Back to the Office After the Fire Camp

      Fortunately the whole fire flap had ended on a Friday, so that gave me the weekend to unwind.  After all of the long hours and days of being away from home and working on the fire, when I did finally get back home, I found myself wandering around blitzed, without direction.  After days on a fire, it always took a while to return to normal.

    Back at work on Monday, I found myself faced with all of work that had continued to flow onto my desk while I was away at the fire.   There was a long list of maps that were waiting for me to create and of course, there was the usual flow of memos and other office generated paper that had to be shuffled through and dealt with.

    Gregor, one of my co-workers had been very keen on some diamond stock, telling everyone at work it had potential to make a lot of money.  Being very fiscal conservative, I was very skeptical, but a few of the people in the office bought in.  On that first day back at work after the fire, news broke that the diamond stock had crashed.  Poor Gregor lost $6,000 and a couple of my other friends at work were scrambling around looking to quickly sell off their diamond stock.

      On the positive side of being sent away to work on the fire, I had worked a lot of overtime and had earned an extra forty hours that I could take either in pay or in time off.  

    That first day back at work, I also learned the vacation ban put on all Forest Service personnel in the Province had been lifted.  That was good news because we had been all set to go on a camping trip to some of the Canadian prairie parks for a vacation, but the provincial vacation ban had been decreed on the day before we had planned to head off.

           Unfortunately this site is not allowing me to post the photo of my old office workspace.   I am not sure why.  However you can always read the blog and see the photo at:  davidmarchant2.ca

I Can Hardly Wait to See the Ear of Corn

     Having grown up in Indiana, I know what a corn plant is supposed to look like (Knee high by the forth of July).  Obviously, this corn plant is way shy of that.  In fact, this whole variety of fast growing corn that I planted is extremely puny-looking.  I started them in the house, then transplanted them outside, but outside was still too cold for them, but I guess they tried.

    What surprised me was that despite the hardships they endured, this plant has sent out tassels and a small ear is ready to be pollenated.  I can’t wait to see what happens.  Maybe I will get one of those miniature ears of corn you sometimes see in a salad.

You can view my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

A Bird In The Hand

     A couple of times each summer, I find a panicking bird in my greenhouse.  Usually it is a hummingbird, terrified and banging against the glass trying to get out.  I have a small butterfly net that I use to trap the hummers against the glass, then gently grab the tiny fragile creature and let it loose outside. 

    Yesterday when I was watering my chili pepper plants I kept hearing a fluttering sound, but I couldn’t see anything or locate where the sound was coming from.  

    The sound kept repeating, and eventually I was able to find the source.  It was, I think, a vireo (the species I couldn’t determine.)   It was down in the narrow space in between the glass wall of the greenhouse and the wooden wall of the pepper plant bed.  As I tried to grab it, it kept trying to flee from my hand, fluttering from one end of the space to the other.  There wasn’t a whole lot of space for my hand to wrap around the bird and several time it escaped from my grasp.

    I was finally able to grab the terrified bird.  I took it outside the greenhouse and let it lose into the fresh air and freedom of the wilderness, but not before I took a couple of photos with my iPhone.  It was amazing that the photos turned out.  I couldn’t steady or operate the camera very well with my shaky left hand, and the poor bird wasn’t staying very still for its photo.

You can see my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

1994: Chaos in the Fire Camp Continues

         On June 21st, I started telling you this story about a 1994 fire camp south of Valemount,.  If you remember, I had to get up at 5:00 but was soon wide awake after mistakenly brushing my teeth with Ben Gay, the ointment I used for a sore back.  Here is the rest of the day:

    I got to the fire camp an hour later.  It was dark and damp after the overnight rain and wind storm.  I found the Fire Camp chaotic and in disarray.  No one knew what was going on.  There was no Camp Boss or Fire Boss, and my job was not to run the camp, but to coordinate helicopter traffic.  I made a call to Valemount and they sent out both a Camp Boss and a Fire Boss. 

