Friday’s sunrise from my favourite out of the way spot at Jericho Beach.

Reading

• I’m about half-way through Peter Brannen’s The Ends of the World: Volcanic Apocalypses, Lethal Oceans, and Our Quest to Understand Earth’s Past Mass Extinctions. The last few years I’ve been increasingly drawn to books about deep time, particularity books on geology, abiogensis, and evolutionary biology. I’ve been enjoying Brannen’s book, and if you’d like to read a review of it, I implore you to visit The Inquisitive Biologist.

Some other things I read this week

• Tiny Tubes Reveal Clues to the Evolution of Complex Life
• Why I Became a Birdwatcher (archive.is link if that link is paywalled)
• Tiny skaters beneath the arctic ice rewrite the limits of life

Watching

• Meditations for the Anxious Mind aka Frankie’s Cultural Observations: Imagine if Adam Curtis had an absurd sense of humour decided to make youtube shorts instead of hours long documentaries. Ridiculous and incisive, Frankie might appear as a joke at first, but don’t be fooled – he’s got some of the most relevant and biting cultural criticism packed into his few minute ‘on the street’ videos.

• Leave it to insects to break basic rules of biology we thought we understood: 7 Days of Science - The Ants That Broke Biology

Listening

• Last week I revisited the mesmerizing composition that is Steve Reich’s Drumming. If you’re unfamiliar with minimalist music from the 1970s, it might be challenging to get into – but if you stick with it for a few minutes you’ll be swept away. I can’t imagine how mentally and physically demanding it must be to play. Here’s an except from Colin Currie’s percussion group:

Photos

Sunrise at Cypress Mountain

A few days ago I spend the morning at Cypress Provincial Park looking for plants and mushrooms – while keeping an eye and ear out for birds.

Drosera rotundifolia (Round-leaved Sundew)

Despite it being late in the season, I found a significant amount of Drosera rotundifolia. I adore these tiny plants… seeing them at the Camosun Bog a few years back got me really paying more attention to plants.

Corallorhiza mertensiana (Pacific Coralroot)

While trying to find some Monotropa uniflora (aka Ghost Pipe), I found this instead. Corallorhiza mertensiana is a mycoheterotropic orchid. This weirdo no longer has chlorophyll and cannot photosynthesize. Instead, it parasitizes fungi to get the carbon it needs to grow. The above picture shows the fruits.

Sunrise at ƛ̓éxətəm Regional Park

Misty morning at the Vancouver Avian Research Banding Station.

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