This edition of the Nearby Nature Project includes a short news feed, a board game review and a reflection on nature-friendly gardening through Calgary’s outdoor watering bans in 2024.
News Feed
Teaching Birds to Migrate
Hunted almost to extinction in the 17th century, the Northern Bald Ibis has been revived by breeding and rewilding efforts over the past two decades. But without wild-born elders, they don’t know which direction to fly to migrate. This success story tells the tale of biologists teaching the captive-born birds to migrate!
Norway Cutting Tourism Campaigns in Favour of Nature
On the heels of overtourism stories from Spain and Japan, Norway is hoping to avoid similar issues. State-owned Innovation Norway has suspended it’s campaign aimed at promoting the nation as outdoor activities destination over concerns about putting too much pressure on Nature. There’s a lesson for Canada in here, especially when it comes to our Rocky Mountain National Parks.
Think Twice, Travel Naught?
Published in August, this article in The Guardian summarizes most of the pros and cons I weighed before we ultimately decided to travel to Antarctica last year.
Cultivating My Nearby Nature Connection
I have another game review for your this month. Undergrove, from Alderac Entertainment Group, is considerably easier than Wingspan (reviewed here). It’s for 1 to 4 players, and with an average playing time of under 90 minutes, makes a nice addition to the games in rotation for our Saturday family board game nights.
From the publisher:
“For over 300 million years, trees have traded nutrients with fungi in a vast underground network. Scientists continue to make new discoveries about this hidden world.
“In Undergrove, you are a towering evergreen with an ancient symbiotic connection to the fungi in your forest. As new mushrooms appear, your options expand for converting nutrients and helping your seedlings. Using cube conversion, tile placement, area control, and a tiny bit of engine building, you’ll need to claim the most advantageous locations and optimize your actions to leave the best legacy in the forest. The player with the greatest number of successful seedlings, wins!
- Build a shared forest containing mushrooms with diverse abilities.
- Trade with the mushrooms to get resources based on the partnerships you’ve made.
- Place your seedlings in the most advantageous positions to score the most points.
“Inspired by real mycorrhizal trading networks, Undergrove brings a hidden world to life with stunning artwork and engaging gameplay.”
I bought this game through the Kickstarter campaign, which means we have the upgraded, full-colour printed wooden playing pieces and the bonus holiday tree pack. After three games, I offer the following comments:
- The quick start guide is VERY helpful; don’t skip it!
- For the first few games, it probably makes sense to include the “multiple lines / rows” goal card as one of the three goals.
- If you get frustrated when your game play can inadvertently help other players, this game is NOT for you!
- The first house rule we’re considering relates to the carbon track – the mechanism by which the game ends. The published rules state that when a player reaches the end of the carbon track, that round of play finishes and then everyone gets one more turn. Since the carbon track can be abused (ie one player can deliberately accelerate end of game ) and can catch you off guard, we’re considering adding an additional round of play (ie everyone gets two more turns).
- We’re also considering whether one of the mushrooms is so powerful that it needs to stay in the box (like the crow and raven bird cards in Wingspan).
I look forward to studying the included booklet on the various mushrooms and keeping an eye out for matches during our fall walks.
My Nearby Nature Projects
Birding
We inadvertently turned down our bird watching the past couple of months. Now that I’m finally fully-recovered from whatever virus I caught in Greenland (not COVID) and our deck project is complete, I think we’ll get back into it a little more intently. We have enjoyed incidental bird sightings: geese and common loons while kayaking Lower Kanaskis Lakes, gray partridges in west Calgary, a dusky grouse in our Canmore backyard, and these sightings while hiking.
We’ve been surprised at how many Steller’s jays we’ve seen this year, all of them east of the Continental Divide. Until about 2 years ago, we only ever saw them in British Columbia!
Other Wildlife
Sadly, earlier this month a mature bull elk was struck and killed on the TransCanada Highway through Canmore (details here). We are keen to see the promised wildlife fencing go up between Banff NP east gate and the new wildlife overpass near Seebee, slated for 2025. Meanwhile, we hope other mature bull elk (and the cows, calves and juvenile bulls in their herds), will safely move throughout the Bow Valley. We saw this bull elk and his harem just days after the highway incident. They were hanging out in the big meadow that’s part of the Cross Valley Wildlife corridor.
Wildflower Appreciation
There aren’t too many wildflowers in full bloom these days. We’re more likely to spot seed pods and berries where we saw blossoms earlier this year. But alert walkers and hikers can spot the occasional late bloomer while out and about.
Mushrooms
Our first walk in September, I remarked to Mr GeoK that I hadn’t seen many mushrooms yet this year. By the next walk, it was like I’d spoken directly to Mother Nature and she responded! In fact, it’s that time of year when mushrooms of all sorts are popping up all over!!
Transition to Fall
Mother Nature is taking out full colour ads to announce the arrival of fall! Berries are ripe, seed pods are opening, mushrooms are popping up, and leaves are changing colour. In this part of the world, that includes the needles of larch trees, and the golden larch march is well underway.
This is a great time to fool around with intentional camera movement, to capture abstract impressions of the season. Use neutral density filters and a slow shutter speed if you have a DSLR or the long exposure mode on your phone camera.
Nature-Friendly Gardening
I harvested the last of the 2024 vegetable crop by mid-September. I thought of two reasons I had a disappointing harvest: 1) I planted fewer kinds of vegetables, because we were away during peak planting season and because we were away for a few weeks during peak tending season; and 2) Calgary’s water restrictions (June/July and August/September) meant a LOT less water on what was planted.
Specific crops:
- Kale – a good harvest. The kale row received a goodly share of saved rain / gray water during the outdoor watering bans. Planting cilantro next to / among the kale minimized the hole-eating insect attacks.
- Carrots – a poor harvest. The carrots are small and some are quite bitter. Victim of the extended outdoor watering bans.
- Beets – a very good harvest. I planted them in areas where I’ve not planted beets before. And I need to remember they need a lot of compost / nourishment.
- Swiss chard – a good harvest. See kale, above.
- Onions – an okay harvest. They were on the small side. I forgot to bed the tops over in early August, so that the energy would grow into growing the bulbs, rather than the tops!
- Ground cherries – no a single seed sprouted. I must have done something wrong.
We enjoyed a bumper crop of raspberries this year. I look forward to making several batches of raspberry jam before Christmas.
Three of my four raised veggie garden beds are new ready for winter. The fourth is sprouting volunteer flowers (mostly poppies and sedums). And it’s also the bed where I’ve planted my 2025 garlic crop.
The only thing left to harvest = apples. There are almost no apples on the September Ruby. But there should be a good picking off the Norland. During outdoor watering bans, I allocated a large share of saved rain / gray water to the apple trees, which explains the acceptable harvest. Lots of apples means more time in the kitchen, preparing applesauce for the freezer. 🙂
Because I use no pesticides, hornets and ants have claimed at least some of this year’s apple crop. So has the wind!
As for the flowers and shrubs, they’re holding up fairly well despite the extended watering bans. I’ll be watering them quite heavily now, until the sprinkler system blowout. And I’ll use my deep root watering tool for the trees at least twice more before freeze-up.
Call to Action
The province has invited residents of Alberta to share their thoughts re: Alberta’s “Nature Strategy” – whatever that is!! This survey is open until November 7th. I tried responding the first couple of days the survey was up and it got stuck after page 1. I’m hoping it’s fixed by now.