Lots of animal tracks in the fresh skiff of snow we got on Sunday - the snowpack is hard enough in the areas of the valley with a measurable snowpack (mostly east of Snootli Creek), that even the deer can walk on the top. Wolf, Fox and Marten tracks were all abundant during a sortie around the woods today.
It just didn't feel right putting up a wintery picture for today when we have already had 6 weeks of winter weather in the Bella Coola Valley! This is a shot from last summer of the plant known as Devil's Club (Oplopanax horridus), the horridus part of the Latin name meaning 'frightful and rough'. It's a challenging plant in terms of the spines on the stems and leaves which easily stick you when grabbed and leave a nice little festering spot for a few days. It's also an important plant for First Nations cultural and medicinal uses and wildlife (Grizzlies love the fresh buds in the spring and the berries in late summer). Luckily it grows in extensive patches in many of the valleys of the Central Coast. I've included it today to cheer you up and remind you of green times ahead.
The morning started out with just the slightest of snow flurries, which wasn’t enough to even show up in some areas. Again no wind until later this evening and a little outflow wind started. Environment Canada says we are in for another Arctic outflow. Got some outdoor machinery maintenance accomplished today and it was quite pleasant, better than the -54o C wind chill they are experiencing in the Fort McMurray, Alta area tonight. I chatted with a relative working in that area this evening and they were limited to 10 minutes at a time outdoors today, very tough conditions. The temperature is barely -2o C this evening in the Bella Coola Valley. Grizzly
It was -7o C in the morning to -4o C in the evening with no wind. There was a high cloud most of the day which looked threatening and like it wanted to snow, but nothing really materialized. North Bentinck Arm, the inlet which terminates at the town site of Bella Coola, was flat glassy calm this afternoon, looked like a good day to try fishing for winter Chinook, but no one out there. Grizzly
Cold and clear continues for us in the Bella Coola Valley as it does for most of the province. So far we have gotten off lucky, the temperature has stayed in the -4 or -5 C range and the winds haven't been 'epic', although I see Cathedral Point winds peaked out at 98 kmh last evening. A friend of mine reminded me today that in the Bella Coola Valley you have to remember to look up once in a while, and a morning like this rewards you with incredible views in any direction as illustrated by today's photo. 
Spent some time up at East Branch (in Tweedsmuir Park at the top of "The Hill"), getting organized at the ski hill for the first opening day (next Sunday). Lots of good snow and beautiful views. The little Roundhouse was bearing a heavy load though, and fortunately a bunch of hardy volunteers showed up at -22 C to shovel it off before it pancaked. Looks like Tweeds is gearing up for some serious winter fun over at the cross country trails as well. A good day was had by all. Grizzly
It tried to snow for awhile this morning in some areas of the valley, but for the most part the lower valley had turned to rain by mid day, but only just barely rain -- the temperature is hovering around 2 C most of the day, the snow level can't be very far up the mountains. It sure has rained though most of the day. I don't think the cloud/fog layer went much higher than 100 metres above the valley today. If you had something to do inside today, it was a good day to do it. That's what I did - made a pile of wood shavings while working on some projects and listening to the rain on the shed roof. Grizzly
I like firewood piles. People find all kinds of interesting ways to cut them and to stack them. They are visually appealing with the endless patterns they form, the type of wood that makes them up and the colours that develop. To the owner of the firewood they represent more than just a lot of hard work. In addition they represent a sense of independence and security. Just about everyone in Bella Coola has a wood pile, as most other forms of heat are expensive, but your firewood pile represents something that just won't fail you when you need it. We all prepare for those inevitable power outages where we might be in the dark and our freezers thaw, but we know our families will be warm and we don't fret too much about when the power will be back - it always comes on eventually, but in the meantime we are warm and dry. Firewood for most of us is a real connection to a simple, renewable and reliable source of energy. It's a favourite topic of mine to talk to people about what kind of firewood they like to burn, there are lots of opinions and reasons, but I'll comment on that in another post. What wood cutter doesn't stand back when they are done their yearly firewood supply and have a great sense of satisfaction with the work accomplished and the security it represents? Grizzly
The night stayed pretty mild last night and it was just above freezing this morning. It actually warmed up to 4o or 5o C in the afternoon and had a few periods where you could see some clear sky. Otherwise just a damp feeling most of the day. At least the highways are all nicely back to bare blacktop. Grizzly
This is the time of the year when the bald eagles really enjoy a good spawning salmon. The valley floor is covered in snow, the days wet and cool and catching a fresh fish or even scavenging a dead one is real treat. The fish in this photo met his match when the eagles plucked it off the spawning grounds and what you see is all that’s left. There weren’t any critter tracks in the snow, except for bird foot prints, so I’m pretty sure they were successful in actually catching this one themselves and dragging it up on the snow. Can’t tell if the fish had a chance to spawn before they caught it, because there wasn't much left. With the snowpack on the valley bottom, picking off the odd spawning salmon and scavenging here and there will be all there is to look forward to for valley bald eagles for awhile.