        While we were waiting, I had the fire fighters work to put camp back together after all of the wind and rain.  Grant, the Fire Boss arrived, but didn’t stay long because one of the fire fighters had a bleeding ulcer, so Grant had to drive him to Valemount.  He was gone for longer than I expected so I was the one who send out the crew to the fire.  

    The Fire Camp was not located in a very good spot.  It was in a field right beside a railroad track and trains seemed to be always parked on the track for a very long time, continually blocking our access to the highway and inhibiting a lot of what we needed to do.   This caused no end to snafus and a lot of ill feelings.

        That afternoon I had to run one of the First Nation’s fire fighters to the dentist in Valemount, because he had lost a filling.  That evening, another lightning storm blew through and we watched as lightning struck a tree which flamed up on the mountain slope across the highway, but fortunately the fire didn’t spread into the surrounding trees.  

    The next day I got to sleep in until 6:00 because of a heavy overnight rain.  I got to the staging area at 7:00, but Grant the Fire Boss again arrived late.  The heavy rain had extinguished the fire, so as soon as the fog lifted and the helicopter could take off, I sent the Kalum First Nation’s crew back to the fire to pick up the pumps, hoses, and other equipment.  It was decided to demobilize the camp and send the Kalum crew back home as soon as they returned to camp and all of the fire fighting equipment was off of the mountain.

    Once they and the equipment had been helicoptered back to the camp, I had the crew gather up all of their possessions, and boarded them onto a bus that would take them to Blue River, where they could be flown home on a plane.  However another glitch arose.  After they had all boarded the bus and were ready to head down Highway 5, the bus’s engine blew, which then sent us scrambling to find another bus to drive them to Blue River.

    We all had to hang around for hours before a new bus arrived, but eventually the fire fighters were on their way home.   I was then released from my duties and also headed home.  I had to make a stop at the Valemount dump to empty all the trash from the camp, that had been loaded onto the back of the Forestry pickup.   I also had to make a stop at the Valemount Fire Cache, where f the big shot “O Team” members (the big bosses) stood around chewing the fat. 

        I finally got back home at 7:00 in the evening.  I was tired and very happy to be back home, away from all of the chaos.  My wife and I took a refreshing dip in the pond to help renew me to my everyday life.

Take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

Dale Stephens: A Creative Talent In Everything

     Despite its small population, the Robson Valley sure possesses a disproportionate number of really creative people.   Last night we went to the opening of Dale Stephen’s work at McBride’s Valley Museum and I was blown away at what I saw. 

    I have known Dale for decades.  I knew he was a skilled woodworker, (he made the windows in my house), I knew he was an architectural designer (he designed many of the beautiful newer buildings in McBride), and I knew he was a talented musician (playing in several local bands), but his show at the museum opened my eyes to the many other creative skills that Dale possesses.  

    I discovered he is a skilled painter, sculptor, wood carver, and guitar maker.  Even the wooden frames that he made for his paintings and prints are beautiful.  Certainly, I knew Dale was a creative guy, but I was surprised at the vast range of his creativity, most of which he had kept hidden.

    That is Dale in the photo above in front of some of his architectural design illustrations.  Below are photos of a few of Dale’s creations that are on display at the Valley Museum for the next few months.  You should catch it if you can, it is a wonderful show of creativity. 

  View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Beaded Raindrops

     The association between lupine leaves and water has always fascinated me.  Something on the leaves causes the water to bead up.  In younger leaves the water funnels down to the center of the star-burst shaped leaves and collects in the center.  There it sits like a giant jewel.  

    We have been getting one rain shower after another for a week now; several a day.  I walked down to the pond yesterday after one of those showers and spotted this large lupine leaf that had been splattered with raindrops.   The way the sun was hitting them as I walked by, made the drops sparkle  like diamonds.   In the photo I took, they don’t look like diamonds, but I like the distinct clarity of the drops sitting on surface of the leaf.

