Mushrooms in Boston Bar?

Nope, no mushrooms in Boston Bar. Normally, fall is the ideal mushroomseason! But The biggest part of British Columbia had an extraordinary month of september so far, with a lot of sun and high temperatures. What a mushroom needs is moisture so we'll need a few days of rain before we can start picking. We didn't mind the sun on this lovely day! A roadtrip to Boston Bar feat. Tanja Tija Minga Zizi and Cava.

This picture is on its side for an unknown reason. Anyway, we had a lovely day and lots of fun. The girls had there swim in the lake, we picked berries, we had lunch and we tried to catch some fish without any luck...On the road back home, three girls and two dogs were sleeping in the car and I had a little nap myself!

Beware mushrooms, once the rain comes...we'll be back! It's always an adventure with Tania and the FartyBumbum Sisters.

Lots of love

T H & Th.

OWL Rehabilitation Society - Week Two.

It's quiet at the facility, we do our daily check ups on the birds in rehab and on our permanent birds. It's cool to learn the different habits of several raptors during this daily routine. Casper, a Great-horned Owl (Bubo virginianus) attacks on a regular base so we have to wear a hardhat while going in. And beware of Ladyhawk when she's in a bad mood. Flinger, a Roadside Hawk (Buteo magnirostris), native to Latin America is a lot easier to deal with. She's glovetrained and we handfeed her every day.

Every two days, our Golden Eagle (Aquila chrysaetos), Goldie, needs to be treated. She has severly advanced bumblefoot. This bacterial infection of the footpads is very common for raptors in captivity. There are only a few options left for Goldie. In a few days, x-rays will make the decision for this beautiful old eagle.

I've handfed several birds already so I'm getting used to handling birds on the glove and everything that comes with it. I hope I'll have the chance to work with Stella one day. Stella is a big sized female Red-tailed Hawk (Buteo jamaicensis). She's been through some rough things in the past and she's not easy to handle but it's definitely worth every risk!

I've spend some time with the Barn Owls (Tyto alba) last week. This is probably the only place one earth where Barn Owls can actually rehab in a barn...with real chickens! I've fed the Owls several times and I've cleaned the barn...this is a great idea to take home!

And ofcourse we have our unexpected visitors passin by. A big coon visits us on a regular base to steal Tiger's (the housecat) food and Barn Swallows (Hirundo rustica) have their nest under the roof of the Outside Interim Cages. Everybody has its place...

If you deal with living animals, you have to be able to deal with the dead ones as well. Unfortunately, today one of our latest permanent birds, Peanut, died unexpectedly. Peanut was a little Northern Pygmy-Owl (Glaucidium californicum). Pygmy-Owls are smaller than a Starling with an average weight of 70 g. Peanut could have been very old...You can only do so much, so long Peanut!

Enjoying life in North Surrey feat. Tania Zia Tia Minga Cava Jake Tamara Duke and Maya.

Learning every day at OWL feat. Rob Barb Martina Pascal Julia Sonja Liron and a 1000 volunteers.

OneLove.

The Beard The lady and the Pervert.



Unforgettable High and LowLights.

Lonely Icefisher, End of Season...Parry Sound, April 2011.

Viktor, Dead Horse On My Mind, Maberly April 2011.

T H Th.

OWL Rehabilitation Society - Week One.

My second internship started on Thursday August 25th. OWL (Orphaned WildLife) Rehabilitation Society is under direction of founder Bev Day. This Birds of Prey rehabcentre is worldwide renowned for its efficient training and pre-release cages. This week started off differently because OWL's second Open House of this year was coming up. Visitors got to see more birds and had acces to several interesting rooms of this facility so everything needed to be prepared. Highlight of the weekend: the release of a juvenile Bald Eagle on each day. Daryl, a long time volunteer, was the lucky Star on Saturday. As soon as Bev had given a few thank you's and a brief history of the eagle, it was time to go!

OWL has two types of educational birds: Permanently injured birds in the front-educational zone, these birds are left wild, set in pairs and are often used as fosterparents for incoming orphans. The side-educational birds are different. A few are permanently injured, some of them are human imprints while others are born in captivity. There is one thing they have in common, they are all glovetrained and handfed daily. I've learned a lot about these raptors last weekend because I talked about them for approximately eight hours, : ). Interesting how people of all ages react differently on these magnificient hunters. One bird I was talking about was Katie, a female North-American Kestrel (Falco sparverius).

