June 16 2022 - Sand Dunes in Ontario

 

Are there Sand Dunes in Ontario?  The best known is Sandbanks Provincial Park in Picton.  The park is considered one of the best sandy beaches in Ontario and contains the largest bay-mouth barrier dune formation in the world. The 1,550.87-hectare (3,832.3-acre) park was established in 1970 and operates year round. Birdwatching, camping, cycling, fishing, and swimming are among the activities available in the park.  This sand dune came about 12,500 years ago, formed by glaciers. They drifted inland with timber cutting and poor farming practices.  In 1881, the West Point Road was buried under 30 metres (98 ft) of sand and the town of Athol, Ontario was forced to relocate after facing a similar event. In the 1920s, Sandbanks was the site of an intense reforestation project. The sand dunes extended over a further 34 hectares (85 acres). To recreate the Carolinian forest that had pre-existed there, the reforestation project used poplar to prevent the sand dunes from burying roads and orchards. The park has capacity limits and the Wikipedia entry says that these are commonly reached by 10 am.  You have to book a day use reservation to get in at all.  That's a busy place.  In the Q and A here's a question that got my attention: Q The beach is really busy.  What else can I do at the park? A  Try another beach, take a hike, go for a paddle. Ha ha! The next choice of sand dunes might be Sandhill Park is on the north shore of Lake Erie at Port Burwell.  It is under 2 hours drive compared to the over 3 hours to get to Sandbanks.  Closer, but less scenic.  Accessible without the warnings of of reservations.  Definitely worth considering. Our pictures today show Florida's sandy beach patterns and the sand dunes in Colorado.

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Fenn 12 2022 - Rogue Waves on the Radar

 

Waves are definitely on the brain - Waves of COVID, waves to truck convoys, waves of democracy.  It is waves in nature that got my attention yesterday.    A rogue wave in B.C. was covered by the weather network news.  It is a record-breaking wave that was measured November 17 2020 and has since been determined to be the biggest rogue wave ever measured on the Canadian west coast.  It was 17.6 m tall  - that's a four story building. You can see the spike on the chart below.  This is a once in 1300 years occurrence.   The same article said that on the other side of Canada, waves produced during 2004's Hurricane Ivan rose to more than 28 metres tall and one in particular was 30 m. That's an 8 storey building.  Here's the chart of the BC rogue wave.   This famous painting - the Great Wave off Kanagawa by Hokusi is considered to be an example of a large rogue wave. I went looking for the biggest wave in recorded history - it is a tsunami wave. That is different than a rogue wave.  It was recorded July 9 1958 in Alaska and reached 1,720 feet high - the comparison given in the article is the Empire State Building which is 1,250 feet tall. The wave was caused by an earthquake - it is known as the Lituya Bay Tsunami.  "As the giant mountain of water started traveling across the entire length of the T-shaped Lituya Bay, it reached a peak height of 1,720 feet (524 meters) near the Gilbert Inlet and destroyed everything around.  Soil, plants, and trees were snapped off, and the shorelines were completely obliterated." While the Alaska wave was caused by a tsunami,  the 2020 BC wave was a rogue wave.  Rogue waves are considered sneaker waves.  They don't seem to have a single distinct cause, but occur where physical factors such as high winds and strong currents cause waves to merge and then create a single exceptionally large wave.   Here are my little waves on the Lake Ontario Shore.

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July 25 2021 - Sun Fish or Sculpins

 

The deepest water in Lake Superior is 1,332 feet.  Fish are found at the 600 foot level in  Lake Superior. The Siscowet Lake Trout lives in the deepwater region of the lake.  Two more live in the deeper waters. They are the Sculpin and the Kiyi.  The Sculpin is a type of  Lake Trout as well.  The Kiyi is a Lake Whitefish. Other lake trouts live at depths up to 300 feet. In contrast, Sunfish, are common to the Great Lakes in slow streams and rivers, as well as warm lakes and ponds.  Children are the fishers of Sunfish. There are a lot of varieties and in our area, they are Northern Sunfish.  I don't remember seeing Sunfish in Lake Ontario - I expect it is because they like to be near aquatic vegetation, and Lake Ontario shores are sandy.  In Georgian Bay lakes they were a common fish in the 1960s.  I expect they are still there. Perhaps Dan Cooper could check at his cottage and give us the latest Sun Fish update. Kids love fish, so we can expect a lot of cute fish jokes - the list I found had 85 jokes.  Here are a few: What did a shark eat with its peanut butter sandwich? A jellyfish. How do shellfish get to the hospital? In a clambulance. What did the shark say after eating a clownfish? That tasted a little bit funny! What do whales have for dinner? They eat fish and ships. What does every fisherman want? A gillfriend. How did the oyster manage to hide from the fish? Clamouflage! What did one fish say to the other? Keep your mouth shut and you won’t get caught. How do you talk to a fish? You drop it a line. Two parrots are sitting on a perch. One bird asks the other one “Does something smell a little fishy to you?”   My fish pictures seem to focus on Koi.  These are readily seen at botanic gardens.

May 25 2021 - how Dangerous is Niagara?

