Today I visited my two remaining trail cameras in Glen Canyon Regional Park--to bring them home to be deployed elsewhere. The memory card of the camera at the old ford yielded a pleasant surprise--two visits by a Great Blue Heron. It stood in the creek, on the low side of a small beaver dam, poised as if to strike. It was probably hunting a fish.

The only other pictures of note were of mule deer crossing the creek.

The water is quite high from the spring snowmelt. The larger of the two beaver dams has raised the creek level there by about a metre. I saw no evidence of new beaver cuttings made during the several days since my last visit. This makes me to think that the beaver may have left the area, likely downstream to Okanagan Lake.

I checked the place in the old gravel pit on the south side of the park where I always see Bitterroot in bloom in April and May. It is, of course, too early to expect blooms but I found many of the little ground-hugging Bitterroot plants. Right now the plants are storing up energy in their roots, in preparation for the blooming season. When they bloom, the green parts of the plant will have disappeared, leaving only the marvelously beautiful blossoms. 

This picture was taken in April 2004.

 Nearby are plants that I am unable to identify. They show up on these disturbed gravelly soils at this time of year, with their bright yellow leaves that at first sight might make one think that they are in bloom. I have photographed them in previous years but have yet to learn their identity.

Perhaps someone can identify them?

On Friday, March 4, Martha found a black spider on our patio here at Westwood. It is still with us, being kept temporarily in a glass jar. On first sight I expected that it might be a Black Widow, and sure enough, on its abdomen are the red markings characteristic of Black Widows. 

This second picture of it is just a copy with increased light (overexposed) to more easily show the red marks. Black Widows typically have a red mark the shape of an hourglass, like two triangles joined, but the red marks are reported to vary considerably, sometimes being only a couple of red dots.  See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latrodectus

The bites of Black Widow Spiders are poisonous but the spiders are not aggressive. I think that it is not unusual to find them here in the Okanagan.