My First Forest Fire, Part 2

 The photo above shows the building that used to be the McBride Ranger Station.

    My wife drove me the 6 miles into town and dropped me off at the ranger station. I kissed her good bye and began walking up the sidewalk. I couldn’t help but notice that there was a distinct lack of chaotic rushing around and the yelling of orders, that I had expected to see at the Forest Service office with a forest fire to be fought. Instead I saw a quiet sunny morning with no activity at all, in sight. 

        I walked up the concrete steps, opened the door and stood by the counter. A man wearing a beige shirt came up to the other side of the counter and asked if he could help me.   I replied that I had received a call from Alastair, and that I was there to help fight a forest fire. The man walked around a wall and called to Alastair who came to the counter and welcomed me.  He  then introduced me as David, his neighbor who was a teacher. He told me to follow him. 

        Alastair led me into a large room in the basement of the office, and handed me a big brown envelope with a string tie and told me that since I was a teacher, I was going to be the “Timekeeper” on the fire. He had me open the envelope and as I took out and looked at all of the various pads of paper forms and cards, he explained to me what each of them was and what I was to record on them. 

    Alastair then introduced me to Grant, who was to be in charge of the fire. I was then left on my own in order to spend more time reviewing the various timekeeper pads and forms.  Grant returned to tell me to make sure that all of the pencils were sharpened. 

        Things seemed to be moving a whole lot slower than I had expected. There was still no other fire fighters that I could see.  As I sat in the basement studying the Timekeeper’s forms, I was introduced to a couple of other Forest Service guys and began to glean a bit more information about the fire and what was going to happen.  

        The fire was caused by a lightning strike, up one of the tributaries of the McGregor River, which was about 50 miles northwest of McBride. There were no roads close to the fire so I was going to accompany a truckload of supplies to Dome Creek, the nearest  community to the fire, where a helicopter would pick me and the supplies up, and fly to the location where the fire camp was to be sited. I would be helping set up the camp. The firefighters would not be flown into the camp until the afternoon. 

        I then did a lot of waiting, which was followed by more waiting.

        I accompanied Alastair to the grocery store to pick up the food order that had been filled for the Fire Camp. I was starving; firefighting is hungry work. I took advantage of being at the grocery to buy myself a chocolate bar to tide me over until I got something more substantial to eat. We drove the groceries back to the office and where I did some more waiting. The guys at the office had some sandwiches brought end and fortunately I was a recipient of one of them. 

You can see my paintings at: davidmarchant2.ca

My First Forest Fire Call Out

           My life took an unexpected turn when the phone rang at 9:30 on a hot and sunny August Saturday morning in 1978.  It was a phone call that had an immediate repercussion, but also had further repercussions two years later that led to a 25 year change in the direction of my life.

        The call was from Alastair, a neighbor who lived a couple of houses down the road who worked for the B.C. Forest Service. In our many visits with him and his family, I mentioned that I was available and eager for any kind of work, and fortunately Alastair remembered that, and was on the phone to tell me that there had been a lightning strike that had resulted in a forest fire up the McGregor River drainage, and the Forest Service was in need of fire fighters. Was I willing to come and help?

        “Sure”, I told him “What do I need do? 

         “Just bring some boots and gloves and come down to the ranger station as soon as you can”, Alastair  replied, then added, “You’ll probably be away from home for a few days, and this is a helicopter show, so we will be flying you in and camping.” 

        Wow, a helicopter ride!, Now, I was really excited. It was mostly the pristine mountains that had attracted us to move to the Robson Valley and the McGregor River was a totally untouched wilderness drainage, about as pristine as it comes, and now I was getting an opportunity to ride in a helicopter and see the mountains from the air. I had never been in a helicopter before, and jeez, I had never had to fight a forest fire before. My mind was racing, by this sudden opening of new opportunities. 

