Bear tracks, "significant" stumps, red-legged frogs and banana slugs! They were all here as we landed on Sonora Island, British Columbia early this morning. We set off to explore a remote stand of second-growth rain forest, struggling over windfalls, tripping over exposed roots, and sloshing through good clean mud...but laughing all the way. We soon realized the speed at which a new forest grows here after logging. Massive redcedar stumps still remain, and are classified as "significant" for their heritage value. Judging by their springboard notches, these trees were cut by handsaw perhaps 60 to 80 years ago. Already, though, hemlocks and Douglas firs of up to 2 feet in diameter shade the spongy and moist forest floor.
Fresh tracks of black bears, black-tailed deer, mink and bobcat were found, as were those denizens of the temperate rain forest, banana slugs. Like the many fungi growing here, slugs help to redistribute the nutrients of this rich but diminishing ecosystem.
The afternoon was spent cruising south toward Victoria under a hot sun, and reviewing the history of the world's largest non-nuclear explosion (to 1958) as we passed over the site of Ripple Rock in Seymour Narrows.
