someone found a little cone

only a few of all those immature cones, are trying to become a cone

immature spruce cones

Around this time of year i always pick sprucetips.( light green with golden cap)

I noticed the sprucetips had seem to come in different colors this year.

 A closer look revealed the spruce trees are full of immature spruce cones.

What is that all about?

A few years back there was a bumber crop of cones in the top of the trees.

Last year we first noticed how squirrels nip of the tips of spruce tips eat the heart and discard the rest, we have seen that again this year

i shook the branches to make a cloud of yellow pollen.

they are quite tasty!

butterflies

i did start a new blog, i know, again
and probably will post all insects there...
http://ytbutterflies.blogspot.ca/

bumblebees and coltsfoot flowers

Petasites sagittatus 

and

Tussilago farfara

tussilago - cough

farfara - coltsfoot

petasites - broad rimmed hat

sagittatus - like an arrow head

Both are coltsfoot, I spotted the yellow one, that doesn't grow here, in the botanical garden in Toronto on May 2 2014. 

And for the bees, they are both bumblebees, but the one with the orange bum, smaller and more slender, and the wings larger in proportion.

And the snail... i leave that up to you

The Great Sandhills, Sasketchewan

April 25, 2014

mother moose

and lo and behold more moose

on the Alaska Highway close to Cracker creek.

Pronghorns

An adventure:
http://www.greatsouthwest.ca/great-sandhills/

Sabina and i found the  Great Sandhills by the way of the pronghorns, we did see life deer on this day. And on my trip as a whole i have seen 7 moose! 4 of them on the prairie.

from wikipedia:The pronghorn (Antilocapra americana) is a species of artiodactyl mammal indigenous to interior western and central North America. Though not an antelope, it is often known colloquially in North America as the prong buck, pronghorn antelope, cabri (native American) or simply antelope

an explosion of green

this was 2 days ago, moose skull lake thawing.

this was yesterday, the leaves turning green en mass.

I have been away for 3 weeks and came home Wednesday, to summer land, Yukon! Where did i go for a holiday?  to Southern Canada, where it was still very much winter most of the time. 

I hitched a ride with Alexander back in April, driving down South. Only 10 km away from Taber (AB) we saw a shimmer of green. I never knew Canada was such a cold country ( you probably always knew that).  I did know that Canada is a beautiful country, even in the drabness of snow gone and spring not there yet.

Hopefully i will soon make an album here of all the wonders i've  seen.

And maybe a story of the pure joy of travelling with the greyhound.