May Long Weekend Wildlife Viewing

Since I am falling behind already getting all the weekend post up here is a 3min long “video” of my wildlife encounters during the May long weekend. Enjoy!

Porridge till Tuesday?

What a week, sigh. Not only did one of my projects at work do a nose dive just before the finish line I also had to give up a part of me. About 20 years ago my dentist in Germany told me that my front tooth won’t last more than 5-10 years after I had a root canal done. When I came to Canada 15 years ago every single new dentist I went to wanted to replace that tooth with a crown. Most of them probably thought how someone could be happy with crooked front teeth all there live. But hey they were mine and I had them forever. Finally this Tuesday though my current dentist could say “I told you so!” But hey I got a good 10 more years out of it. Nevertheless, on Tuesday morning I heard a crack and Tuesday evening after the TNR in the pub the pizza crust did the rest. And that tooth really broke in half – pretty much the whole tooth broke off leaving just the root which made for an awkward smile all evening long in the bar. But I did save the piece that broke off and finished the pizza – it was really good. Tuesday morning I popped the broken off piece back in after removing some pieces of pizza and to my surprise it stayed put as long as I didn’t touch it. Nevertheless I called the dentist and they actually got me in that afternoon. There wasn’t enough time to put in a temporary but the dentist glued the piece back in. And it seemed to work fine till the next morning when stupid me tried to eat an apple. And since then I am living with a loose tooth and am eating pre-cut food only. At least the tooth stays in for the looks. My next appointment isn’t till Tuesday so we’ll see if it lasts all weekend. But we’ll be out in the woods again so who cares about a glaring hole – sure the deer and bear won’t 🙂

The pictures below may are a bit gross – so may not want to enlarge the below… Do you think the tooth fairy still comes at my age?

looks like a whole tooth doesn’t it..

well it sure left a big hole

Frog Parade

Jeff invited a buddy of his Riley, to join us for the weekend,. I have raced K2 with his wife Marlene a few times and know her well from all the sprint regattas I went to in the past. I had never really met Riley but he and Jeff hooked up for Coho fishing in the fall last year quite a bit. Both of them love to camp and fish but pour Marlene had to stay home to help out at a regatta. We wanted to make sure we’ll take Riley to a lake where he would catch fish. I think he is fairly new to Chironomid fishing. Of course we picked Little Pete! Weather forecast was for sun and warm again. Since Sunday was the Tour de Indian Arm, I took Friday off and we went for a Friday-Saturday weekend May 10-11.

No issues getting into the lake but it was busy. Lots of bigger groups camping in all the usual spots around Little Pete – and it was only Friday and no long weekend yet. I guess our secret little lake is no secret any more. Maybe I shouldn’t’ blog about it so much :-). Lucky for us though our campsite near the northwest end was still open. Except for hundreds of tiny little frogs that had taken over the grassy area near the lake – had to be carefull where to step. They were so cute though coming in all sorts of colors – green, brown, red, black… Hard to take a picture though since they were tiny and didn’t want to sit still… Jeff headed out in his boat right away and I went for my usual walk first. Didn’t see much – cows (that shouldn’t be out yet) with HUGE horns, a garter snake and lots of insects. Yep the warm weather brought out all the flies, mosquitoes, bugs and spiders early. Back at the lake Riley had arrived as well and I saw him fishing near Jeff on the other side of the lake. At least I thought that must be him since I never met him. It looked like they were catching fish. I had seen lots of fish splashing in front of our campsite and hopped into my float tube to join the fun. Got into a couple nice ones right away. But the fish moved around quite a bit and I usually like to stay in one spot. But eventually I joined the moving around game and got a couple more here and there moving ever closer towards the guys. I finally anchored close to the opening to the big lake. Since it is deeper there I went deeper with my fly as well until I hit bottom. No fish. I almost moved on but thought what the hell, try really shallow one more time and BANG. I got into this great fish which gave me a real run for it. The fish was probably about 4 lb and all silver – very pretty. But he did not want to have a proper picture taken. That was fun – but all sudden boats started moving in on both sides of me and crowded my spot. I didn’t want to give up much spot though now that I knew there are big fish around. And I caught another one of similar size but with big spots and a bit more golden in color. Neither of the two boats next to me got into any! I am sure they were fishing too deep :-). I must have fished for at least 4 hrs.

Back on shore I set and camp and got some firewood until the boys came off and I finally met Riley. He is a very nice guy and just as un-complicated as us when camping. We sat around the campfire till almost midnight – usually we are in bed by 10PM. To our surprise we hardly heard anything from the other groups camped around the lake.