Well the snow that started yesterday kept up till the wee hours this morning. Most areas of the valley received at least 5-15 cm, a lot more as you go east in the valley, more like 30 cm. In some areas the snow was a lot heavier and wetter than other areas, but generally pretty heavy snow . Highway 20 on “The Hill” is reported to have received a serious amount of snow that kept the highway ploughing contractors busy. The power went out in most of the valley in the middle of the night when one of the large trees at the rock cut near the Village of Bella Coola came down across the power line and the highway. There were also a number of smaller trees heavily laden with wet snow which fell partially on the highway. Further up valley the power is still out in the Stuie area tonight. The public schools were closed today, because the buses could not get between schools till mid morning when the tree was cleared and the power and heat restored in the schools. The good news is that the big rains stayed further south and missed us. Virtually all the precipitation in the Bella Coola Valley came down as snow. The temperature in the morning was close to 0o C and it more or less stayed there into this evening.
All in all, a typical November day, early wet heavy snows are always a challenge for everyone. It appears as though the mountain snowpack is quite substantial already which provides ideal conditions for all of our Grizzly and Black bears to head off and find their winter dens. Last year we had a low early season snowpack and some very cold weather in December which along with fewer fall spawning salmon likely left bears in vulnerable conditions for denning. With this snowfall in the valley, it will be a lot quieter on the bear activity in the valley bottom and the bears can feel secure and warm in their dens, although there will be those that prefer to feed on late season spawning coho salmon around for a while yet. Grizzly
An early winter, the first serious snow on the valley bottom arrived starting late on Friday afternoon and kept up through the night. There were several wet inches by the morning. November snow in the valley is not very nice, always wet sometimes it stays sometimes it goes.
The October foliage colours in the Bella Coola Valley were much better than most years this fall. It must be the result of the very dry hot summer and relatively nice fall with a few cool days in early October. Most years the Cottonwoods often drop their leaves while still green or only partially coloured, but this year it seems the extensive stands of valley bottom Cottonwood took on a very nice yellow while the birch in most cases was brilliant yellow. The only thing missing were the reds that are characteristic of the vast eastern mixed hardwood stands, but all in all a nice bonus to the end of the summer. The rain of the last few days pretty much ended the fall colour display.
It wasn’t the biggest flood Bella Coola Valley has seen, but certainly some problems have been created and some areas had higher water than others. It rained most of the night, but luckily the freezing level came down to about 3000’ through the night and so at higher altitudes there was snow. The Thorsen Creek bridge was saved, luckily the road contractor had an excavator move in and dealt with some logs that had become jammed and could have easily damaged the bridge. Hagensborg is flooded from the Bay Hotel to the Legion, Saloomt Road was flooded in the normal low spot, Hammer road is washed out in two places, the forestry bridge on Noosgulch washed out the approach on one side and Nusatsum forestry road is washed out at 2 km. There was fresh snow on The Hill (Highway 20) today as well.
The rain was much slower most of the day and hopefully this storm has ended and now we can wait for the first big snow.
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