Triteleia - What's in the Name?

Of Plants, Magical Spears and Frogs.

It was the end of May, when I stumbled upon what looks like a long abandoned Sinixt summer camp.What made me to park the car and go exploring the rocky outcrop above Kootenay River were bunches of dark-blue blossoms, happily nodding from a steep bluff. I climbed up, photographed them, post-processed the pictures in Photoshop (I always shoot in the RAW format) and began to look for their common and scientific names.
Little did I know!
The pretty blue flowers made me change into a detective, historian and a theologian at the same time. By the time I finished the identification I learned about a whole range of unrelated topics.

I had no leads so I started to snoop in my Illustrated Guide to 2000 Plants and Animals. It had been published by Reader's Digest about a kadzillion years ago - in 1985 - and it is called North American Wildlife. As I just discovered it is still available, updated. A great resource indeed. They have done an amazing job and I use this book as a first line when narrowing down my findings. I am extremely visual and it is the fastest way for me to match my photo with an illustration.
A name that jumped out from the book was kind of strange: Ithuriel's Spear - Brodiaea laxa. A strange name considering that the whole plant looks more like a bazooka than a spear. Let the modern research begin!

My Internet connection fired, I typed in the common name. Well, the first thing I found was that there was (is, I suppose) an angel called Ithuriel. I grew up in a different time and regime, so there was no Sunday school for me. Ithuriel posses a magic spear that can detect deceit. Wouldn't that be a handy thing to have! Perhaps there would be no economic crisis at the beginning of the third millenium. Where is the angel when we need him? Her? It could be flying around Wall Stret and around the rest of the world, touching people here and there, singing "Show me your true colours, tadada daa da." 
Sorry, could not resist ....

Ithuriel became famous for exposing Satan who happened to be sneaking about in Paradise. The story goes somewhat like this: One day, Satan, the Fallen Angel, got some kinky ideas and wanted to sell them to Eve. He  squatted down by her pink ear disguised as a toad. Pretty hard to do if you are a toad but maybe Eve was lying in the grass or something. He was just about to start whispering when Ithuriel noticed that things were not completely right. Maybe the toads were supposed to be in another part of Paradise or it was a wrong season, we don't know. Ithuriel knew. He dashed over and smacked the toad with the magic spear. No more marketing! Poof! The toad turned into his proper form - Satan - shrieked and flew away. Phew!

If you doubt this story, have a look at John Milton's Paradise Lost. It is a lengthy epic poem (just in case that you are like me and forgetting your high school education). It was written in 17th century and it might really, really talk to you. I am quite serious. Or, it might not.

Why they chose a toad to be a bad creature is beyond me – they are very helpful  (maybe that’s why). 

They are also endangered and disappearing because of us.

Western Toad - Bufo boreas

OK, Ithuriel has been solved. As for the spear and the plant, things did not add up. The bunch of blue blossoms looked like anything but a spear!
What were they smoking before wondering into the woods, I thought. So I took another avenue and typed in the the Latin name. Brodiaea. Whatever that means.
Bingo!

Bingo? Not really. Someone has re-named the plant to Triteleia. Why?
Bingo anyway.

Detective me, I was getting close .... really close!

Well, was it Brodiea duglasii or Brodiea laxa? Is it Triteleia laxa or Triteleia grandiflora?  Where did they come from with all these names?
No matter what the name was - all of them, save the White Hyacinth, gave matching descriptions to the plant I found in the woods.

Finally, I summarized as follows:
A perennial that grows from small scaly corms on a single stem that is up to about a half meter tall, and whose bell-shaped flowers are presenting many shades of catchy blue (from dark to light), and whose leaves are like long thin daggers growing straight from the base and not attached to the flower stem and that, as far as I know, has been called all of the below: 

White Hyacinth, 

Ithuriel’s Spear, 

Gophernuts (hmm), 

Brodiaea, 

Douglas' Brodiaea  

scientifically previously Brodiaea douglasii or Broadiea laxa  

and presently Triteleia grandiflora or Triteleia laxa.

and probably many more

Come on guys, make up your minds! 