 

What an interesting question pops up in Google:  Is Niagara dangerous?  And the answer? Niagara Falls is in the 9th percentile for safety, meaning 91% of cities are safer and 9% of cities are more dangerous.  The rate of crime in Niagara Falls is 65.71 per 1,000 residents during a standard year.  People who live in Niagara Falls generally consider the southeast part of the city to be the safest. Is that New York or Ontario's Niagara's Falls?  It turns out to be Yew York:  Niagara Falls, N.Y. has a D- overall crime grade.  Violent crime grade F, Property crime grade A+ and Other Crime grade D-.  The overall crime rate is 83.33 - very high.  This number comes from numbeo.com - the world's largest cost of living database.   How about Niagara Falls, Ontario?  The retrieved answer is:  there is virtually no crime in this area.   The crime index says 36.95 and safety index 63.05.  Level of crime is rated as low, but crime increasing in the past 3 years is rated high.  These numbers come from numbeo.com too. The overall quality of life index says very high.  That is higher than Hamilton at high, and Toronto at very high.  And if you compare Niagara Falls, N.Y. with Buffalo, it has more crime there too.  The overall crime index for Bufalo is 44.36, and the safety index 55.65. It's level of crime is considered moderate. When we were children, it was our understanding that Niagara Falls, Canada with its tourist industry was considered a city with more organized crime than in St. Catharines or other nearby towns.  I don't know how we as children got this sense.  Maybe it was the newspapers reporting on criminals who vanished in the area.  That was the case with Peter Mitchell in 1959. Or other reports such as MacLeans article on organized crime's grip on Ontario.  Maybe someone can tell me how we got these ideas. Here's what is interesting.  Canada is generally so safe that I hadn't considered looking at these numbers, or asking the Google pop up question. Here's my most frequent view of Niagara - the greenhouses.

April 18 2021 - Beautiful Towns with Beautiful Beaches

The 25 most beautiful towns/villages in the world sort of articles have Spain, Greece, Italy, and various mountainous sea towns on display.  Their houses are perched on cliffs that descend to the ocean. Without doubt, Niagara-on-the-Lake is a pretty town too.  It is perched at the fork of the Niagara River and Lake Ontario, so there's much water scenery. And the houses are heritage and historic, like those seaside buildings on Mediterranean cliffs with matching red roofs. I realize that Ontario has lots of seaside and lakeside towns that overlook expanses of water. So which ones are at the top of the list? Perhaps it would be Wasago Beach - as it is the longest freshwater beach in the world.  It is 90 minutes north of Toronto so accessible to millions.  It has warm and shallow water - this sounds ideal.  Quieter and more natural areas are considered perfect for settling down in the sun with a good book.  Really? Why would you put your head down in a book rather than looking out to the vast blue waves? I suggest moving on to the part where you bring your dog with you and head to section 3 where they can "frolic in the waves".  Wasaga Beach's beautiful beach means beautiful sand, and that's what made it remain undeveloped.  The land was too poor for farming in the 1800s. But the Lake's beautiful sand also means lots of maintenance as Lake Ontario water levels that have been rising.  And sand shifts in  the big November storms each year causing damage.  But still all that sand and water is a delight to the human eye. As we consider this summer, we might not get to Wasago with COVID, but we can know it is close-by for future visits. I couldn't resist showing you aerial images of the vast curve of beach along with the splendid river beside it.   Here's a happy collage of lilies. Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwellart.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

 

Mar 7 2021 - Lake on a Mountain

 

I don't think of us having any mountains nearby.  Prince Edward County is on the other side of the Lake and on the Bay of Quinte, close to Belleville is a lake that is 200 feet (60 metres) above the water of the Bay of Quinte.  That's high enough for me to justify the name Lake on the Mountain.  Think of Niagara Falls - it is 167 feet tall.  Of course, it isn't the height of Niagara, but the expanse of it and the speed of the water as it hurls along at whiplash speed.  That's what makes it so spectacular an experience. Lake on the Mountain, being on the other side of Lake Ontario at Glenora, has Northern Ontario terrain and northern forests.  The lake is deep - it is 37 metres deep and just over one square kilometre in size.  Stories of how the lake was created include volcanoes, meteorites, and glacial whirlpools.  The most accepted theory is a collapsed doline - a limestone rock feature in areas with limestone foundations. Another way of thinking of it is that it is a type of sinkhole. So we have our own mysterious lake on a mountain very close by.  Here's a youtube video showing where it is located HERE. The ground view youtube video is HERE.  It is most amusing as the comments from Tavel Canada indicate a boring drive along the 401 to get to the destination.  That does describe the 401 east of Toronto for me.   This is a Niagara lakeside picture the southern side of Lake Ontario and below it, near Kingston on the north side. Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwellart.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

