Snow - then a brief marginal thaw - and now cold again with ice. Only a week though to the winter solstice after which the days begin to lengthen again on the way to the return of spring. Before that, however, we have January and February and serious winter days ahead. [...]
Approximately this date but taken ten years ago at the end of the road - resurfaced from the archives. Never throw anything away, one day it will be of use. Last night there was a pretty violent wind storm with gusts up to 100km/hr and power outages all over the province ... thank goodness [...]
The beginning of December brings with it our return to winter birding tasks - tasks we spend all summer, especially during the too hot months, looking forward to. Regular readers will know that these duties involve weekly (weekdays for us, a couple of friends do weekends) visits to the nearby bird banding station [...]
As some of you will know I am a member of the Board of Directors of the Ecomuseum Zoo which is close to where I live. It's not a commercial zoo, but one which concentrates on the animals of Quebec and provides a home and care for animals that for various reasons [...]
HOSTAGE TO FORTUNE The sole point of this post is to make sure, by making a public commitment, that my current project is actually going to be completed on time. After 23 years just looking at wildlife in this region and after the daily species blog posts I published for a couple of [...]
Sometimes, while wandering around town, it's pleasant to find a bench with a view and just sit down and ponder for a while. Bryan, a small town resident who lodges with us, is collecting ponderable town benches as winter approaches ... he has asked the town residents to suggest which benches they [...]
Two Fascinating Findings this Morning. We took today’s walk (we make it a rule to walk somewhere every day - got to fight off this ageing business) in the Arboretum which apart from a couple of dog walkers we had to ourselves. When we set off along the trail there were ice [...]
This photo was taken in a forest on the west coast of Scotland about five years ago and was remarkable for the mossy layer covering around and bark - extraordinarily atmospheric. More recently, I happened to be reminded of Terry Pratchet's "Wee Free Men" and for some reason this image bubbled to the surface [...]
All Hallows Garden Flowers : 1 November 2021 In England we used to have fun finding how many plants we had in flower in the garden on Christmas Day. Not really an option here but J had a good idea when she noticed just how many flowers are still flowering (some only just) [...]
Autumnal tree colour in Quebec is always spectacular but everything is late this year. Realizing that November is almost upon us, last night was the first frost and the weekend will be blattering rain we took a walk in the Arboretum this morning to catch what will probably be the last of the [...]