        I pictured myself as a fire fighter;  I stood stoically, axe in my hand, as an inferno of flames snaked up nearby trees and sparks swirled around me.  I neatly stepped aside to dodge the incendiary branches that crashed down beside me.  I paused for a few seconds, exhausted from the exertion of using the axe.  The heat was intense. I took off my hardhat and wiped the sweat from my ash smeared brow. The fire roared, my 30 seconds of rest was over, I must returned to the fire fight.

    Back to reality:  I filled my wife in on the details of my exciting phone call, then gathered some work clothes, my heavy duty hiking boots, and a pair of work gloves. A camera, I mustn’t forget to take my camera. I was ready. 

View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Happy Canada Day

     We’ve got a fairly grim looking holiday going for us today.  It is coolish and raining, so I thought I would pull out a more scenic photo for the occasion.  This Is a picture taken on the way up to Kinney Lake in Mt. Robson Provincial Park.  The beautiful, but unnatural looking color of the water, is due to glacial “flour”, a mix of ground up rock carried by the river.

    Like every other country these days, Canada is suffering from the erratic, chaotic, and unstable bullying of the child-like president of the US, but it is muddling along.  

    Our weather will no doubt put a damper on the Canada Day events scheduled in McBride.  We will probably drive into town later today, to get some doughnuts from the local food truck.

You can view my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Heat Dome Singed Hostas

     Three days ago I blogged about the heat dome the Interior of BC suffered under, five years ago in 2021.  Well, it wasn’t only local people that suffered, the photo above shows what happened to my hostas as a result of the heat dome.  We recorded a extraordinary temperature of 41°C (105°F), and the hostas that were growing immediately beside the walls of our house got even hotter, because of the radiated temperatures generated by the nearby walls.  The heat caused their generally vibrant leaves to curl up and die along the edges.  

    I am currently painting another image of the phenomenon.  The photo below shows how far I have gotten so far on the painting.

Leather Postcards, Who Knew?

     Remember Sadie, my grandmother who homesteaded in Montana?    My sister recently went through an old trunk of Sadie's and discovered that Grandma hoarded a lot of the postcards she received throughout her life.  Among those post cards were two very old ones that were made of leather.  Leather postcards were something neither my sister nor I, even knew were a thing, but I guess in the early days of the 1900’s, leather postcards had become a very popular fad.

    The first leather postcards started showing up in 1903.  One of those in Sadie’s old trunk was postmarked 1906.  Leather postcards were made of deer hide, and the drawings and lettering where burnt into the leather, using hot metal tools.   Making leather postcards became a popular craft with the ladies.  Some leather postcards had holes perforated along their sides, so that they could be easily stitched  together to make decorative pillows.         

    Because the buckskin was so soft, in 1909 the US Postal Service banned leather postcard from being mailed, because their flexible leather clogged up the sorting machines that were beginning to be used.

    Hey Grandma, who was this Jim character who sent you the card?

View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Colorful Lupines

     Lupines are one of my favorite flowers, and over the years I have taken hundreds of photos of them.  It seems I can’t help myself.  A few evenings ago as I was walking back from closing the greenhouse, I noticed these partially shaded lupine in the yard.  The way some of them where illuminated caught my eye, and I just had to snap a couple more photos of the plant.

    Our native lupine are violet in color, but over the years I have planted some pinkish, yellowish, and white lupine, and together they have generated a lot of new hues of colors.  Lupine are hearty plants and can be a bit invasive in spreading themselves, but I don’t mind because I enjoy seeing their long colorful blooms and their wide array of color.  

View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Heat Dome Anniversary

     Five years ago today, the Robson Valley experienced something I had never imagined would happen.  A stifling Heat Dome formed over BC, sending heat temperatures soaring, breaking long-held record high temperatures.  The Robson Valley was no exception.   During the summer our average daytime temperature hovers around 19°C (66°F), but in 2021 as we sweated under the Heat Dome, we got the previously unheard of temperature of 41°C (105.8°F).  