The next day was a little bit cooler and some high clouds had moved in covering up the sun every so often – which was good actually. I already got too much sun the day before. Jeff was up at 6:30PM to try the big lake. Riley was in his boat by 10AM. And I spent pretty much all day reading my book – “The Passage” from Justin Cronin. Finally some action was happening in the story… Went for a short walk but got annoyed by all the traffic… don’t know why the area was sooo busy. The boys were on the lake all day and said fishing was pretty good again. This was probably the best fishing we have had on Little Pete for the quality of fish rather than quantity.

Tiny little frogs all over

In all shades of colours

Can you count how many in this picture?

And I thought cattle can’t be out yet … especially the ones with scary long horns

I barely saved this spider and her net while walking through the high grass

Pond on my walk

Spring in full force – birch trees are starting to grow leaves

.. and the few flowers that are out yet are busy with insects

Riley and Jeff across the lake

I went fishing as well. Very energetic fish….

and a few really good size ones. I stayed out for much longer than planned.

Day 2: Riley and Jeff waiting patiently…

Fish on!

..Jeff as well

Busy chipmonk

Deer along my walk

Lesser Scaup on little Pete

The boys were out all day…. while I read my book most of it.

“Do you want to change to pedestrian mode?”

2nd fishing weekend, May 4-5. When your GPS asks you the question in the title while DRIVING you know you are on a bad road. But let’s not jump ahead…

Summer has arrived in Vancouver with temperatures sky-rocketing into the mid twenties last weekend – easy a 15C jump in temps from the week before. And Merritt was no exception – endless sun, hot and little wind. Once more our fishing trip started with a tree blocking the road to the lake we had selected – Rickey Lake. And this tree was bigger than the last one. Even though we now have a second bow saw, 36 inches long, this tree was too much and we had to turn around. Plan B was Roche Lake. Haven’t been there in a LONG time. It’s a bigger lake for once and also a Provincial Park with a resort and a couple campsite. Obviously we avoided the resort side but even the other campsite was fairly busy. First spot we picked had a huge ant nest at the launch site – fire ants were crawling up our legs in no time. Nope! The 2nd spot we picked was right next to a group with a generator. No thank you! The 3rd place was quite far away from the lake and on the road but it would work. Jeff was about ready to explode wasting all this time driving and looking for a campsite and rushed out onto the lake. I took it a bit more slowly and went for a hike first. Found this trail with a lot of trees down – go figure – and ended up scratching up my legs all over. Obviously it being hot and sunny I only wore shorts and T-shirt – not really a good idea when bushwhacking. The trail eventually spit me out on a big road at the edge of the park and I almost turned around if not for some moose tracks I followed down the road which led to this really muddy trail to the left. It we a really rough road, lots of puddles and deep holes but when I got near the end of it there was a Tacoma parked there. To my surprise it let right back to Roche Lake. It went on a little past the truck opening up into this nice grassy spot right along the lake, almost flat and no other campers around except for the two people in the Tacoma that were tenting like us and likely looking for quite and solitude like us. I “rushed” back to the place we had “parked” – good thing I left before ever setting up camp. Well rushing is not quite the right word either. Since I wanted to know how to get there by car (could never get the truck down the first trail because of all the trees) I followed that big road back to the Provincial Park campsite and it was a LONG way around. Lucky for me, Jeff was near the shore when I got back to camp 3 and I told him about the spot I found. He was to row his boat up there while I was to take the truck. Was a bit nervous about taking the new truck down this muddy road but hey – there was already a Tacoma in there and if the truck can handle it so should I… When I left the campsite I had to stop for 3 deer to cross the road … all this walking/stalking I do to see wildlife. These 3 were right outside the campsite, sigh. Anyhow, I made it down the muddy road without any trouble and almost without a scratch. There was this one tight spot with a tree halfway into the road and that tree was in the middle of a big puddle. I was too lazy to get the saw and the gum boots out … somehow those guys made it past it. The nice spot at the end of it was still empty. I had been a bit worried since it took me a good 2 hrs to walk back and another 20 min to drive. Jeff was already in the bay. I sat up camp and relaxed for a bit. When Jeff got off the Lake we watched the muskrat and the sunset while sitting at the campfire. Our neighbours were very quiet and despite for some noise from across the lake (some private cabin) it was nice and quite – definitely gets an A for campsite.