Further research uncovered that these plants bloom mostly in shades of blue BUT some can be white therefore White Hyacinth, the description that could not be further away from the appearance of what I found.

The plant stem comes out from a corm - and underground part, that is about 2 cm wide - would that warrant Gophernuts or is it the fact that the corms can be eaten (raw or cooked)? The starchy corms played important role in people's diet,  especially during the early spring when all the nutrients still rested inside the corm. Perhaps that's why such a profusion of these plants at the old camp.
Speaking of corms, why did I not take a photo of the corm? I did not think of it, that's why. I guess that I am just like the most other people, I fail to dig deep down to have a thorough look at the whole thing. Instead, I just have a quick look and say: "Wow! A pretty blue flower on a tall stem."
I am tempted to promise to fix this approach and start digging - but as I also found out, this plant is becoming scarce in nature (same of which applies to the toad in the above photo). If every photographer, gardener and nature enthusiast started to dig ....?

It might be a good idea to get a good book instead. Something like Plants of The Rocky Mountains. It is written by Linda Kershaw, Andy McKinnon and Jim Pojar and published by Lone Pine Publishing. That’s where a lot of my info came from. There, on page 92, is also a nice sketch of the entire plant (Including the corm!) .

When the plant starts to shoot up in spring, it does just that: shoots up like a spear - looks like one too. So that's where Ithuriel's Spear came from. O-kay.

Further on - sometimes around year 1800 two Scottish botanists came to North American continent. They were collecting, describing, drawing, drying and ... you name it ... all kinds of plants and trees still unknown or little known to the Europeans then. What a better pat on the back than to give their names to the plants and trees. One of the explorers was James J. Brodie and the other one was David Douglas. They probably ended with "Sir" added to their names. That's where Brodiea douglasii and Douglas' Brodiea come from.

Have YOU had enough? I am not finished!

We have all those wonderful names. So can you tell me why we needed to re-name the plant to Triteleia?
Someone liked Greek language better than the peoples' last names. Tri = 3, teleios = perfect. Perfect threes. Check it out, everything is in threes. Why did Mr. Brodie fall out of botanical dichotomous favour, I did not find.

Just in case that you are not asleep and still keen to go on and you are wondering about "laxa", that refers to the "loose" blossoms dangling on the long stem. Laxa should be easy to remember.
And grandiflora sound like large-flowered doesn't it? Is Triteleia laxa and Triteleia grandiflora the same plant? My plant? I do not know that.

And, unlike you, I have had enough!

Next time, let us get a good dichotomous key. It might save a lot of time.
On the other hand - would I have learned all this?

In any case, wherever these pretty plants grow and bloom, their vivid blue is sure to catch the eye's attention
They are a welcome sign of spring and early summer and they are definitely worth a photograph or two. Well, ninety seven in my case.

Supermoon

On Super-Moon, Heavenly Bodies & Getting Old

In Nature, there is no such thing as a perfect circle. 

Therefore the orbits of the planets and their moons are elliptical rather than round. That means that our Moon is sometimes closer, sometimes further away from the Earth. When the moon is at its closest distance to the Earth and it is full at the same time it seems much larger and brighter than at other times. It becomes a super-moon.

It was May the 5th when my friend Nel called me on the phone:

"Watch the moon tonight - it is going to be really big 'cause it's the closest to the Earth it can get! Lets hope that it does not rain because our next chance to experience something like this will be in 2029."

Hm, I would be 80 years old then, and who knows, the skies might be cloudy that night, so I decided that it was the best to prepare my gear and photograph it NOW, in 2012.

The moon in this West Kootenay valley was supposed to rise at about 11 p.m. 

I was out and ready at eight! Waiting, praying for a cloudless night, trying to imagine what it must be like in the Prairies. Huge Prairie Moon rising above the unobstructed horizon, its super-size multiplied by the atmosphere, looking so huge as if  wanting to swallow the Earth. 