    While I was aware of heat domes forming in flat, hot areas, I never dreamed that we would suffer under one up here in the middle of the Canadian Rocky Mountains, but with climate change, nothing is normal anymore and anything seems to be possible.

    The photo above shows my what my greenhouse looked like, after I tried to cover part of it to keep the temperatures inside from becoming lethal to my tomato plants.  The inside temperature of the greenhouse did climb to 51°C (124°F) and my tomatoes did suffer, but survived.

    The extreme heat caused rapid snowmelt on our mountains, causing the Fraser River to flood into the neighboring fields.  (Photo below)

    During the 2021 Heat Dome, the town of Lytton, BC which was often the temperature hotspot in BC, broke Canada’s all time heat record, with a temperature of 49.6°C (121.3°F) then immediately the whole town burned to the ground, destroyed by a forest fire. 

    Just yesterday, I read where Evansville, Indiana my home town, will find itself sitting under a heat dome, this coming Tuesday.  I always found the hot humid summers they usually experienced, intolerable by themselves, and I hope the heat dome doesn’t linger too long over them.

You can take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

No Snake Worries In The Robson Valley

         Like our Primate cousins, humans seem to have an innate fear of snakes.  While I know most of them are harmless and not poisonous, whenever I happen suddenly come upon a snake, my first reaction is always shock, until reason takes over.   In the Robson Valley, we don’t have to worry about snakes.  The only type of snake that lives here is the Red-sided Garter snake.  

        The Red-sided garter snake is harmless reptile that eats things like slugs, insects, and in water, tadpoles, leeches, and minnows.  The Red-sided Garter snake is the most northern occurring snake in North America.  

        In the spring, I sometimes see one of these garter snakes slithering around in my greenhouse.  It is only about 18 inches (45cm) in length, and always looks for a hiding place when it sees me.  I think they overwinter in the crevasses in the boulders of the rock slide on the slope above our house.  In the spring they migrate down to the valley bottom for the summer.  I generally see one of two flattened snake corpses of these snakes who failed to get across our road during the spring.

       I have only ever seen one poisonous snake in the wild.  My wife and I were hiking along a over-grown jungle trail in Costa Rica, when we spotted this brown-patterned baby snake in the weeds.  It was the size of a pencil and had an arrowhead shaped head.  We discovered later that it was a baby Fer-de-lance, one of the most deadly snakes in the world.  We were a lot more observant about where we tread after that encounter.

    

View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Getting On Top Of things

     I have been overwhelmed all spring, trying to get on top of everything outdoors.   Our long spell of rain showers made everything explode into growth.  The lawn became so out of control to the point that instead of mowing it, I had to use my weed whacker to cut it, before it could be mowed.  The weeds in the garden were overtaking everything I had planted.  It was all very discouraging.

    Finally we got some sunny days and I was finally able to start getting things under control.  This morning, instead of my usual morning schedule of painting and blogging, I went outside to weed in the garden,.  I am finally starting to see some results in my endeavor to control things outside.

    After I got done weeding this morning, I took this photo so at least I would have something on this blog.

\

You can view my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

June Sure Is A Musical Month

     Our Jam meets to play music every Tuesday night throughout the year.  We just play for ourselves and the few people that come to listen.  Then suddenly June arrives, and the Jam gets all these invitations to play for the public.  

    In the first weekend of June McBride celebrates Pioneer Days, and we play in the park pavilion for a couple of hours.  Then a week or so later, we drive out to Dunster to perform at the Dunster Museum opening.   That happened on Sunday.  Then two days later we had our regular get together, and now a day later, we will be playing for the Old Age Pensioner’s picnic. ( At present, I am worrying about my voice and fingers functioning today, after last night’s jam.) The photo above shows us playing at the picnic last year.

    Because it is summer and everyone has so many other things going on, I never know how many of our musicians are going to show up for these public gigs.  There are about eight musicians that make up our regular group, but at this year’s Dunster Museum opening, five of our members couldn’t make it, so only three of us were there, luckily we were augmented with two other local musicians that came to play with us.

