Karstad Biodiversity Paintings: adventures in the colour of Canada

26 December 2009     4x6 inches     oil on canvas Such short days we have, and especially when they're cloudy!   My Birthday December 26 has been darkly overcast with freezing rain. We drove out to "The 18 & 20 Bridge" a few minutes from home, to see whether the familiar Maple swamp offered an interesting composition for a quick painting,

This spring, the Grenville Land Stewardship Council commissioned a watercolour of a Least Bittern , as a "Species at Risk", to be given as a prize to someone who responds to a questionnaire about their SAR educational campaign. And it wasn't very long before a suitable subject presented itself!

This is the last of the 11 Pilot Trip paintings and drawings. 4 x 6 oil on canvas Clayton vernal pool 11:00  Fred and I are booked as Invertebrate (non-insect) experts at the Bell Property Bio Blitz on Clayton Road.  This is the last Bio Blitz of the season - a very late one, at the end of a summer of more Bio Blitzes than any before.  Taking one look at the Headquarters, several tables arrayed with books, microscopes, jars of insects and rainbows of mushrooms, and computers, all set out under a series of canopies in the woods behind a banner for the Mississippi Valley Field Naturalists, gives the impression that this is perhaps the best organized Bio Blitz ever! Adam and I, equipped with mushroom guides and painting kit, wander off into the woods toward a patch of sunlight where we've been told there is a wet area with lots of ferns, while Fred readies himself to lead the Invertebrate Walk. 12:00 We hadn't gone far along a trail when it passed close by a dried-d...

4 x 6 inches oil on canvas Paudash Lake 19 September 2009 There used to be a creek running through a culvert under the highway here, but there was only an energetic volunteer fireman to tell me about it as I sat painting just inside the guardrail from the shoulder of the road, looking south across the wetland with my back turned to the lake.  He said that when the highway was repaired they neglected to replace the caved in culvert, and now there is still a  wetland but no more creek.  His brother lives in the house to the west of the wetland.  I can hear sounds of children playing from the house.  Most of the forest is in its own shadow as the sun lowers in the west, but the billowy Maples still have their tops in the sunshine and the late afternoon sunshine is on the marsh.  Patches of autumn-bronzing Pickerelweed make crisp dark reflections of thin curving stems and curling arrow-head leaves.  We hear a splash from the lake across the road, ...

This is the last of the 11 Pilot Trip paintings and drawings. 4 x 6 oil on canvas Clayton vernal pool 11:00  Fred and I are booked as Invertebrate (non-insect) experts at the Bell Property Bio Blitz on Clayton Road.  This is the last Bio Blitz of the season - a very late one, at the end of a summer of more Bio Blitzes than any before.  Taking one look at the Headquarters, several tables arrayed with books, microscopes, jars of insects and rainbows of mushrooms, and computers, all set out under a series of canopies in the woods behind a banner for the Mississippi Valley Field Naturalists, gives the impression that this is perhaps the best organized Bio Blitz ever! Adam and I, equipped with mushroom guides and painting kit, wander off into the woods toward a patch of sunlight where we've been told there is a wet area with lots of ferns, while Fred readies himself to lead the Invertebrate Walk. 12:00 We hadn't gone far along a trail when it passed close by a dried-down vern...

4 x 6 inches, oil on canvas 18 September 2009 Crab Lake, just south of Cartier, Sudbury District, Ontario We parked last night after midnightin a pulloff on Highway #144 at Crab Lake, and this morning Fred was eager for me to do a "morning painting" here.  Apparently there are Pitcher Plants growing on little boggy islands floating just across a beaver-churned morass of peat slurry.  Fortunately someone had thrown tires into the breach and we crossed rather tipily to the largest island.  11:00  The little floating bog is golden and red with Sphagnum and furzed with Leatherleaf and Sweet Gale.  Thin threads of tiny Cranberry leaves embroider themselves into the mossy tapestry.  Red and green Pitcher Plant leaves, clustered like politicians at a convention catch the sun in their pitchers, glowing so their red veins show.  Tiny Sundews lurk about the bases of the pitchers. Small, smooth waves lap through a gap between islands, and a pile of huge bloc...

4 x 6 inches, oil on canvas 18 September 2009 Crab Lake, just south of Cartier, Sudbury District, Ontario We parked last night after midnightin a pulloff on Highway #144 at Crab Lake, and this morning Fred was eager for me to do a "morning painting" here.  Apparently there are Pitcher Plants growing on little boggy islands floating just across a beaver-churned morass of peat slurry.  Fortunately someone had thrown tires into the breach and we crossed rather tipily to the largest island. 11:00  The little floating bog is golden and red with Sphagnum and furzed with Leatherleaf and Sweet Gale.  Thin threads of tiny Cranberry leaves embroider themselves into the mossy tapestry.  Red and green Pitcher Plant leaves, clustered like politicians at a convention catch the sun in their pitchers, glowing so their red veins show.  Tiny Sundews lurk about the bases of the pitchers. Small, smooth waves lap through a gap between islands, and a pile of huge blocks of grey granite looms a sho...