Earthquake in Ontario

Earthquake in Ajax, Ontario May 9th.  At 2.4, it only made a few lines of news, but has the ability to get one's action.  That's because the most famous earthquakes are covered widely in the news and the images and stories tell of hundreds of thousands of people dead and total destruction of landscapes.  Time Magazine calls them unforgiving.  I would guess that we remember the after-Christmas Tsunami of 2004, particularly the pictures that hit the paper immediately and then were withdrawn. California had an earthquake in Banning California on May 8th, at 4.5 magnitude.  This carried a red banner. They've had 5 temblors in 18 hours.  This is one of many - California's earthquakes are tracked on earthquaketrack.com.  Here's California's summary:  38 earthquakes in the past 24 hours 169 earthquakes in the past 7 days 639 earthquakes int he past 30 days 7,968 earthquakes in the past 365 days Ouch!  That's a lot to deal with. That would make the score California 7,968, Ontario 1. The referenced source for dealing with earthquakes is Robert S. Yeats' Living with Earthquakes in California, published in 2001.  It is subtitled A Survivor's Guide.  It covers what citizens can do to protect their families and homes.  Other earthquake-preparation checklists are available - here's one in a Los Angeles Times article HERE.  The expert, Trent Sanders, has a storage bin in the back yard.  He says to be prepared that the house and garage will be damaged or on fire.  We live a safe and calm existence here in Ontario. Yesterday's excitement was visiting Freeman Herbs and Gaeta Bougainvilleas to pick up donations for the plant sale on Saturday.  I got to see thousands of bougainvilleas in the greenhouses.  One has to appreciate the sight of the blossoms strewn on the ground.  They are moving out to the garden centres this and next week.  I recognized many of the place names.  Some lovely bougainvillea trees were going to Plant World.  That was my local and fabulous garden centre in Toronto.

Support Ontario Strawberries

Wake Up on the Bright Side View this email in your browser I found these giant strawberries at Hildreth's yesterday, with the backdrop of Thanks for supporting Ontario farmers.  It seemed like a fitting tribute for Niagara's autumn Thanksgiving.

Seiches and Surges

The Lake at Grimsby Beach is the subject of our pictures today.  This is the point where Forty Creek empties, and there is a walking path that follows the creek and joins up with the Bruce Trail.  There are usually bird here in the inlet, even though there are some sizeable waves that come in.  Lake Ontario's largest waves have been higher than 20 feet, usually in spring and fall. Twenty-five feet is considered the upper limit. The Wikipedia entry tells me this information about waves: Lake Ontario has a natural seiche rhythm of eleven minutes. The seiche effect normally is only about 3⁄4 inches (2 cm) but can be greatly amplified by earth movement, winds, and atmospheric pressure changes. (A seiche (/ˈseɪʃ/ saysh) is a standing wave in an enclosed or partially enclosed body of water. Seiches and seiche-related phenomena have been observed on lakes,reservoirs, swimming pools, bays, harbours and seas. The key requirement for formation of a seiche is that the body of water is at least partially bounded, allowing the formation of the standing wave.) A storm can produce both surges and seiches - I found this explanation here "Storm surges may cause seiches. The word seiche is French for “to sway back and forth.” After a storm moves past the lake, and the wind and pressure are no longer pushing the water, the piled up water moves toward the opposite end of the lake. The water sloshes from one end of the lake to the other a few times until the water level is returned to normal. This sloshing back and forth is called a seiche. Often a seiche can be spotted because the water level will be high along the shore and within a relatively short period of time, the water level will then drop, sometimes leaving bottomlands exposed. Seiches may “slosh” back and forth like this several times before reaching equilibrium."

Four Geese and a Dog

Dezi made a brisk exit last week as we checked out the view across the lake.  The geese seemed to march up the hill in formation.

Trout Lily in Spring

Hi everyone,

This is one of the early spring bloomers - Trout Lily.  It is Erythronium americanum.  It's also known as Dogtooth Violet and Yellow Adder's Tongue.  It is in the Liliaceae family.  I didn't realize that it is an edible plant.  At the same time, it seems to be an emetic (makes you throw up), so it is not recommended that one eat a lot of it.  I guess I wouldn't add this one to the menu with guests coming.

Garden Benches

Hi everyone,
I seem to be drawn to garden benches.  They are meant for us humans, so make the garden a human place.  They are invitational to sit and enjoy, and they provide a resting place for the eye in the landscape too.

Everywhere I go, I just seem to find them.  Of course, going to a lot of gardens does mean I find a lot of them.  If you know of any beautiful benches, it would so wonderful to hear from you.

My favourites so far this there have been the Royal Botanical Gardens benches in the Mediterranean Greenhouse with that beautiful variegated Bouganvillea framing it and in the Rock Garden with the tulips framing the bench with their vivid colour display.  These pictures are from April 2013.

This last bench is in the Harry P. Lieu Garden in Orlando Florida in February.  It is particularly pretty with the Camellias framing it, and the light patterns.

All my best,
Marilyn

Cedar Creek Farm

Every week at the St. Lawrence Market Bob Taylor and his family sell flowers.  As the blooming season progresses, there are such lovely blossoms as daffodils, tulips, peonies, delphiniums, dahlias and chrysanthemums.  I was able to get to Cedar Creek Farm this week to see the massive field of delphiniums and to be able to capture some images so that you can have experience of this great beauty.