British Columbia Magazine

Some people like new car smell; personally, I’m fond of new book smell. So it was with delight that I opened up a box this week from Harbour Publishing containing 10 advance copies of James D. Anderson’s new book British Columbia’s Magnificent Parks: The First 100 Years. This lovely 259-page coffee table book was written by a parks insider who spent 30 years of his professional career creating and managing B.C.’s provincial parks.

We are giving away copies of the book along with a single copy of the Summer 2011 special parks issue of British Columbia Magazine on our Facebook page throughout the summer.

Our first winner was Lotte Sonne Nielsen from Denmark, one of the magazine’s many international readers. Congratulations, Lotte!

Keep your eye on our Facebook page for the next random drawing — and while you’re there, please “like” us to receive regular updates about the magazine. Now, back to that new book smell….

Did you know that there are more than 25 island wineries to visit and discover? A new book, Island Wineries of British Columbia, explores the unique flavours, grape varieties, and terroir of this emerging wine region.

Covering Vancouver Island and the Gulf Islands, the book delves into the history of the region’s wine production and provides up-close profiles of individual wine producers, from Alderlea Vineyards to Vigneti Zanatta. The 230-plus pages are enhanced with colour photos, maps, and info boxes.

The guide was edited by Gary Hynes of EAT Magazine and written by contributors. Not surprisingly, one section provides tempting recipes from local restaurants, such as Cafe Brio’s Braised Pacific Halibut with Spring Vegetable Ragout in a White Wine and Golden Beet Sauce–a mouthful in more ways than one. Each recipe is paired with a recommended wine varietal, such as Ortega–”the premier white grape for the islands.” (Who knew?)

Expect to discover some new wineries and even novel groups of wines to enjoy. As Hynes writes, “Blattner, anyone?”

British Columbians wear their Cowichan sweaters with pride. This Sunday, you can show yours off at the Victoria launch of Sylvia Olsen’s new book: Working with Wool: A Coast Salish Legacy and the Cowichan Sweater, published by Sono Nis Press.

Wear your sweater or other Cowichan knit and hear Olsen give a reading from her new work. Some of the oldest Cowichan sweaters will be on display, including one made 90 years ago.

The event takes place December 5 at the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria (1040 Moss Street) from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. and is free to the public. Drinks and snacks will be served.

Eating fish and seafood can boost your heart health, excite your tastebuds, and be sustainable. That’s the message behind The Ocean Wise Cookbook: seafood recipes that are good for the planet, edited by freelance writer Jane Mundy.

The 328-page paperback includes contributions from well-known Canadian chefs, including Rob Feenie and Jamie Kennedy, and provides a range of interesting options such as Tuna Tataki with Green Papaya Slaw, and Grilled Scallops with Charred Heirloom Tomato Salad.

The new collection, published by Vancouver’s Whitecap Books, was inspired by Ocean Wise, a nation-wide group founded by the Vancouver Aquarium and devoted to encouraging people to eat sustainable seafood at home and in restaurants.

Ocean Wise also offers videos on seafood cooking tips and techniques, such as filleting a salmon, featuring some of Vancouver’s top chefs. They now have 2,800 partner locations around the country.

Loyal readers of this blog: please forgive my recent fixation with aquatic critters. I can’t resist posting one more entry about octopuses — slimy, slinky, eight-armed wonders that they are.

Susan Rybar of Victoria was waiting on shore for some friends to complete a dive off the city’s Ogden Point when one of them surfaced with an old medicine bottle and placed it at her feet. Out of the bottle squirmed a tiny octopus! It stuck around long enough for Susan to snap this photograph before it wriggled back into the water.

James Cosgrove, British Columbia’s resident cephalopod expert, says Susan’s photo shows either a juvenile giant Pacific octopus (Enteroctopus dofleini), or a ruby octopus (Octopus rubescens), also known as the Pacific red octopus. It is common to find the young of either species taking shelter in cans and bottles in shallow water.

Watch for Cosgrove’s new book Super Suckers: The Giant Pacific Octopus and Other Cephalopods of the Pacific Northwest (Harbour Publishing) this March. The text will include fascinating factoids, new research on octopus behaviour, anecdotes and legends, as well as underwater photographs taken by regular British Columbia Magazine contributor Neil McDaniel.

I laughed when I first cracked the cover of Exploring Tumbler Ridge. Charles Helm, family practitioner and unofficial cheerleader for his Northern British Columbia community, had inserted a personal greeting for me written on a sheet from his medical prescription pad.

The book, written by Helm, is a fitting prescription for anyone itching to experience Tumbler Ridge. He provides a thorough overview of the area’s geological and human history, and explains how the community survived when the coal industry it depended on temporarily collapsed. He discusses the dinosaur fossil discoveries that have brought a level of fame to Tumbler Ridge in recent years, and other topics of local interest—the eagle migration and the impact of the mountain pine beetle, among others.

“The Tumbler Ridge area has yet to give up all of its secrets,” Helm writes, “and the purpose of this book is not to provide directions to every interesting feature.”

Yet the section I find most valuable provides an excellent, detailed overview of nearly 50 hiking trails in the area. It includes maps and difficulty ratings, as well as estimates for distance, time, and elevation.

I’ve already dog-eared a few pages. Who knows, a summer hiking trip to Tumbler Ridge might be—sorry, I can’t help myself—just what the docter ordered.

Exploring Tumbler Ridge can be purchased from www.exploringtumblerridge.com.

You will almost certainly never see a northern spotted owl in the wilds of southwestern British Columbia. Fewer than 20 of the birds remain, down from a historic high of 300 to 500 pairs. But that doesn’t mean you should stop caring about the species, which continues to sound the alarm for all manner of animals at risk.

Enter Jared Hobbs, Ministry of Environment biologist and professional photographer with his important and compelling new book, Spotted Owls: Shadows in an Old-Growth Forest, with text by noted Okanagan ecologist Richard Cannings (Greystone, $36.95, cloth, 136 pages).

In the summer of 2005, I accompanied Hobbs by helicopter and foot into the Stein Valley near Lillooet to see the owls for myself. The experience left me with mixed emotions:  saddened to witness the downward spiral of these precious birds, but feeling fortunate to have at least seen them before they vanish altogether, the victim mainly of logging of their old-growth habitat and, to a lesser extent, of competition from the more resilient barred owl.

Hobbs’ remarkable collection of photos takes me back to the forest, deep into the owls’ shadowy world, and shows why we are all richer for maintaining ecological diversity–and what we stand to lose if we do not take care of our natural world.

For more about Jared Hobbs and his new book, please visit his website (www.hobbsphotos.com).