    I am not sure how many of us will show up for this afternoon’s performance, I think maybe there will be five, but no matter, we will be happy to play our music.   It is always interesting to hear how which musicians show up, changes the dynamics of the music that we make.

Take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

Root Cellar Troubles

     We have never had much luck with root cellars.   Back in the 1970’s when we bought our place there was a root cellar on it.  It was a mostly an above ground root cellar that was shaped like a big loaf of bread.  We found it more trouble than it was worth.  In the winter, it was difficult to get into, with snow piled up in front of the door, which was often frozen shut.   Then in the spring the floor would flood, due to the high water table where we live.

    Once when I was burning the weeds that grew on the root cellar, the flames caught the cedar timbers supports that held up the root cellar, and the whole thing burned and collapsed.  That was the end of that root cellar.

    It is nice to have a cool place to store our garden produce during the winter, so when I was building an addition onto our house, I dug out and made a root cellar under our kitchen.  I thought that would be handy and easy to get to, during the winter.  We did use it a few years, but then it too started to flood during the spring.  Eventually, we just quite using it.

    When we put in our gravity feed water system, I ran the waterline into the root cellar, where I did all of the plumbing to the kitchen and bathroom.   During that period of time, the root cellar remained dry for decades.  

    For a month now, our water pressure has been going down in the house, even through the water pressure in our waterline remained high.  I figured that the water filter, which is in the root cellar, probably needed changing.  When I opened the trap door to the root cellar to change the filter, I got quite a surprise. 

    There was two feet (60cm) of water in the root cellar.   We have been getting an awful lot of rain, and I guess a lot of it seeped into the root cellar.

    The water level in the root cellar was higher than the top of my boots, and too deep for me to change the water filter. 

    I did have a sump pump, so I thought I would use it to pump out the water.   Luckily, the water level was not as high as the motor of the sump pump.  I was able to rigged up the pump so that I could do everything from the kitchen, and not have to get down into the pool of water.   

    I discovered that the sump pump hose was too short to run out of the front door, as I had planned, so I had to run the hose out of the kitchen window.   The hose was too short to get to the lawn, so I found an old plastic drain pipe to stick onto the end of the hose, allowing the pumped water to run all the way out onto the lawn.   I had to rig up a chair and bench to support the hose and pipe to make it all work.

    Although everything looked very jerry-rigged and ridiculous, it all functioned as I had hoped and I was able to pump out 20 inches of water from the root cellar.  

    Rural living can often be challenging.  

        You can view my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Porcupines

 Here is an old post from a 2013 blog:

        What you are looking at is the business end of a porcupine.  I have only seen a few porcupines during the 40 years I have lived in Canada.  They are generally nocturnal, but do sometimes roam around during the day.

        I saw this one last Sunday along the logging road leading to the Goat River Trail.  By the time I got my camera out, it was already heading for the bush, so I was not able to get a shot of his face, but then again, its all these 30,000 spiny quills that make the porcupine interesting.

        I have heard lots of stories about porcupines and dogs.  The unfortunate canines that try to attack a porky, will soon have a face that looks like a pincushion and dog will have to unfortunately have all those quills pulled of his face, one by one, by someone using a pair of pliers.

        The other porcupine stories you hear are about what they eat. They crave sodium, which is found in salt and as a result, things like plywood ( the glue), sweat soaked handles of wooden tools, and tires seasoned with road salt become some of their favorite meals.  They chew big holes in plywood, and things like outhouses built in the bush have to have to be lined with metal around the base, to prevent the porcupines from eating the plywood.  

        Often, people camping or hiking and have left their vehicles parked overnight in the wilderness, have returned to their trucks to find that a porky has eaten it’s tires and brake lines, leaving them stranded and a long way from home.  People in the know often wrap their vehicles with wire fencing to keep the porcupines from doing damage.

