On the way back home from a one-day spring skiing trip in Jasper, I saw a flock of birds flying south. I thought they're supposed to fly north in spring. My brother was there too and he is my witness.
Today on the way home from work, I saw a flock of birds flying north. Again, I would've expected them to fly the other way. I didn't have any witnesses with me, but shortly after that, I saw another flock of birds flying south, so if my sense of direction is messed up, there was still at least one flock of birds going the wrong way. A little while after that, I saw several flocks of birds quite close together, all flying north, and then another lone flock flying north.
I wonder what makes these birds go the wrong way. Maybe they got tired and thought, I saw a lake back there. I'll turn around and rest there. Or maybe they read a Yellowknife weather forecast in Fahrenheit and they thought it was in Celsius. Any other far-fetched explanations?
Showing posts with label animals. Show all posts
Showing posts with label animals. Show all posts
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Wednesday, May 07, 2008
Sympathy for the beaver
"All them birds and predators just take from the land, but the beaver always gives a dam."
--The Arrogant Worms
There's a buffer zone between the plant where I work and the nearest neighbourhood. The buffer zone is basically a park, but it's owned by the owners of the nearby plants. One day last week during my lunch break, I went for a walk with a co-worker, and we decided to walk down a trail that goes along a creek. As we got closer to the end with the beaver dam, we saw lots of freshly-cut trees lying on the ground, with lots of teeth marks where they were cut. The beavers had been busy.
When we got to the dam, we saw another co-worker. He showed us two beaver traps that had been set on the dam. (I'm not sure if they were set by the city government or by the company that owns the land.) He said a couple of beavers had been caught and killed earlier that week.
I couldn't help but be disappointed. They're killing our national animal! And then the less sympathetic side of me kicks in and reminds me that beavers are a pest when they're in a city. The co-worker who showed me the traps pointed out how few tall trees there are near that part of the creek, and he said it's because of years of beaver activity.
Maybe it's necessary to keep the beavers out of the city to keep the park in better shape, but I wish it wasn't necessary. Are these trees any more important than the ones they cut down to build the plants? Besides, I still think the area around the creek is beautiful even if all the trees are short. But maybe it would get a lot worse without any animal control around there, and maybe it's harder for predators to get into the city so beavers can naturally do more damage there.
--The Arrogant Worms
There's a buffer zone between the plant where I work and the nearest neighbourhood. The buffer zone is basically a park, but it's owned by the owners of the nearby plants. One day last week during my lunch break, I went for a walk with a co-worker, and we decided to walk down a trail that goes along a creek. As we got closer to the end with the beaver dam, we saw lots of freshly-cut trees lying on the ground, with lots of teeth marks where they were cut. The beavers had been busy.
When we got to the dam, we saw another co-worker. He showed us two beaver traps that had been set on the dam. (I'm not sure if they were set by the city government or by the company that owns the land.) He said a couple of beavers had been caught and killed earlier that week.
I couldn't help but be disappointed. They're killing our national animal! And then the less sympathetic side of me kicks in and reminds me that beavers are a pest when they're in a city. The co-worker who showed me the traps pointed out how few tall trees there are near that part of the creek, and he said it's because of years of beaver activity.
Maybe it's necessary to keep the beavers out of the city to keep the park in better shape, but I wish it wasn't necessary. Are these trees any more important than the ones they cut down to build the plants? Besides, I still think the area around the creek is beautiful even if all the trees are short. But maybe it would get a lot worse without any animal control around there, and maybe it's harder for predators to get into the city so beavers can naturally do more damage there.
Sunday, October 28, 2007
Oil and friends
Premier Ed Stelmach has finally announced his decision about oil and gas royalty payments, jacking up royalties by about $1.5 billion per year, total. I'm no economist, so it's really hard for me to predict what effect this will have on the oil industry and on job prospects in Alberta. While I don't want to see people lose jobs, it probably wouldn't be bad for Alberta if our economic growth was slower. As it is, we may be the richest province in Canada, but it's an expensive place to live. I've heard before that Alberta has the highest rate of depression in Canada--more evidence that money doesn't buy happiness.
One piece of evidence the premier may have found the right balance: people on both sides are angry.
On Saturday I went to visit two friends who moved to Forestburg, Alberta a while back. They went to my church while they lived in Edmonton. So a few of us from church went to visit them. They have a funny dog named Rolo who was scared of my other friends' baby at first. Actually, the dog was scared of all of us at first, but she got less fearful of most of us. Except Curtis. (If you'd seen how he treated Rolo, you'd understand.)
Our Forestburg friends took us to the school where they work and we played a sport called "pilo-polo" or something like that. Their description went something like this: "It's kind of like floor hockey, but you play with a ball. And there are nets." At this point I was wondering what the difference is. "You hit the ball with these foam bats." Then I was starting to see the difference. And it turned out the ball was larger and softer than typical floor hockey balls. It was a tiring, challenging game, maybe because I'm kind of out of shape, but it was fun and I scored two goals. One of them was even for my team!
One piece of evidence the premier may have found the right balance: people on both sides are angry.
On Saturday I went to visit two friends who moved to Forestburg, Alberta a while back. They went to my church while they lived in Edmonton. So a few of us from church went to visit them. They have a funny dog named Rolo who was scared of my other friends' baby at first. Actually, the dog was scared of all of us at first, but she got less fearful of most of us. Except Curtis. (If you'd seen how he treated Rolo, you'd understand.)
Our Forestburg friends took us to the school where they work and we played a sport called "pilo-polo" or something like that. Their description went something like this: "It's kind of like floor hockey, but you play with a ball. And there are nets." At this point I was wondering what the difference is. "You hit the ball with these foam bats." Then I was starting to see the difference. And it turned out the ball was larger and softer than typical floor hockey balls. It was a tiring, challenging game, maybe because I'm kind of out of shape, but it was fun and I scored two goals. One of them was even for my team!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