Here I was instead, at the bottom of a deep V-shaped valley on the shores of Kootenay River with tall mountain ridges reaching high for the darkening sky. The moon would be half way up before I could see any of it. It did not matter to the kid inside me, wanting to check out the 400 mm lens on the heavenly super-body.

Just no clouds, please, no clouds – okay?

There are times when wishes come true. There was not a cloud in the sky, not at eight, not at nine, not at thirty past ten! At ten forty a small portion of the Eastern sky lit up! Slowly at first but then the moon popped up, and with increasing impatience (so it seemed ), rapidly rose above the ridge. The fields and forests, the river and everything around just lit up gaining a different dimension.

The fairy tale night  began!

   SuperMoon

Several decades ago, on July 20, 1969 my brother Stan and I lazed around a small fire on a lonely beach somewhere in Italy watching a bright full moon. The news of that day was huge: “Apollo landed on the Moon! ” The world was celebrating, radio and TV stations endlessly discussing the achievements and future possibilities of the space programs. Man conquered the Moon!

Somehow I did not share that excitement; I felt a wave of sadness as if something sacred had been taken away from me. It felt as if someone walked across a field covered by freshly fallen snow.

“ No longer a virgin”, I remember saying. Stan only nodded his head.

…..

All the memories, 43 years old, came back while I was taking dozens of pictures of the rising moon. Click-click-click …. boy, was it ever rising fast!

No, no, no no no! – (that was my brain) – it is not the moon, it is the Earth and you – spinning in the opposite direction, silly!

What would happen if Earth suddenly stopped spinning – would I land on the moon?

Ah, full moon is known to do strange things to human brain. And this was Super-Moon.

     Star Trails and Polaris

Satellites above my head kept crisscrossing the skies; there was one, there – another one! No big deal, simply more of the space pollution, I thought.

Not so some fifty years ago when Stan, ever the scientist, came running into our parents’ house, grabbed me by the arm and dragged me out into the darkness of the night.

“Hurry, hurry! There is a satellite in the sky! lets see ….” It was only an optical illusion but we both pretended that we REALLY, REALLY saw one.

Half a century later a brand new “star” lights our night every now and then. Only a few people ever bother to lift their heads to have a look. 

"Ah, …  yes, the Space Station. of course. I wonder what’ they are having for dinner up there tonight."

     Space Station

So much has changed in such a short time. Sometimes I wonder: how can one begin to tell a modern Fairy Tale? Perhaps it could go like this:

Once upon a time, fifty, sixty long years ago there reigned Chaos. No man-made objects orbited the Earth. There were no human tracks on the Moon, no satellites, no lasers, no cell phones, no Internet …”

A seven year old would cringe in horror: 

“What?  How about people? How were they able to survive? What was it like for them? “

To tell the truth, I am not sure if I could explain to a seven year old that it was beautiful.

Oh that super-moon!

Gerrard Trout and Black Bears

WEST KOOTENAY MAGIC

Today I had an opportunity to share most of the day with a friend and a realy good wildlife photographer Jim Lawrence 

www.kootenayreflections.com

What a treat! 

We traveled North from Kaslo and Meadow Creek to the head of Lardeau River  looking for opportunities to photograph wildlife. Our main objective however was to see the spawning Gerrard Trout. These giants spawn from late April to mid-May.

The day was hot and sunny and it seemed that most of the wild animals took refuge in the deep woods of the Goat River Provincial Park. 

At 8:30 we saw 4 Turkey Vultures (Cathartes aura) circling the morning skies above Meadow Creek. 

We continued North towards Trout Lake. The road was unpaved and potholes, at many places, were quite deep . Winter has left its marks and our Honda Fit had a few challenging sections to conquer. Nevertheless, the vistas and Nature, budding  all around us, more than made up for the road troubles. 

Weather forecast for the day called for 32 degrees Celsius!

Beavers dammed a portion of the valley and we stopped to have a closer look at their lodge. Jim found a snake hiding among the alder roots by the edge of the swamp.  