        I have also heard that in places it is unlawful to kill porcupines.  Because they are slow moving, they are considered a good emergency food source for people lost in the bush.  I don’t know if this is true or not.  At any rate, the porcupine is another interesting critter that lives up here in the Robson Valley.

    

Take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

Lucifer Is No More

     Sadly, Lucifer our longtime cat, died yesterday.  She had gotten extremely thin and weak.  Over the last couple of days her walking had gotten wobbly, then yesterday it got to the point where she could no longer stand up.  She had been spending the bulk of her last days laying outside in the grass, and not moving, although she always found the strength to bring herself back inside the house for the night.  Yesterday, I had to carry her in.  She died peacefully in her cozy bed.

    Lucifer was a rescue cat.  When she was young, I spotted her criss-crossing across Main Street in McBride.  She was one of several unowned cats living rough in an old structure behind the hardware store, until it was torn down.

    I brought her home to be a barn cat.  However, like the other “barn” cats we had had, once the cold of winter began, she ended up living in the house.

    Lucifer had a crotchety and unpredictable personality.  In those early days she couldn’t always be trusted to act civil.  I gave her the name Lucifer after trying to put her in a pet carrying case to take to the vet.   She shredded my hand with her claws and bit me to express her objection to the action.  Several times she attacked friends who had come over to visit us.

    However over the last few years, Lucifer mellowed to the point that she sought to sit on our laps so she could be petted.  

    Lucifer became a big part of our lives, and we will certainly miss her antics and having her around. 

You can view my paintings at: davidmarchant2.ca

A Baby Squirrel

 This is a blog posting from 2013:

        Yesterday at 5:30 in the morning, I got out of bed and walked down stairs to go to the bathroom.  As I was sitting there looking out of the open window, heard some “scritching” sounds coming from the cedar siding outside of the house.  I figured that it must be a mouse crawling up the wall.  I wondered if it would make it to the window, and I could see it.  Suddenly, I saw a shape move in the cornor of the window, but it wasn’t a mouse.

            It was a baby squirrel.  I hitched up my pants and grabbed my camera and went outside to investigate.  I don’t know where the baby squirrel had come from.  I couldn’t see the mother anywhere.  I took some photos, and even picked it up and put it over on the birch tree.

            Later in the morning when I was painting, my wife called to me and said the baby squirrel was in our house.  We had the screen door slightly cracked open, and the inquisitive baby squirrel had slipped passed the screen door and was in our mud room.  I grabbed it again, and this time it bit me on the thumb as I held it.  I took it outside, again put it on the birch tree.

            There are always so many mysteries that happen around here that never seemed to get solved.  I am still wondering what the back story of the baby squirrel was.  Hopefully, the poor little critter got its problems satisfactorily resolved.

You can see my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Taking A Lie Detector Test

             My parents owned an acreage where our home was located.  On a corner of that land was a small house that my parents rented out.  Once when I was a freshman at university, living in my parent’s basement, they collected the rent from the small house and the cash was in an envelope, sitting on top of a chest of drawers in my mom and dad’s bedroom.

            One day when none of the family was home, my dad had a air conditioner repairman come to fix the ailing air conditioner in the bedroom.  Later it was discovered that the envelope full of rental money had disappeared.

            My father reported the robbery to the police and they sent a detective out to investigate.  When the detective found out that there was a long-haired teenage son living in the house, who do you supposed became suspect number one?   You guessed it, it was me.     

            The police wanted me to come down to the station to take a lie detector test.  I had, of course already told them I hadn’t taken the money, but they were skeptical.  I had seen lots of people taking lie detector test on TV shows and thought it might be an interesting experience, so I told them I would do it.

            I went to the police station and they sat me in a room and began to question me.  I told them again that I hadn’t taken the money and that I had never in my life felt any desire to steal anything.  I explained that if really needed money, I was sure that if I just ask my parents, they would give it too me.  I, of course, liked to have money, and worked to earn it, but I would never steal it.