View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Wow, There Was Garlic Under All Those Weeds

     Because we have a mold or something in the soil of our garden, we can no longer grow garlic or onions there.  Our friends the Milnes, generously allow us to grow our garlic in their garden, so when David Milne mentioned that our garlic needed weeding, I quickly scheduled some time to go over to their house to weed it.  He had told me the weeds were taller than the garlic, I assumed that he was exaggerating, but when I saw our garlic patch, it was clear that he was not. (photo above)

    Usually when I weed, I sit on a stool, but this year the weeds in the garlic were so tall, I had to stand and bend over to do the job.  It was tiring work.  I pulled out several wheelbarrows full of weeds from the patch.  It wasn’t helpful that there were a lot of mosquitoes buzzing around me the whole time I was working, but after a few hours I had managed to get the patch all weeded.

    I have to weed the garlic every year, but this year there was a whole different ecosystem of weeds in the garlic.  In the past, the variety of weeds that came up were shorter and the garlic stood out above them.  It seems that this year David had gotten some manure from a different farmer, and that manure had a lot of seeds from lamb’s quarters and morning glory vines in it, and those weeds grew very tall and vigorously.  

    Below is what the garlic patch looked like after all that weeding. 

My paintings can be seen at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Severe Thunder Storm Alert

     Last evening I was watching an old black and white movie on TCM when suddenly, the screen on the TV went red and a loud European-like siren blasted from the TV That was followed by a voice speaking French, which didn’t do much to clear up what was happening.  Then the screen went to yellow, with some printing, still in French.  I was able to pick out the word “Prince George”.  Fortunately then the voice and printed words switched to English, but they still left me confused.

    The gist of the message was that there was a severe thunder storm warning that could include heavy rain, hailstones, and a possible tornado in the Prince George area.  Now, Prince George is 230 miles away, but still we are sometimes lumped into that “area”, so I wasn’t sure if the warning included the Robson Valley or not, after all, we did receive the warning on our satellite TV.

    Seeking more accurate information I went to my iPad, and checked my Lightning Tracker App.  It showed me that nothing was happening around us, but Prince George was sure getting hammered (photo above,  McBride isn’t shown.)  Zooming out on the app (photo below) to show McBride, I was able to see that there where a multitude of lighting strikes all around McBride, but fortunately all far away.

    Kona had been acting nervously and needy, and I suspect she had somehow picked up on atmospheric disturbance even before we were made aware of the warnings.  That had happened to her before, even though we had not heard any thunder.

    We prepared for a disturbing night, since our radar apps showed a small storm heading our way after midnight, but our night ended up peacefully, with no storm ever hitting us. 

    This morning, I scanned the headlines and found no reference to any tornado.  I had been amazed at even hearing the possibility of a tornado, because in the forty-five years of living in the Interior of BC, I have never before heard of the area getting a possible tornado.   These days with the climate in flux, I guess we never know what will happen.  (A couple of years ago we suffered under a heat dome and had temperatures of 41°C (105°F) which was unheard of in the Robson Valley.)

Take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

Oh Canada

     Today is Canada Day.  It is a day when Canadians pay tribute to the country they love.  This year that love is greater than ever before, thanks to Trump.  I’ve heard it said that there is no hate greater than that toward a friend who has betrayed you, and I think that is how most Canadians now feel toward the United States.   Feeling threatened and no longer trusting what used to be our friendly ally and neighbor, whose erratic leader now speaks of taking us over, Canadians have bonded together, and have become more unified and passionate toward this country and society that we treasure.  

    Like every other country on Earth, Canada is not perfect, but I have always appreciated its kinder and more humanitarian history, and I hope with all of my heart that Canada will be able to maintain those characteristics in a world that grows darker, less trustworthy, and more cruel and threatening, with each passing day.

View my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca