The House & other Arctic musings

Bad photographer. Bad!

A few days ago the sun once again showed itself briefly late in the day, about 11pm or so. As I had seen what I thought was a Red-throated Loon on a nest on an island I decided to head out that way and try my luck. Sure enough, the loon was in the same spot, so I walked down towards her, meandering my way there, trying to appear as nonchalant as possible.  The loon, from when I was still quite far off, laid her head along the ground, trying to disappear from view.  The effect actually works quite well, had I not known exactly where she was I would have found it hard to distinguish her from a rock.

She stayed in this position and I made my way as close as I thought I could get and not disturb her too much, or flush her from the nest. Close was a neighbouring island in the river and I laid down prone, and tried to disappear myself and wait for her to relax and raise her head. Now when I say "island" I mean a mound of sopping wet sphagnum moss, slightly above the level of the river. I laid there for an hour, and this next photo shows as high as she lifted her head during that time.

I could wait no longer, as I had promised to pick up Leah at midnight from Victor Bay, and I stood, snapping this picture from a little higher angle. I then shifted over a little bit to try and get a photo with her head a little less obscured by grass.

That shifting proved too much and she flushed from the nest. It was not what I had wanted to do, but I fired off a couple of frames when she moved. The results, while a less than stellar photo of a loon, is one of the most interesting water pictures I've ever taken.

As I walked the half kilometre or so back to the truck, I kept turning back but she had not returned to the nest yet, so I didn't linger when this female Lapland Longspur posed for me. I returned to the truck and hightailed out of there, knowing that I had gotten too close, and wasn't being an ethical photographer. But life is filled with mistakes, and the idea is to learn from them. As I drove away she was returning to her eggs.

Flower season

... is upon us. It's timing is a little off kilter this year. I would have expected to see more flowers blooming by now, yet at the same time some seem to be finishing already, a little early.

I've grown a little frustrated by my switch over to RAW from JPG, as it has added a lot of time for me to get photos from camera to blog. I'm quite happy with the results but my Model-T desktop isn't keeping up with the demands. I suspect I ask it to do too much at the same time. But enough whining, on to some flower pictures, and that is mostly what you'll get, very little narrative. All of these flowers shots were taken at First Bridge.

Arctic Dryad - one of my favourite flowers for its subtle beauty.

Another Arctic Dryad photo, this one shows how many of these flowers are already fading.

Arctic Poppy.

Arctic Poppy are predominately yellow. On rare occasions there are white ones. First Bridge has always been a reliable place for me to find the white Arctic Poppy (same species - just a colour variant). This is one of several that we found.

This gorgeous little flower is unknown to me, I've never seen before and so far have been unable to figure what it is. With the four petals I'm wondering if it belongs in the mustard family. It was found on gravel of the shoulder of the road. The other sprays of purple flowers we found were the waning Purple Saxifrage, Moss Campion not yet peaking, and the very beginning of River Beauty (Dwarf Fireweed). If anyone knows what this is though I'd appreciate knowing.

More Arctic Dryad, two takes on the same flowers.

And just in case you haven't had your RDA of cute yet today... Puppies!

Bonus points to whoever can find Leah and Hilary in one of these photos.

Dramatic sky

Drop The Pop

I may have mentioned this before, but pop (or as some of my friends in the States refer to it: Soda) is like crack cocaine up here. Seriously. The stores in Arctic Bay ran out of the pop that came up on Sealift in May, which basically means the community is out of pop for 1/3 of the year. For a while they were flying it in, but that seems to have stopped.

Now, I have never run a retail store and I don't have the sharpest business mind around (in fact the arguement can be easily made that when it comes to business my mind is pretty dull, but I digress) but it seems to me that there wouldn't be a great mystery when it comes to ordering pop for the year. How much pop did you sell last year? When did you run out? At that rate how much would you sell from sealift to sealift? Order more than that.

Pop is expensive here, and I'm pretty sure that both stores turn a profit from the sale of it, and thus wouldn't be turning that profit when those shelves and coolers sit empty. Normally it sells for $2.00 a can, and when they fly it in - $5.00 per. And people willingly pay that. With barely a grumble.

A short time ago, Leah decided that she had more than enough pop from our sealift to last, and decided to sell  the excess. She was making a nice little profit on it and kept selling stuff she wasn't planning on it because people were clambering for more. It started feeling like a crack house here, there were desperate calls in the dead of night "You guys got any pop for sale?", my facebook chat would light up from time to time "Still selling?" that sort of stuff. I'd just refer them to Leah, the advantage of the few cans of Spruce Beer I have is I'm pretty much the only person in town with tastes that warped, and no one is clambering for my pop.

Just how desperate did it get? Or rather just how desperate is it? After Leah decided not to sell any more, people were offering her $10 a can. Yes, ten dollars for a 355 ml (12 oz) can of pop.  And I'm sure she could name a higher price if she so desired. I'm in the wrong business. 

Nesting Redpoll

It must be the day for me to post other people's photos. Indigo Sweetwater, that passionate patron of northern blogs, has taken a couple of great photos of a nesting Common Redpoll (Carduelis flammea), at let me know after I bemoaned the fact that my son has seen one up here, but I've yet to. Check out this little beauty.

