Yesterday’s grueling job was finishing the festival map and making sure that there was room for everyone in the park. Last year we experimented with filling the outsides of the park and some exhibits were unhappy with the amount of engagement they received so this year wenre smushing everything back together to keep activity on the inside of the park.
Which means measuring with a fine tooth comb to make sure there’s room for everybody and an aisle to get in and out. Poor Jon had to run back to the park three times just to make sure the numbers were right. But in the end I was pretty grateful everyone fit and things would work. One advantage of everyone being in the interior is that everyone will have an ‘across the way neighbor’ which means that when folks finish at one booth there is another close by to visit. That should increase engagement fingers crossed. And mean that everyone isn’t too far from the artist, the music or the restrooms.
The nice thing about seeing it on paper is that you can imagine the children’s activity and how they will have to hunt down map fragments in every row to get pieces they can then reassemble at the map making station to find the lost key.
Thank goodness Erika will be helping them and tasked with the assembling. All in all it looks like a pretty active event, with 40 exhibits (f you county Amy chalking in the center). Today’s job is getting something in Diablo magazine and final touches on my presentation at Safari West. Oh, plus our labrador Kenzie has a toothache and has to go to the vet. Nothing is ever easy.
Meanwhile folks across the pond from Port Moody are still determined to be as stupid as possible.
Province continues to investigate Saanich’s Horticultural Centre of the Pacific
Investigation stems from May 2 incident that turned Colquitz River ‘chocolate brown’
It remains uncertain whether a Saanich non-profit had the necessary permits to perform work responsible for a spill into a local salmon-bearing river already facing various strains.
The Ministry of Forests, Lands, Natural Resource Operations and Rural Development is investigating whether the Horticultural Centre of the Pacific (HCP) had the “appropriate permits” under the Water Sustainability Act to remove a beaver dam on Thursday, May 2.
Various public and private authorities have deemed the removal of the dam responsible for triggering a spill of warm, sediment-rich water into the Colquitz River from a weir part and parcel of the HCP.
When are people going to realize that removing a beaver dam is BAD for fish? I know they have fun pretending it’s good for fish, but lots of us know better. Having the ministry of forests investigate whether they did this with the correct permits is ridiculous. Why would anyone hand out a permit for this vandalism? And even if they DID how much investigation would it take to determine whether they did or didn’t?
You and I both know that what they’re really investigating is whether to tell the truth or not about who’s to blame for this fish fiasco.
Ian Bruce, executive director of the Peninsula Streams Society, said he witnessed the river turn “chocolate brown” on Thursday, May 2. Students from Royal Oak middle school were releasing Coho fry into the river at the Wilkinson Road and Lindsay Avenue when the level of the river suddenly rose four inches in height, said Bruce, whose organization hosted the students.
“The clear, slow moving water became chocolate brown with sediment, and began rushing by,” he said. Its temperature rose from 10.8 degree Celsius to 18.5 degree Celsius, while the level of dissolved oxygen dropped by more than half, he added.
Bruce said the spill could lead to the failure of future salmon runs.
Wh
y on earth a non-profit worth its salt wouldn’t know better than to rip out a beaver dam is beyond me. But here’s their website if you share my inclination to shame them. They look a lot like Heather Farms where folks can have weddings and audubon meetings. They probably never exhibited at a beaver festival.
Maybe that could be part of their fine?