This gorgeous little falcon is a human imprint in perfect condition. We feed and train her daily on the glove and I already had the opportunity to do it myself, what a wonderful scene...all beautiful stories in life start with small things. Unfortunately, OWL gets patients in on a daily base: I've seen injured Barred Owls (Strix varia), a juvinile Osprey (Pandion haliaetus) and a juvenile Cooper's Hawk (Accipiter cooperii) with nerve damage, coming in. An injured Golden Eagle (Aquila chrysaetos) was on its way by sportplane when I left OWL on monday. Cars, windows and humans are the main enemies of these raptors. Please keep your guns inside and keep all your garbage in the car till you get home folks, even fruitleftovers!

This is why and how I do it my friends, Hands-On experience and working with the best on these magnificient birds! At present, I'm a shadow of the supervisors but hopefully in the future...maybe one day I'll supervise myself. I'm enjoying this final chapter of what is still a wonderful journey. And ofcourse, Big Up for my all time favourite BlueBerryPicker...thanks babe, for letting me do this! I close this story with one of the most beautiful purebred falcons I've ever seen, Falco cherrug...Meet Sally.

To be continued...

The Beast The Beauty and The Rocket.

Permanent Residents of North-Surrey!





Roaming Around - Southern BC!

Driving round the southern BC penninsula brought us on different spots! We tried different campings and different parkinglots. In a meanwhile searching for a permanent place to stay during this final chapter while we're trying to sell our Dear Annabel! It's still summer down here that's for sure...does anyone know these flowers?

And if it's 28 degrees outside we like to have of pop cold! Icecold...the almighty Westfalia Freezer did it again, or should I say MyLady did it again. Awesome result...

We went to different places, searching for different rooms to rent. One of those places was White Rock...after visiting an awful basement room we were right on time to see an amazing sunset! The sky on fire...

This part of BC has some beautiful spots, beaches and walking trails! We enjoyed a walk along the Boundary Dyke Trail and the Raptor Trails in the Regional Park looking for Harriers.

There's much more coming up folks, we finally found ourselves a cozy little studio! I've started my second internship in a Worldwide Renowned Raptor Rehab Centre and it all looks very promising!

Enjoy life and seize the day, we're almost there!

T H Th.

Modern Slavery.

I think you all know we both are not afraid to make our hands dirty and work ten hours a day. In the Southern part of Vancouver you see a lot of Blueberry fields and guess what, it's picking time! We contacted a guy and we could start yesterday at 8 am...for every pound we picked we would get 44 dollarcents. No green, no red, only darkblue...please! That's basically how our day started...

It was burning hot on the fields: 28 degrees and practically no breeze! We were mostly surrounded by Indian families: shouting, singing, laughing and...picking! We started off smiling and had a lot of fun. At the end of the day (10 hours later), we were tired and dirty and we realised how insane this job was. If you don't pick fast, NO MONEY, welcome in today's modern slavery! We are very lucky, fortunate and spoiled that we can choose to do something else, that we can travel the world knowing that our future will be bright. It's crazy to realise that a lot of people have to do jobs like this to survive, even in Canada, people like us, children even...something to think about!

We're both good workers and we don't give up easily...well we only picked 157 pounds with the two of us (that's basically five 12 liter buckets! We've been told that experienced pickers can pick up to 300 pounds each which is very hard to believe. One dollar is zero point seventytwo eurocents, so I think you have enough numbers now to figure out how much money we made on saturday 22nd of August 2011.

We live, we learn...we still have fun!

T H Th.

Okanogan Valley.

We left the Island a week ago, we missed some Travel Juice to enjoy it to the fullest. We didn't catch any salmon in Campbell River, Tofino was a dissapointment...bad weather, a crappy little town and a beach like we saw many before, nothing special or maybe just us! We did enjoy the Rain Forest in Pacific Rim, very impressive! Anyway, we found the travel spirit back in Naramata, a nice little village in the beautiful Okanogan Valley, interior BC! Maritime temperatures and nice lakes with fake beaches and unfortunately...no fruitpicking for us!

Thurber's first swimlesson!

Off he goes...

He made it to the shore and so did we...: )

No comment...

We drove from Osoyoos to Summerland and back to Naramata and everywhere we asked: Do you need pickers? And everwhere the answer was...No, cherries are done and it's to early for apples! Bad timing so we decided to spend some more time...near the lake, in the sun...doing nothing!

The beauty...

The beast and the Coonhound!

Awesome summerdays in the Valley, beautiful region and definitely worth a visit! We know now that the Mellow Sausage can swim, which is great and that finding a descent job will be difficult! We're back in the Vancouver area to complete our final journey...Sorry for the delay folks! MeetTheMoose, still standing...: )
And oh yeah, that's what tourists do in Penticton! The two lakes in the valley are connected by a river, you jump into your innertube at the upperlake and float two hours and a half down to the lowerlake! Sometimes the river is really full of floaters...One little detail, the river runs next to the highway so you can take the shuttlebus back! Crazy canadians!

Thomas Hannah and Thurber.