Fishing had not been so great… Therefore we packed up early the next morning – it was already warm – and headed out to another lake in the area – Hosley Lake. Jeff had heard lots about the quality of fish in that smaller lake but the road into it was supposed to be pretty rough. Now that we were “experts” in navigating muddy roads we figured we can get into any lake. And we did. The road wasn’t as bad as we thought but definitely a 4×4 road with lots of mud and deep ruts – this was when the GPS suggested to change to “Pedestrian Mode”. The reward, at the end of it was this really pretty lake. Gin-clear water from beige to green to dark blue in colour, depending on the depth. What I didn’t expect was the number of boats on the water (12 in total us included). Seems to be a popular spot. But they all looked like hard-core fly fishers – small boats with oars or maybe an electric motor at the most. I picked the spot I wanted to fish later – a little bluff not far from where we parked. Most people were on the other side of the lake (I like to stay away from crowds). But first I went for a little walk … lot of mud-puddles to navigate around, should have taken the truck :-). When I got back to the lake after about an hour and a half later I saw Jeff anchored in MY spot – fish on. So I went over there right away. But he was fishing really deep. To deep for me to cast. I tried shallow for a while but didn’t get into anything. When Jeff hooked into this monster fish – unfortunately we only saw him jump a few times before he came off, I put on a long-long leader as well. But really, that’s no fun fishing for me and I soon fell asleep. Needless to say I didn’t catch anything. I left the lake after a couple of hours, grabbed my blanket and book and roasted in the sun for a bit and napped a bit more. We didn’t leave the lake till 6PM… and by then my shoulders were fried but you should have seen Jeff’s legs – he had been in shorts all day 🙂

Roche Lake Provincial Park

Camp 3 neighbours

Marmots on my 4hr walk – one

two

three

As I left camp #3 in the truck, three deer walked across the road just outside the camp.

The backend of Roche Lake – finally found a campsite we liked -camp 4

Jeff coming in after a day of almost nothing

But the camping is really nice

Sunset with muskrat in the foreground

The camp in the morning sun.

Pretty rough road going into Hosely this is the EASY stretch and much less bad than the road into camp 4

Hosley Lake – soo clear!!

..and pretty colors all around

But first off to aother walk

Grouse was the biggest game I came across that day

And then some fishing – no luck for me though

Jeff did really well for a while.

…while I was watching the Common Loons

.. and Barrow’s Goldeneye. This guy cam pretty close to my tube. They are usually not that brave

TNR May 7

I love racing our double surfski again – Jeff and I…

An evening in the woods …

Last week I took this video on my evening walk near Roche Lake trying to spot a moose.  Remember my post about “Rudi” the tireless bird. You need to turn up your volume all the way and have it really quiet around you … enjoy! Can you tell what he is – leave a comment if you do.

A full weekend report is still to come.

Timber!!

Apr 27-28 weekend – our first fishing weekend of the season. Bit earlier than usual since it was still April. But the weather forecast for Vancouver was for heavy rain, the forecast for Merritt was for dry and mix of sun and clouds. They also forecasted strong winds of 25-30km/hr for the interior but they aren’t always right, right!? Well we left Vancouver and its rain-threatening sky behind and got blown over the Coquihalla into Merritt. Literally. I have never seen big waves like that on Nicola Lake. It was windy!!

