabriola’s seasonal residents are back — [...]
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Bisphenol A doesn’t sound like a good news chemical, not by a long stretch. So this is alarming: Hard plastics decompose in oceans, releasing endocrine disruptor BPA. Scientists today reported widespread global contamination of sea sand and sea water with the endocrine disruptor bisphenol A (BPA) and said that the BPA probably originated from a [...]
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Spring on Gabriola means swamp lanterns (skunk cabbage) will be blooming in shady streams and wetlands all over the island. Today we wandered into such a stream, more or less by accident, and had to wade though it to get out of the woods again. There were thousands and thousands of these plants, each a [...]
They paddled out to see Gabriola’s wildlife, in this crazy herring-spawning week of wildlife extravaganza. And did they see the wildlife? Well, yes, some of it. But the sea-lions had the last laugh, I think, playing behind the kayak, and putting on their best show half a second after the kayak had paddled past. See [...]
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You’d be hard-put to recognize Gabriola’s first regular ferry today. In its Gabriola days it was painted black and white. Today, at age 82, it sports green and burgundy. The car deck is gone and there is a bakery where once pickup trucks and sedans made the passage to and from Nanaimo and Descanso Bay. [...]
Filed in ferries,Gabriola Island,history One Response so far
This one is 15 or 20 feet above the ground, suspended in a cedar tree. In the Gabriola woods, of course, where all manner of strange things turn up. It’s the glass trailmarkers I worry about. Is this one a fire hazard, do you think? Or do I just worry too much? Update: I’ve just [...]
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I came across several of these five-gallon water bottles next to a Gabriola forest stream. A moment later a man appeared, and proceeded to fill his water bottles right from the stream. Because it’s good Gabriola water, right? And he didn’t see the point in paying for drinking water at Village Foods when the stream [...]
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You know you live in a (seasonally) wet climate when even the imaginary poultry holding down the end of someone’s driveway are wearing gumboots. I almost wrote that this fine feathered specimen was a duck; Min E. Mouse set me straight. In my mind, apparently, only ducks wear rubber boots. No, said Min E., it’s [...]
Filed in Gabriola Island,weather One Response so far
We know some people who are thinking of moving to Gabriola. They ask us questions about life on the island. I’d like to give a broader range of answers than the ones that pop up in my head, so I’m asking for your help. This week’s question: What’s good about living on Gabriola? Your opinions, [...]
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Just two months ago I told you about a new bridge in Gabriola’s forest – in the Elder Cedar Nature Reserve. Well. Here’s another one! If you’d like to see this one for yourself, park on North Road and head into the Elder Cedar (S’ul-hween X’pey) Nature Reserve from there. Cross the stream on those [...]
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What did Gabriola look like hundreds of years ago? If you could go back in time and see Gabriola before European contact, you’d see some gorgeous Garry Oak meadows, with flowers and plants that are in short supply these days. Garry Oak ecosystems are endangered now, but perhaps we can help change that, at least [...]
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Have you seen this? It’s one of two concrete boxes at Drumbeg, up on the hill behind the broom. A reader sent me this photo, asking what these are. Well, I don’t know. Do you? My best guess is that these were built as water reservoirs, back before Drumbeg was a park. What do you [...]
Filed in Gabriola Island 3 Comments so far
Well, what do we have here? This is the view from a Gabriola beach. There’s the ferry off in the distance (Queen of Some Suburb) and then, um, that thing in the foreground. What could it be? We watched it for ages until we figured it out. Do you know what it is? (Hint: it [...]
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When do you suppose this Gabriola Realty sign went up? It looks like it’s been in place for decades. I’m fond of history, signs, and Gabriola — here all three interests come together in one happy place. So I’d love to know more about Gabriola Realty, which must have ceased to exist years ago. Was [...]
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We’re all concerned about Gabriola’s kelp, and grateful to those who spent time re-planting kelp at Berry Point last fall. When I blogged about kelp forests, Michael noted that kelp harvesting might be playing a role in the disappearance of kelp beds. I asked who would harvest kelp, and why. Commenters helped answer that question, [...]
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Here’s a shelter that could help homeless Haitians (or, um, homeless people on Gabriola). It’s cheap to build, and you can make one yourself. It’s a hexayurt. Wired.com explains. With just $100 worth of plywood and screws, almost anyone can build a shelter known as a Hexayurt that can last three years and possibly even [...]
Filed in Gabriola people 4 Comments so far
