British Columbia Magazine

Do beavers know which way a tree is going to fall?

Oliver Busby, an environmental consultant in Delta who deals with urban wildlife, says beavers typically fall trees “towards the water where they can further access them safely away from predators.” Trees on the shoreline also fall more predictably because they naturally lean towards open water; as beavers clean out the easy pickings and move inland the risks could increase.

 iStockphoto

“They have no idea what way a tree will fall, and some are killed by falling trees,” says Jack Lay, a veteran trapper based in Princeton and retired provincial problem-wildlife officer.

Partially caught cut trees abandoned by beavers also run the risk of falling down in the wind and posing a threat to anyone or anything in their path. One illustrative Internet youtube posting from the Large Herbivore Network shows a beaver repeatedly taking a few bites of a tree, and then hesitating, before scurrying away just before it falls. Clearly, logging is not something this animal takes for granted.

— Larry Pynn

Masters of disguise: A Q and A with Jude Isabella

Science writer Jude Isabella spent months researching wildlife camouflage for her article “Visual deception,” published in the Winter 2012 edition of British Columbia Magazine. Read on to learn about the animal that stopped her in her tracks.

Jude Isabella in the field.

Credit: Dee Cullon

Which animal impressed you the most?

“While the decorator crab is entrancing with its slavish devotion to Fashion Camouflage, edible camouflage no less, I would have to say the giant Pacific octopus.”

How does the animal camouflage itself?

“They instantly morph themselves, changing colours and textures to match their surroundings. Obviously a winning life strategy—octopuses have roamed the planet for 450 million years. And, aside from their presto-chango antics, they’re also brainy. All this makes octopuses otherworldly to me. As someone whose beach reading list is full of sci/fi and fantasy titles, I can see how watching an octopus would tickle a writer’s imagination. Changelings, for example, in Star Trek—inspired by octopuses? Maybe. Changelings are also naturally gelatinous when not taking on human or other forms.”

What do they hunt?

“Changeling or octopus? Ha! Octopuses usually dine on crabs, scallops, clams, shrimp, and fish. (Their saliva has a kind of venom that paralyzes their unlucky entrees.) They will scavenge too, given the opportunity.”

When do they hunt, typically?

“Typically at night. They hide in crevices and small caves during the day.”

What are their known predators?

“Sea lions, harbour seals, sea otters, and sperm whales prey on octopuses, which escape an attack by squirting ink at the threat and then using jet propulsion to distance itself from the danger of ending up as some other creature’s meal.”

Any other facts we should know about this master of deception?

“The giant Pacific octopus has pale blue blood. And the latest octopus housed at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C., named Pandora, is Canadian, hailing from British Columbia as did the zoo’s last beloved octopus, Octavius, who died in 2011, age four. (The octopus’s average life span is three to five years.)”

To help you take better wildlife photos, we turned to Paul Colangelo, who had the very difficult task of photographing elk for our current issue’s cover story, “Operation elk” (Fall 2012).  Here is Paul’s first wildlife photography tip:

Know your subject. “Research the behaviour and evolution of your subject. Knowing the what, where, when, why, and how of the species’ behaviour will help you anticipate the animal’s moves, and just as importantly, it will help you create a shot list,” advises Paul. “For example, knowing that mute swans perform a poetic courtship ritual, I aimed to show their behaviour in a manner that suggests romance in this image.”

Happy shooting… stay tuned for another wildlife photography tip from Paul, coming soon. Click here to enter our Photo Contest.

Kissing a frog won’t turn it into a prince but that’s no reason not to show amphibians a little love.

This coming Saturday, April 28, 2012, will be the fourth annual Save the Frogs Day, as declared by environmentalists and nature lovers. And while it may not be as widely observed as, say, Earth Day, Groundhog Day, or Administrative Assistant’s Day, organizers confirm it’s gaining traction. More than 150 Save the Frog Day events are planned in 25 countries. Vancouver mayor Gregor Robertson is among the leaders who have officially recognized the cause, having signed a proclamation in 2009.

According to Save the Frogs!, the California-based non-profit coordinating events, nearly one third of the world’s amphibians are threatened with extinction, due to such challenges as climate change, pollution, disease, habitat loss, invasive species, and overharvesting. “Frogs eat mosquitoes, provide us with medical advances, serve as food for birds, fish and monkeys, and their tadpoles filter our drinking water. There are lots of reasons to save them,” says founder Kerry Kriger in a release.

B.C. is home to eleven species of frogs. The Rocky Mountain tailed, northern leopard, and Oregon spotted frogs are classed as endangered; two others (Pacific tailed and northern red-legged) are of special concern.

What can you do to show Kermit you care? Aside from reducing your own environmental impact and supporting programs and organizations in place for protecting ecosystems, learn how to identify B.C.’s amphibians and report sightings to the B.C. Frogwatch Program. (While you’re at it, why not learn their language? Click here for recorded B.C. frog calls.)