To kick off the lake fishing season – well Jeff had already done day trips – we decided to go to one of our favourite lakes, Little Pete. There are two campsites we would normally stay in but the first one was busy and the second one had a tree down blocking the road into it  –  which was already there last fall. Planning ahead though, we had left our little bow saw out and cut through that tree in good time. It wasn’t too big of a tree, maybe 20cm across. And of course we had campsite number 2 all to ourselves – actually I think we are the only people who stay there, not counting the cows and coyote we see there frequently. But the cows are not yet out in the open. The ranchers can’t let them out onto crown land till June. So this time we were just sharing it with some birds. A lot of birds mind you – the swallows were going crazy over the lake darting on and off the surface to pick up insects. That’s a good sign for fishing!! If it would not have been blowing 20knots gusting to 35… How do those tiny little birds manage to fly in this. Determined as always, Jeff headed out onto the lake not minding the wind. I hate it though when it is windy – makes casting a fly line from the float tube very difficult and I don’t like it when a hook buries itself into the back of my head. So I did my favourite camping activity… walking up the hills, following the cow trails, looking for wildlife. The sun was out and I was able to dress lightly – and it was only April!!! The wind was cold but the trees took away most of its force. I did not encounter much in the sense of wildlife on my walk except for an area with a LOT of bear poop. Obviously a small bear family had spent some time near my favourite rock up the hill from the campsite (you get nice views from there). There must have been 7 to 10 droppings in a small area of different size telling me this must be a mom and at least 2 little ones. Or maybe it was the family of four I encountered just below this hill last year in the fall. Anyhow, they weren’t around anymore even though I searched for them along my cow trails. You may think that isn’t the wisest thing to do LOOKING for bears but actually I had a better chance getting hit by a falling tree than encountering a bear that day. I heard at least 2 come crashing down on my walk even though I didn’t see them. It’s not that the wind was really that strong but there are quite a number of dead trees around – pine beetle devastation, which isn’t quite as bad here as some other places we go to. The area around Little Pete is a bit more open woodland with some nice old trees. Well old is relative – this area had been logged before but the trees have grown back on their own accord which generated a forest that seems more natural to me than the densely re-forested woods you find in most of the province accessible by logging roads. Maybe that’s why I can spend hours just walking through it, up and down the cow trails, sit for a while to watch the birds or squirrels or chipmunks… Back in camp though I finally got my wildlife encounter. Three deer were walking across the open knoll above the lake. They were looking at me but obviously not too concerned. And the muskrat was out on a stump near shore – right in the bright daylight. I spent the rest of the afternoon setting up camp and getting us firewood. I set the tent up well away from any suspect trees. When Jeff finally got blown off the lake we were ready for a nice evening at the campfire eating bratwurst from the BBQ. It got cold though once the sun disappeared.

Day 2 was pretty much the same, except the sun was hiding behind a thin layer of clouds. The wind was a bit less, yeah, but it felt colder. While Jeff fished I read a bit and went for another walk discovering some new cow trails to follow, had a little chat with a woodpecker that landed on a tree right in front of me. I was sitting on my rock up the hill waiting for the bears to show up – they never did, sigh.  And when I got back to camp I decided to fish for a bit finally – wind seemed to be tolerable. Unfortunately though I had grabbed the wrong waders – I took Jeff’s and they were leaking like a sieve, right in the crotch area. And let me tell you the water was NOT warm. But hey, that’s what makes neoprene so great. Once you warm up that water between the pants and your skin your are actually ok – until you have to move and more fresh water gushes in. Jeff had been slaying fish all day. I got my first one in less than 10 min – good size too –  and 4 more in the next 30min. That lets you forget about your wet bum. But then nothing for 10 min and my bum started to complain as it was sitting in a puddle of water, so was my left foot. On top of that the wind got stronger and stronger again. So I was off the lake again in less than 1 hr. To my surprise Jeff came off shortly after as well and we started packing up around 3:30pm – early for us. We decided to use the spare time to stop in at the pub in Merritt for some beer and food. Well we almost didn’t have any spare time. We made it maybe 100m down the trail to get back to the main road and there was this big tree blocking the track – no way around or below it. I thought I had heard a huge crash the day before…. With it being about twice the size of the tree we cut on the way in we looked at our little bow saw and thought “This is going to take a while….” On the one side, the tree was about a meter and half up in the air as it was suspended on an old tree stump. It was quite awkward to cut over our heads and we had no way of telling which way it would roll once cut. Also this tree was thicker than the bow of our saw was deep – by quite a bit and we had to try to make cuts from different sides meet… But after 45min or so the big piece we had been cutting finally came crashing down and now lay across the trail. No way we could lift it. I was worried we had to cut it into smaller pieces but luckily we were able to roll it off the road.  Jeff sure did most of the work. Finally we were driving again only to be stopped once more after another 50m. TWO more trees down – at this rate I figured I will be late for work the next day… But these two trees were quite small we had them cut and were on our way in no time. And lucky us, those were the last trees down. The pub food was well deserved…

Leaving rain-heavy storm clouds over Vancouver behind

..only to encounter that the access to our campsite is blocked

Well, nothing our little hand saw …

and lots of man power (mostly Jeff’s) couldn’t solve

View fom up the hill where the bears live

Back in camp – deer

..and geese

..and a muskrat

Jeff is out fishing despite the howling winds

.. at least he is dressed up for it

Our camp

The fire was very welcome at night – it got quite cold

One of the deer was back the next morning

While trying to find the bears this little chipmonk found me – he almost jump on my shoes

While trying to find the bears killing time watching the eagle soar above

While trying to find the bears this little woodpecker landed in the tree right in front of me

Finally I get to fish – in leaky waders and gusty winds

Jeff got a lot of fish on day two – this is a good size too

And on the way out – more trees down

Took a long time to cut

Quite big tree for our little saw

50m down the road – two more trees down, sigh!