And you know, I don't know how much more "northern" this could get, but not only is the redpoll an Arctic nesting bird, but this one has built her nest in a caribou skull/antler sitting on a building rail.

Thanks Indigo.

A father's kiss

I love that my children are still young enough that a kiss from their father along with a gentle "That's okay, you'll be alright. Dad's here." will cure most ills and pain. I dread when that will no longer be the case.

Yesterday at the games, Hilary was playing in amongst the guy lines of a tent when the inevitable happened, and she tripped over one. My friend, Niore Iqalukjuak, is a gifted photographer and he was there taking candids. He got this sequence of photos that he graciously shared with me.

Playing

The fall.

Dad making it better.

Smiling again.

As a bonus, after reading the last post he also shared this photo of an Ugly Fish, which I believe is the Shorthorn Sculpin (Myoxocephalus scorpius) which apparently have antifreeze proteins in their bodies.

Ugly Fish

It is amazing the change wrought by a little blue sky. Well actually a whole lot of blue sky. The cold, rainy, windy, overcast skies of the last few days have been cast aside, and the change is incredible.

There were games down at Victor Bay this evening, and I dropped Leah off there (Travis was already there and Hilary was, as is usual, hanging with her dad) after work. I know this is going to sound nuts, but the traffic on the road to Victor Bay was annoyingly  heavy. Every truck and ATV in town seemed to be on the road, and it took me over 15 minutes to travel the four kilometres back to town. Not the 401 I realize but still...

After I fed the client I gathered up supper and brought it with us to Victor Bay and we ate in the tent after the games were finished. By the time supper was finished there wasn't a breath of wind, and the day felt so perfect it made you wonder why the rest of the world doesn't live here (and thankful that they don't). Travis wanted to go down to the ice to fish for "ugly fish", which is the local (English) term for the Sculpins that live here. So he, his cousin, Leah's brother, and I walked down and began fishing through the tidal cracks.

Now I know beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and I suppose the reverse is true also. Ugly must also be in the eye of the beholder, for I find these fish marvelously handsome. They are spiny, with large heads relative to their bodies, cryptically coloured on top but with white spots bordered by bright orange underneath. I know why people think they are ugly, I just think they are fascinating looking.

The water beneath the cracks was shallow enough and clear enough that you could watch the fish approach and soon everyone had caught at least one, which I promptly returned to the ocean. Before long, Leah, two of her sisters and Hilary joined us, and even Hilary got into the act, catching her very first fish. At that we walked back to the tent, startled to learn that it was 11 o'clock already, I glanced up at that beautiful sky that stretched clear to forever, and hoped that the weather would hold. Days like this make the briefest of summers worth while, and I was reluctant to return home.

The icing on a perfect evening was waiting in the tent when we arrived. As we headed down to the ice, Leahs' parents had headed in the other direction going on an ATV ride. A short time later they discovered the lost rocket, not too far from where it had been launched. It was in surprising good shape for something made out of cardboard, but I think most of the cardboard tubes will have to be discarded, and the rest salvaged for another rocket. Still it was nice to know that it would fly again.

Playin' around

The fog is doing some dramatic things these wet, grey days. Unfortunately the light hasn't, for the most part, been conducive to translating that drama into photos. This evening, though, was a little better. I'm in the process of trying to get a better handle on using RAW as a format, and here is some post processing playing around from one of the shots.

This first one is in HDR and the least favourite of the three for me.

Here is the scene in greyscale.

And this is the traditional view, with the colour saturation tweaked a little.

I've actually discovered lately, though, that what I'm seeing on the monitor where I work on the photos isn't what is coming through on other computers. My monitor is an old 21 inch CRT that I bought used over 10 years ago, and even with the brightness turned right up appears darker than anything else we own. I think I need to either break down and get a new monitor, or start working on the photos on another computer.

The GSI Javagrind revisited.

In May I reviewed the GSI Javagrind and was quite enthusiastic about it. Unfortunately it only took one more use of it to change my mind.

The other night I took the Javagrind and (reluctantly) GSI's french press over to Leah's parent's tent at Victor Bay, determined to have a good cup of coffee while over there. When it came time to brew the coffee I took the Javagrind and began grinding my Yergacheffe coffee beans. After about four turns of the crank, the Javagrind stopped working.

The central part of the burr mill is what turns, grinding the beans against the outer, fixed part of the mill. This turning piece is attached to the crank by means of a bolt, the hexagonal head of which sits in a recess of the mill, allowing it to turn. In only its second use the head of the bolt stripped out of its recessed fitting, causing the shaft to spin helplessly inside the mill.

Again this was only my Javagrind's second use, and it certainly hasn't seen any rough handling. I was able to finish grinding the beans by shimming the bolt in the recess with a thin strip of cardboard, but it appears that the material used for the mill can not stand up to the minimal torques of the grinding process.

Disappointing, as I was quite pleased to find a hand cranked coffee mill for out on the land. The press perfomed marginally better this outing, but still had a sloppy seal on the plunger and is not worth purchasing.

Take me out to the Bird Game #103

The boys of summer are at it again. Who knew they were bird watchers.  The latest edition of I and the Bird (#103) is up at the Bird Freak.  As always, you'll find a fine selection of wild bird related posts from about the world. Visit, for you're bound to find one that hits it out of the park.