And for more on the state of B.C.’s frogs, see “It’s not easy being green” in the Spring 2010 issue of British Columbia Magazine.

Wildlife Wednesday is a popular day on our Facebook fan page. We ask our Fans to tell us what wildlife they’ve seen in the province–and the answers always astound me. This week’s winner, chosen randomly, was Keri Brewster, who shared:

“The other day, I saw a family of otters playing right beside the seawall. There was a mom and two young ones, and they were eating crabs and chasing each other and wrestling with each other and just having so much fun! It was the cutest, neatest thing I’ve seen in years!”

Keep those wildlife sighting stories coming–and stay connected with us via our Facebook page for more giveaways.

My kayak and I tip the scales at about 70 kilograms.

A humpback whale? Well over 25 tonnes.

Yet it was far more exhilarating than frightening to have one suddenly pop up 10 metres away while I was kayaking the Broken Group, in Barkley Sound off Vancouver Island, earlier this month.

For half an hour, my group — Janie Tyerman, Sandy Ferguson, David Bonner, and Al Stockwell — and I enjoyed watching several humpbacks breach dramatically in the distance in the rough waters of Imperial Eagle Channel.

Then we decided to continue our paddle, closely rounding the east side of Dempster Island, where we saw another humpback approaching. We held our position for several seconds until small fish began to dance on the surface, then, watched in awe as the humpback broke the water surface, jaws wide open, in a dramatic display known as lunge feeding.

Another kayaker coming in the opposite direction, Laura Lavine, of Ladysmith, managed to snap this photo just as the whale was going back down.

“Out of the water the Humpy exploded 30 feet from our flotilla” she recalls. “Amazing and exhilarating!”

Our Winter 2010 cover story (on newsstands and in subscribers’ mailboxes any day now) features facts on the cougar — one of British Columbia’s most powerful predators. While cougar attacks of humans are rare in this province, those who venture into the wilderness should know what to do in case of an encounter. We provide a few critical words of advice. See “What to do if you meet a cougar” by Jenny Manzer.

As someone who has spent hours peering over the sides of ferries and wharfs, entranced by the rhythmic pulsing and delicate beauty of jellyfish, I wish to offer my condolences to the Vancouver Aquarium’s new cross jellies. It seems a pair of them have arrived with a most unfortunate problem — a parasitic anemone that “looks like a large, thick, white blob” hanging from their gonads.

I don’t mean to anthropomorphize, but . . . yikes.

The aquarium’s press release explains that, once ingested by a cross jelly, the parasitic anemone begins to chow down on its host’s stomach tissues. This continues for 11 days, before the “jelly-dwelling anemone” migrates to the jelly’s sex organs. “It will continue to feed on the jelly for roughly 31 days, until it acquires its adult characteristics.”

If you’d like to get a firsthand look at this gonad-feeding parasite, stop by the aquarium ASAP. They expect the anemones to stay attached to the host jellies for another few days before dropping to the floor (where, if left alone, they would live out the rest of their life cycle.)

No word on whether the cross jellies are expected to make a full recovery (or require counseling).

For more interesting jellyfish facts, see the “Secrets of Jellyfish” in our Winter 2006 issue.

Just try not to say awwww! This photograph of an adorable seal pup comes to us from reader Brenda Johima, a photographer and artist living in Vancouver Island’s Fanny Bay. She was exploring Tofino’s Long Beach recently when she happened upon the animal. Armed with a telephoto lens, Johima plopped down in the wet sand a good distance away, so as not to disturb the animal, and composed several shots.

“I LOVE wildlife, and as a photographer, it is always exciting to find something totally unexpected,” she says.

Have you had a close encounter with B.C. wildlife? Submit your experiences to www.shareyourbc.com for a chance to win a one-year subscription to British Columbia Magazine.

Every four years, salmon runs on the Horsefly River reach a cyclical peak. 2009 is the year we’ve been waiting for, and folks in the Cariboo community of Horsefly are marking the occasion with a festival on September 5 and 6.

While recent news about British Columbia’s declining salmon stocks has been bleak, Horsefly hopes to welcome home a million spawning sockeye this fall. Education is the focus of activities planned for the weekend, with information about water quality and aquatic invertebrates, as well as fish-dissection demonstrations.

Gutting fish not your idea of a good time? There will also be musical entertainment, a potluck, and a family square dance.

It takes the sockeye approximately 28 days to journey from the Pacific Ocean up the Fraser River, then along the Quesnel River to the mouth of the Horsefly River and its spawning grounds. Only 15 to 50 percent of the adult fish that set out on the 760-kilometre journey survive past the commercial fishing areas of the lower Fraser.

For more on the Horsefly River, see our Fall 2008 story “Protecting B.C. with TLC” (full article online here.)

For details on the Horsefly River Salmon Festival, visit www.horseflyriver.ca. There’s even an online video so you can see what it’s all about.