Tag Archives: Hornby Island

Rivers & Oceans

Satellites track the tiny silver fish hugely important to marine life

Canada’s National Observer, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

A new scientific endeavour has taken to the sky using high-tech drones and satellite images to understand better the annual spring herring spawn vital to salmon and wildlife on the West Coast. 

Between February and March each year, frigid ocean waters transform to a milky tropical-looking turquoise green when male herring release milt to fertilize the countless eggs deposited by females on eelgrass, kelp and seaweed fringing coastal shores.

Unpredictable and dramatic, the small silver fishes’ spawning event is large and best monitored from great heights, said Loïc Dallaire, a researcher with the SPECTRAL Remote Sensing Laboratory at the University of Victoria. 

“It’s one of the very few animal formations that we can see from space, excluding human developments and towns,” Dallaire said. 

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Animals

Birds are smarter than you think

Sandra Milligan has been teaching biology at North Island College, in Campbell River, for more than 20 years. She is an avid birder with deep roots in her local community. Someone from Sierra Quadra came to lecture she gave on bird intelligence, at ElderCollege in Campbell River, last fall. This led to Sierra Quadra inviting Milligan to speak at the Quadra Community Centre at 7:30  PM in Saturday, March 2. 

“Birds are incredibly intelligent, contrary to what science has believed in the past.  They understand what each other is thinking. One of my favourite topics, because I’m a bird watcher, (aka a bird listener) is to talk about bird communication and language. They can have hundreds (and thousands even) of different vocalizations and they really communicate in much more depth than science previously believed to be happening,” she explained.  

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Housing

What They Heard: The Cortes Housing Report

The ‘What We Heard Report,’ from Cortes Island’s Housing Forum and the subsequent Housing Survey, has been released. 

“This is a really exciting document for Cortes. The intention of this forum that we did with the Cortes Housing Society and the Housing Survey was really to listen to Cortes and understand what the housing challenges are. We already had a pretty good idea from previous reports and information, but this really gave us a good sense of what the challenges are and then what do people want us to move forward with?” explained Mark Vonesh, Regional Director for Cortes Island. 

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Water

Mapping Wetlands on Quadra, and what that means on Cortes

The ICAN water security team and We Wai Kai Guardians are getting prepared to map Quadra Island’s wetlands. It is part of a much larger project which also involves monitoring the island’s rainfall, streamflow and wells. As you will hear in the interview that follows, this project is also relevant  to surrounding islands like Cortes. Bernie Amell, a recognized authority in the design of constructed wetlands for water treatment, and in the restoration of streams and riparian habitats, is in charge of mapping the wetlands. 

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Arts

Michael Keith (Part 2): on Cortes Island 

Michael Keith was ‘blown away’ when he visited Hornby Island twenty years ago.

“I was like, ‘Wow, imagine living in a place like that.’ I remember going back to Toronto and telling my friends, ‘they don’t even lock their doors there. It’s incredible!’”

He was enamoured by the spectacular seascapes at Tofino, when he played there a few years later. 

Keith went through a divorce, sold his house, and then hooked up with a professor at the University of Toronto.  

“My new partner who I’ve been with for 10 years,  introduced me to Cortes because she would come here for getaways from Toronto. I was gigging two or three times a week, and teaching in Toronto. She wanted to move here. I came, checked it out and just fell in love with the land. We were fortunate enough to get a tiny little place.”

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