It was 10 a.m. when we arrived to the head of Lardeau River.  It is a beautiful and wild stream, connecting two large lakes: Trout Lake to the North and Kootenay Lake to the South.

People were already watching spawning fish from the bridge that connects the West side of the valley with what used to be a mining community called Gerrard. That's where the name came from - Gerrard rainbow Trout  (Oncorhynchus spp.)

     Trout Lake at Gerrard

Unlike the many streams and rivers along the way Lardeau River was clear and turqoise in colour. There was no silt , mud and other debris being hurtled down from the rapidly warming slopes. 

Gerrard trout are very large - perhaps the largest rainbow trout in the world. Unlike the other rainbows they feed exclusively on Kokanee Salmon (land-locked Sockeye Salmon)

which makes them vulnerable to any problems bequeathing the Kokanee population.

In late spring they spawn - for a very good reason - in this clean, gravel-lined river, just after it had left Trout Lake.  Like dark, streamlined torpedoes they come up in large numbers to spawn.

We had been told that the Gerrard count for this year is somewhere around seven hundred  to a thousand spawning fish. 

Not so high, I thought, considering how many lakes and rivers we have around here. 

I guess that there used to be less, that's why everyone is happy about the numbers.

Watching Gerrads is fun. The males chase each other and once in a while there is a flurry of activity as the males chase away their rivals trying to position themselves in the close proximity of the spawning females.

Once in a while they also jump out of the water - landing with a loud splash. 

One of the local biologists told us that the explanation for such behaviour is unclear. Some people believe that the fish suffer from a skin condition caused by a fungus of sorts. They jump out of the water to seek relief from itching or pain. 

Others believe that this is a part of their mating ritual .... as for myself, I simply think that it is amazing to see a huge fish like that flying through the air in a shower of sparkling droplets.

On our return to Meadow Creak we stopped at an old-growth Red Cedar forest site.

The trees that were spared logging, hundreds years old, clad in moss and ferns, devil's club sprouting at their bases, towered high above us. 

An ideal habitat  for grizzly bears and other wildlife. 

"An owl", said Jim at one point, listening carefully. 

"I think it is a Barred Owl, can you hear?" 

Being half deaf I heard nothing. But it was good to know that the owls were there.

Soon came another sound; this one even I could hear - it was quite loud, like someone half choking was trying to clear their throat. 

"What's that?" I said. "Should we run for the car?" 

I wasn't too serious, but I was listening carefully nevertheless.

"A deer," smiled Jim, "probably scared of something."

"Something, like ... what?"

"Us." 

Leaving Jim at his home and his studio full of amazing photographs, I continued towards my own home. It was only about 5 p.m., so instead of driving along Kootenay Lake from Kaslo to Nelson, I took a road crossing Selkirk mountains from Kaslo to New Denver. I stopped at Fish Lake to enjoy the scenery, hoping to take a photograph or two. But everything was quiet - a couple of ducks too far away and rapidly falling dusk ahead. New Denver Glacier towering above everything else was changing colours as if wanting to remind me that I was still good 200 km away from home.

Light was disappearing fast as I was heading down to the valley bottom. 

Than, just when the last light hit the mountain slopes, I finally came upon a view I was hoping for all day: a mother Black Bear and her cub!

I came to a slow stop and shut off the engine.

They pretended not to see me but the cub slowly turned and walked towards the mother. She also turned - heading in my direction. I did not move, only my camera

made few annoying "clicks". A cannon could not have sounded louder!

Nobody was watching anyone! 

Then she must have given another instruction to her cub for it turned, quite suddenly, and sped towards the thickets. 

Mom did not even lift her head - only the hair on her neck stood up.

As soon as the cub reached the trees Mom turned back and followed - as if to make sure that everything back there was fine.

Finally - having enough of my presence she spun back and headed towards my car.

Charged.

I managed to take off in time and sped away, Honda Fit unscratched! 

Perhaps it was only a bluff charge - in any case, I thought that it was a perfect time to leave them alone. 

I am pretty sure that she could not have agreed with me more.