iBiome

today late afternoon on English Bay

A great blue heron at Jericho pond

Last Sunday I managed to get close enough, courtesy of my megazoom, to a Great Blue Heron hunting in the duck pond at Jericho Beach.  Beautiful creatures.  

Success!  

Our Herons are a non-migratory sub-species, and you can see them nesting in Stanley Park.  More here.

perchance to dream

best Hamlet yet.  Yesterday's natinee performance of Hamlet at Bard on the Beach was the best of the three versions I've seen, due mainly to Jonathon Young's interpretation of the title role.  From the Strait:  

It’s Young’s work in the central role that ignites the evening: in his mouth, every word of the familiar text is new. “Hold, hold my heart,” Young’s Hamlet gasps when he sees his father’s ghost, and you can feel your own heart constricting in your chest. “I have sworn it,” Hamlet says after pledging revenge, and you just know he’s surprised himself and he’s shit-scared that he may have made a pact with the devil. Young’s Hamlet is witty and painfully raw, notably when he dresses down Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, supposed friends who are spying on him for Claudius.

via www.straight.com

Indeed Young's addition of just enough wit to the weight of the role outdid previous Hamlets who have kept the anger and depression too visible and on the boil.  Rachel Cairns' Ophelia was excellent as well, striking the right balance of fragility and strength.  Great also to be reminded of the many many quotes from Hamlet that have entrenched themselves in modern culture (e,g, “Brevity is the soul of wit.”). I suppose i should also mention the 'modern' interpretation - guns, cell phones, ipads, etc.  I expected to be annoyed and distracted and it to feel gimicky, but it worked.

2 thumbs up.

Rising sea levels putting landmarks at risk

Vancouver is at risk of losing landmark communities like Granville Island and False Creek unless the city starts taking measures to defend its shoreline against rising sea levels, an urban planner warns.

Andrew Yan, a planner and researcher with Bing Thom Architects, estimates the city will have to spend upwards of $510 million to build and upgrade the dikes and seawalls - plus billions more to buy the land to put them on - over the next century.

"What's under threat in Vancouver is a lot of our identity; our beaches, our seawall ... this is what makes Vancouver such a livable place," Yan said. "We just need to look at Granville Island and its exposure to sea level rise and what may be required to defend it."

Vancouver isn't the only city under threat.

Richmond's Steveston, which has experienced huge residential growth along its waterfront in recent years, will face significant pressures in the future, Yan said, while south Surrey's Crescent Beach is already being threatened by a more insidious force: increasing groundwater from rising ocean tides.

"It affects every municipality that touches the water," Yan said. "Sea level rise isn't going to separate itself from the boundaries of Vancouver, Burnaby, Richmond or Surrey. We'd better be serious about this. It's important to plan now as opposed to 50 or 70 years from now."

........

The report illustrated a number of sea level rise scenarios, from one to six metres, which could affect between three and 13 per cent of the city's land mass. For instance, sea level rise at the three-metre interval, combined with a severe storm in 2100, would affect most of the city's shoreline, including the harbour, the southern edge of the city and Granville Island.

And it gets worse: At the four-metre interval, False Creek would revert to its 19th-century boundaries, while Gastown, Chinatown and the harbour would be heavily affected. And at five-and six-metre intervals, the report warns, downtown Vancouver would become an archipelago and the city's coast-line would be "unrecognizable" compared to today's.

via www.vancouversun.com

an owl in a tree

a rough image in low light, this evening we had the happy fortune of meeting a barred owl on the grounds of my kids' school, girding herself for an evening hunt.

in like a lamb

Vancouver favoured us with a with a sun showered start to autumn, hiking her skirt a bit to show us what we were missing in June and most of July.  This view is this morning looking north across southeast false creek.

still got nothing

not much and too much going on

i've been absent blogwise for a bit, distracted by family friends and work, damn their eyes.  been finishing some worthwhile books.... i'll try to float some new thoughts with the next tide. 

heh

parked in front of me this morning

Deering Island

Biking a week ago, we followed the edge of the Fraser and discovered an interesting sliver of the city.  A little high-end enclave (to the right in photo) of manicured gardens and backyard jetties.