Fisgard: A Guiding Light

Fisgard Light, with a fog bank and the Olympic Mountains beyond – click to enlarge.

For mariners trying to safely navigate their way along the rugged and often foggy southwest coast of Vancouver Island, Fisgard Light is vital.

The oldest lighthouse on Canada’s west coast, it was built in 1860 on little Fisgard Island, just off the entrance to Esquimalt Harbour in the Strait of Juan de Fuca (the passage separating British Columbia and Washington State). Just beyond Fisgard, to the west, lies Race Rocks Light, and both feel plenty of the wind, waves and fog that roll down the Strait from the Pacific Ocean. Those influences, along with the off-lying reefs along the Vancouver Island shore, mean these are not waters with which you want to trifle.

Up until its destaffing in 1929, Fisgard was maintained by a series of 12 keepers – 13 if you include the widow who took over her husband’s duties for six months after he drowned on his way back to the island. The longest-serving keeper stayed 19 years; the shortest, only 12 days – leaving, he said, out of “boredom and monotony”.

Nowadays Fisgard is a national heritage site, run by Parks Canada, which hosts an interesting historical exhibit inside the old lighthouse. Since 1951 it’s been joined to Vancouver Island by a causeway from Fort Rodd Hill National Historic Site, making the island accessible by land. The day we visited, however, we arrived by kayak, having left our boat moored in Esquimalt Harbour. Some renovations were underway, which is why you can see scaffolding on the lighthouse.

It was a clear day with a light breeze, so we had a brisk but easy enough paddle and a great view beyond the lighthouse to the Olympic Mountains in Washington State. But the dense fog bank across the whole length of the southern portion of Juan de Fuca Strait served as a powerful reminder of how dangerous these waters can be – and how essential light stations like Fisgard and Race Rocks remain.

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Antlers at Last – and Fast!

Solo relaxing under the Deodar (click for larger view). More photos in slideshow, below.

Some readers will remember meeting Solo a few months ago, and perhaps appreciate an update. He’s two years old now, still immensely curious and still visiting us daily. But one thing is different: our little boy is looking quite grown up.

Over the years we’ve watched a number of male black-tailed deer at close range. At two years old, each has been different in the headgear department. Some early antlers, like those worn by Pretty Boy, have been symmetrical beauties; others have been short and stubby; a few have been only long, thin points. One of my favorite young bucks, Holey Coat, had just a single antler (I called him our “unicorn”).

I’d noticed the variety, but I’d never really paid attention to how fast those antlers can develop once they start growing. I’ve tried to document this growth in the short slideshow below (6 images with dates).

As you’ll see in the earliest photo (December 2012), up until last winter Solo showed only the slightest hint he would ever have antlers: tiny round marks on his forehead. By April, those nubs had swollen into respectable little bumps.

Then the pace suddenly picked up. His first set of antlers started to emerge: wide, thick and ever so promising. All being well, they’ll keep growing through the summer and into the fall, then late next winter he’ll lose them – to start all over again next spring.

I’ve read that deer antlers grow by half an inch a day at this time of year. Check out Solo’s progress in these six images (start from December – for manual controls, mouse over the lower part of the image). Don’t you agree, he’s growing up quickly?

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The Trickster Goes Flower Picking

The Trickster (Common Raven) – click for larger view

We live among ravens. Day in, day out, the raucous calls, mechanical-sounding “toc” notes and powerful wing swishes of these large birds punctuate our soundscape.

The raven was known to First Nations people as The Trickster, for good reason. This bird lives for up 40 years and has a wide range of vocalizations, from the gentlest “coo” to the harshest “kraak’, and everything in between. Ravens mate for life and often the pair will work together to snag a meal, one bird serving as decoy, the other as bandit.

Over the years I’ve watched these birds extracting treats from compost bins, flying along over top of fast moving cars when interrupted from a roadside meal, soaring overhead in amazing aerial acrobatics, and gathering in great mobs to raid apple orchards. But never, until a couple of weeks ago, had I seen a raven picking flowers.

I was in the kitchen when I noticed flowers falling from our Big Leaf maple tree and landing on the patio. At first I thought it was the wind, but there was barely a breeze. When the flowers kept coming at regular intervals, I figured Squirrelly must be at work. I hadn’t seen him (her?) for awhile, so I went to an upstairs window for an eye-level view.

To my surprise, the flower picker turned out to be a raven, moving about the branches, picking large flower stems and dropping them to the patio below. Was this a form of play? Was he trying to impress his lady love? I saw no indication the bird was eating the flowers, and I couldn’t imagine they would make useful nest building material, so I was at a loss to know what was going on. But then again, it was The Trickster, after all.

Trickster’s Bouquet – click for larger view

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Lilac Lemonade

Lilac Dreams

When life hands us lemons, we’re told to make lemonade. So what do you do when nature knocks down your beloved lilac tree? You fill the house with flowers, make photographs, and feed your friends!

We awoke last Sunday morning to a changed view from our living room window: an open vista where the lilac tree had stood. Overly tall and top heavy with blossoms, its two largest trunks had fallen over during the night in the heavy rain and wind.

In retrospect, I realized we should have been pruning more heavily over the years instead of letting it grow so tall. Hindsight is wonderful, right?

So what to do with that tangle of trunks, branches, leaves and blossoms?

The smaller of the two fallen trunks was unbroken, so we propped it up and covered its roots with a thick mulch of compost, and we’re keeping our fingers crossed it might survive. Once the flowers fade, we’ll cut it back radically and hope for the best. The larger trunk was a write-off, so I cut off enough flowering stems to fill every vase I could find. Our house has had a glorious scent this week! And of course those blossoms make good subjects for closeup photography.

Solo, our two-year old black-tailed deer, has been taking care of the mess. Over several days, we’ve dragged branches out to our unfenced lawn, where he’s been enjoying a feast of flowers. Although lilac are included in both of the “deer resistant” plant lists in my gardening library, it turns out that this young buck really does love those blossoms.

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