winter
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Hi folks! February was a very busy month working on a couple of creative commissioned projects for the “United for Old-Growth” rally in Victoria. The first project:
🐻 Bear & Owl 🦉 Masks 🎭
I designed a couple of animal masks, created templates for them, and lead two 3-hour workshops to make a total of 42 masks with a group of local volunteers. I usually volunteer with this group doing ecological restoration work in Metchosin, so it was fun to get our hands dirty in the crafting realm together. Here's a pic of the first two masks I made:
Grizzly Bear & Northern Spotted Owl mask designs
See pictures of the templates, process, and a goofy group photo on Kate's original Patreon post!
#winter #art
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Banner for the 🌲 United for Old-Growth Rally ✊
Seán and I were commissioned to design, paint and construct an 8 x 3 foot banner to show Metchosin's support in the United for Old-Growth rally (now apparently known as 'the rally where Neil Young made a surprise appearance and played a couple of songs, and also hugged David Suzuki”).
The banner was to be black & white, preferably in a lino-cut-esque style. The main challenge was designing something striking that included the desired elements-–a cedar tree, creek, animals that depend on old-growth, and mushrooms for good measure––into the odd dimension-constraints of “long & narrow” without it getting too busy and making sure it still looks good and readable from a distance. A definite challenge! Here's the result (before we put the side-poles in):
Spot all of the elements: Tree / Creek / Salmon / Spotted owl / Salamander / Marbled Murrelet / Mushrooms / Bear tracks & Caribou tracks.
Apparently the banner and the masks were a hit at the rally!
Read about the process, see sketches and watch a time-lapse video of the painting on Kate's original Patreon post!
#winter #art
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Read more...
Sidney Spit Restoration Adventure
Yesterday, Kate & I had an opportunity to do some restoration #volunteering with the Gulf Islands National Park Reserve on a beautiful tear-drop-shaped spit jutting out from Sidney Island which is home to a coastal sand ecosystem (rare in this region) which hosts several at-risk species such as the contorted-pod evening-primrose, Edwards' beach moth, & the ground-nesting (deceptively-named) common nighthawk.
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A vibrant varied thrush greets a grey winter morning, perched amidst budding branches
#winter #birds #sounds #meanwhile-winter
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🌺 ✨ Hummer Nectar Schedule 2022! ✨ 🌸
Hi folks!
It's a new year, and you know what that means.... time to print out your shiny, new & improved ✨Hummingbird Nectar Refresh Schedule✨!
Last year, I was dreaming about including a flip-side to the schedule that would provide a recipe, helpful tips and interesting facts. Whelp, with a timely nudge from the Rocky Point Bird Observatory (who asked to display an updated version on their website), I finally achieved this!
Download the new schedule here & read more about the process in Kate's Patreon post.
January 1, '05: Dusk. Four Annas feed together.
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乃東生 🌱 
Two strange creatures spotted collecting acorns here recently...
Read more in the Scuttleverse: 
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December 7, 1999:
Last winter, put a "roof" over where Annas male sat all season.
Removed in spring, and recently re-nailed.
Now see Annas sitting on same perch under his roof.
Last winter, put a "roof" over where Annas male sat all season.
Removed in spring, and recently re-nailed.
Now see Annas sitting on same perch under his roof.
#art #winter #日本
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Read more... Slow-life at the Banana Slug Bungalow
When I saw the call-to-artists for an upcoming show at the Metchosin ArtPod for 'art using photographs as a base', I figured I could manage to put something together for it (considering the massive pile of digital photos we have of things around Hum Hill from over the last two years, heheh).
Looking through the photos, I was inspired by several close-up pictures of various fungi and lichens. They seemed to scream, “you must adorn us with creatures!”, and so it began:
The first in hopefully a series of creatures digitally plopped atop photographed micro-scenes.
Read more...
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Read more... New Year, New Nectar
Here on Hummingbird Hill, one of our most important duties is to keep the hummers happy. We have a handful of hummers year-round who regularly come to sip the sweet stuff from our two saucer-style feeders. When we were still new at it, we found it difficult to remember which of us changed the nectar last and when. This resulted in confusion and—more importantly—the potential risk of unhappy hummers.
So, I came up with a solution.
Enter: Nectar Refresh Schedule!