            The police then rigged me up to the lie detector.  There was a strap that went around my chest, a blood pressure cuff that was wrapped around my upper arm, and small straps that went on the end of a couple of my fingers.

            They explained that I should just stay calm and not be excited.  They would just ask me some questions and I should answer them.  They told me that on the first question I should answer “Yes” even though that was not correct.  

            They ask me something like, “Is your name John Smith?”  I knew that I had to lie, but, I wanted to “beat” the machine, so I tried very hard to stay really calm and collected, and I answered matter-of-factly, “Yes”.

            The detective watched the needles swing across the rolling paper and said, “You are lying.” 

            I was pretty impressed with the accuracy of the lie detector, and then they began to question me in earnest.  

            “Is your name David Marchant?”

            “Yes”

            “Is David Marchant your name?”

            I replied excitedly, “You just asked me that.”

            That irritated the cop, who told me not to say anything except “Yes” or “No”.   He explained that all of the questions he asked, would be repeated in two different ways.

            My lie detector session continued and when it was completed, they confirmed that I had not lied, and was free to go.

            Having lost their main suspect, I am not sure what happened to the police investigation of the theft.  My parents never heard anything further from them and never got the rental money back.

            For me it was an interesting experience to take the lie detector test, “just like something you would see on television”.

You can view my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Michelle & Stephane Return for a Concert Tonight

         Because these two talented musicians have returned to give a concert tonight, I have repeated a review I posted about the concert they gave us last year.

            I haven’t been to a sit-down music concert for years, but one of our jam members arranged to have some musician friends who were passing through, to do a performance in a spectacular local “barn” (the most beautiful “barn” I have ever seen).  Having never heard of Michelle and Stephane, I wasn’t expecting a whole lot, but from the duo’s very first song, I was blown away.

              Their vocal harmonies were solid, crisp, and tight, taking some unexpected turns in their amazing vocal range.  When Stephane’s fingers started streaking up and down the neck of his guitar, I sat in my chair with my mouth open, considering hanging up my guitar for good.  He was an amazing guitarist.  Michelle on her stand-up bass gave a solid floor to the rapid guitar runs.  

            Their music was more Modern Country-oriented than I was used to, but they did the songs so professionally and with so much energy, I was quickly converted.  They did do one song I was familiar with:  “Seven Bridges Road” (also known as “Southern Sky) a song where the Eagles’s show off their amazing vocal harmonies, ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U61bPI8K04s )  Michelle and Stephane nailed the song with just two voices. 

            The two live in a small town in Alberta and I don’t know how much time they spend touring, but I was sure happy they had come to McBride and that I got to see and hear them.

           The other great thing about the concert was being in Froese’s spectacular barn.  It was wonderful to sit there, listening to the toe-tapping music while looking out of the big barn open-air window beside the duo, onto the blue slopes of the Rocky Mountains.   It was a great way to spend a gentle spring evening.

            Below is a photo of Froese’s beautiful barn.  The concert was held on the second floor, with the top two windows open.

You can take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

Another Memorable Jam Night

     It is getting so that I never know what to expect anymore when I go to our Tuesday Night Jam at the McBride Train Station.  Last night was another memorable event, not because of the music, but because for the first 40 minutes or so, there was now electricity.  The lobby was dark, but fortunately there was enough light shining through the windows in the back to illuminate things.  

    The lack of power did hamper those people who relied on amplifiers for their instruments to be heard, so we couldn’t hear the bass, electric guitar, or keyboard.  It didn’t effect me with my acoustic guitar and mandolin.   Once the power did finally come back on, our music got back to normal.

    The Robson Valley has been experiencing rain shower after rain shower, separated by periods of sunshine and blue skies.  Last night was no exception.  As we were taking the music stands and instruments into the station, a rainbow formed over McBride, as the sunshine was reflected by the falling rain.  It was a unique view of the Village, and we we stopped to watch and take some photos of the event.

Take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca