Tag: @kellypovo

North to Churchill, Day Six

Author: Phyllis Root
Photographer: Kelly Povo

July 6, 2018

We have left dark behind. All night, light leaked around the edges of the room-darkening shade. Last night other students saw a bull moose from their window, but we were already asleep.

As we drive down the road on our morning outing–four students, an instructor, a programming assistant, a visiting artist, and a learning technician who is also our essential bear guard–we see geese with goslings and a ptarmigan. Out in the bay a barge heads toward town; since the tundra train was decommissioned the only two ways supplies reach Churchill are by sea or by air. The barge might be carrying badly needed propane or even a pre-built house (cheaper than buying all the pieces needed to build a house here).  Even though Churchill sits on land, without the train the town and Centre are essentially an island, dependent on what arrives by plane or by barge–and only three barges are scheduled for this year.

Some of the flowers we see through the morning, such as northern hedysarum, test our memories from yesterday, and some are brand-new sightings for us here in the sub-arctic, including alpine arnica, Greenland primrose, grass-of-Parnassus, stemless raspberry,  red-flowered saxifrage, and yellow marsh saxifrage.

After lunch at the Centre, we head out again for the boreal forest and Twin Lakes. Along the bumpy road we wade through boggy water to see buck-bean, and in the deep moss on the other side of the road we find Lapland lousewort, more round-leaved orchids than we’ve ever seen, and two green-flowered bog orchids less than three inches tall. Tucked into the gravel under roadside bushes several blunt-leaf orchids grow.

The road rattles us along to the lakes, where our instructor points out sandwort, the tiny pink flowers of alpine azalea, and the bigger pink blooms of bog laurel along with purple paintbrush and the white blossoms of cloudberry.

The day has been hotter than we expected for Churchill (who knew it would reach 81 degrees Fahrenheit—we packed for cold and rain). We end the day at Twin Lakes by pulling off boots and socks, rolling up pants legs, and wading in the water. On our way back to the Centre we stop to watch three sandhill cranes stalking through the hummocks. A three-orchid day rich in so many flowers we can hardly imagine more, but tomorrow holds the possibility of northern lady’s-slipper and who knows what else?

After dinner we learn more about herbarium preservation and how to use the five-question method of keys to identify flowers, then watch a film by a visiting artist about transporting beluga whales, narrated in French and Russian with English subtitles.  We are here to learn, but the Centre is so much more than educational classes, with people doing all sorts of research in the sub-arctic and artists whose work combines art and environmental education.  Already we are planning how to return to this amazing place.

The immense sky at 8:30 p.m. is still as light as afternoon, but we tumble into our bunks tired, happy, and ready for what tomorrow brings.

p.s.  I have managed to write to write a post without the word tiny in it, but we are constantly amazed by the smallness of so much of what we see.  Everything that lives in this incredibly beautiful but harsh place not only survives but thrives, including the people who live and work here. #sustainthenorth   #wildflowerwomen

 

North to Churchill, Day Five

Author: Phyllis Root
Photographer: Kelly Povo

July 5
5 a.m. We wake up at our hotel in Winnipeg.
6 a.m. We arrive at the airport, ready for our 7:30 departure to Churchill on Calm Air.
9 a.m. We arrive in Churchill after a calm flight on Calm Air (which has lived up to its name) excited for our class on sub-arctic wildflowers at the Churchill Northern Studies Centre.
1 p.m. As soon as lunch is over, we head out for some places alongside the road to look for wildflowers, along with our instructor, one of the learning vacation staff, and our bear guard (who knew there was  such a job, but we’re glad there is, since polar bears are seen in the Churchill area at any time of year).  While we look down for wildflowers, our bear guard looks out and around for any sign of bears.  And we do look down—many of these flowers, even the familiar ones, are amazingly tiny, including teeny bog rosemary and the tiniest round-leaved orchid we have ever seen.  We learn new flowers: velvet bells, purple rattle, flame-colored lousewort, Lapland lousewort, alpine milk-vetch, northern Hedysarum, long-stalked stitchwort, alpine bistort, bog asphodel, blunt-leaf orchid, and white mountain-avens. Along the tracks of the decommissioned tundra train we see huge swaths of artic wintergreen blooming (we know it as large-flowered pyrola). I take notes as fast as I can. Kelly snaps picture after picture.We end the afternoon tired but deliriously happy, filled up with flowers and having met our daily quota of at least one orchid, no matter how small.  Orchids or not, this has been a spectacular wildflower day.Out the window of our room the view stretches across pines, lakes, and boggy places to where the waters of Hudson’s Bay begin.  We are in territory I have dreamed about.And this is only the first day in Churchill.

 

North to Churchill, Day Four

Author: Phyllis Root
Photographer: Kelly Povo

July 4, 2018
When we first decided to drive to Winnipeg to catch the plane (Calm Air, a name we hope is accurate) to Churchill, we thought it would be a great opportunity to spend time in the tallgrass aspen parkland, one of Minnesota’s four biomes, which only covers about 5% of the state. Hayes Lake State Park, where we hiked yesterday, edges on the tallgrass aspen parkland, but now we are in the heart of it, where trees and prairie fight it out.

On the drive to Lake Bronson State Park we pass many showy lady’s-slippers in the roadside ditches, two sandhill cranes (for which tallgrass aspen parkland is prime nesting habitat), and a sign that says “Old Mill State Park 11 miles.” On a whim we take the turn.  Old Mill State Park showcases the history of area pioneers complete with an old mill and settler’s cabin, but it also has a wonderful path that winds along the edge between prairie, aspens, oak trees, and pines.  In the prairie grasses we spot prairie sage, milkweed, wood lilies, harebells, yarrow, daisy fleabane, small blue lobelia, purple prairie clover, and bergamot, all in bloom. Under the shade of the trees we’re surrounded by the susurration of wind in aspen leaves. Out in the prairie once again, we see purple leadplant blooming not far from a line of aspen.

At Lake Bronson State Park we head for a prairie where wind ripples the grass and we see purple prairie clover, prairie rose, bergamot, the bright orange of wood lilies, leadplant, rough blazing star budding, milkweed, and puccoon, along with a startled coyote who disappears into the trees at the edge of the grasses.  Farther down the road we hike a mile and a half into a Scientific and Natural Area (SNA).  Along the way we pass white prairie clover, black-eyed Susan, harebells, Canada anemone, Canada milkvetch, camas just budding out, milkweed, wood lilies, purple prairie clover, and yellow paintbrush.

At last we come to the SNA where we decide that if tallgrass aspen parkland is a battle between prairie and trees, then here the trees are clearly winning out, with aspen and willow saplings filling in the grassy open spaces.  We do see blue eyed grass, yellow star grass, marsh skullcap, swamp milkweed, goldenrod, and, behind the barbed wire of a nearby field, one western prairie fringed orchid shining in the sunlight.

So far on our trip we’ve been seeing at least an orchid a day, and today that one bright bloom, along with the showy lady’s-slippers, makes our quota.  We drive on north to Winnipeg for our 7:30 a.m. flight to the place we’ve been heading toward all along.

Tomorrow, Churchill.