Whistler BioBlitz 2020 : Biologists Having A Blast!

The Fire of Life: metabolism and energy flow in animals and ecosystems by ecologist Jordan Rosenfeld

​Jordan is an aquatic ecologist who lives in Vancouver. His childhood was spent in Ontario collecting bugs and falling into streams. He eventually blundered out to the west coast, where he studies the effect of habitat on ecological processes in streams and energetic constraints on fish distribution and abundance. His specific research is focused on modelling fish habitat, habitat requirements of fish species at risk, optimal stream flows, bioenergetic modelling of juvenile salmonid growth, and understanding how habitat structure affects energy flow in streams. In his spare time Jordan likes to sit on a couch watching TV.

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"Metabolism has been called the fire of life because low-temperature oxidation of organic matter is what powers animal (and plant) life on planet earth.  Although metabolic differentiation isn't obvious like wing shape or colour on birds and butterflies, it underlies much of global diversity.  I will consider variation in metabolism from animals to plants to ecosystems, and present a bunch of random factoids that I Googled on the internet at the last minute or just made up."

In July, we are planning on hosting scientists for the field portion of BioBlitz. What makes BioBlitz so exciting is that every year BioBlitz scientists find on average 200 species that we didn’t know existed here. The Whistler Biodiversity Project already has a list of over 4,300 species so to keep finding new ones is amazing. There is so much to discover right in our own backyard!

The forest and the ravine appeared to be the choice of destination for quite a few area families this Christmas Eve day. Talk about a recreational opportunity for young children living nearby the forest, led by their parents on a few rare days of leisure activity. We were out and about ourselves a little earlier than usual this afternoon.

Before we even made it to the long descent into the ravine we could hear from afar the lilting, excited sound of children's voices. We paused at the top of the hill to look down over the long slope and there, at the bottom of another, facing hill we could see the distant figures of colourfully-clad children sliding downhill on sleds and congregating happily at the hill's bottom. Beside them the taller figures of adults.

Jackie and Jillie added their voices enthusiastically to the tumult, observing the distant commotion. We took the opposite direction, however, when we reached the bottom of the hill, the direction we usually take. By the time we would complete a long circuit taking us eventually, to where the activity was taking place, we reasoned the group would be long gone.

And they were gone, either moved on home, or elsewhere in the ravine, sleds and toboggans with them. There exists a myriad of places where children would be able to slide merrily downhill and experience the heady excitement of swift motion over a layer of snow, the wind whipping past them. That layer of snow is not as rich as it was several days earlier, unfortunately, and with it there is now ample ice to make hiking about the trails tricky in some spots.

We'd had several days of mild weather, sufficient to melt much of the gathered snowpack. The second time we've experienced this so far in the last few months, which is pretty unusual. Although there's still some snow left, it's sparse. Certainly not what the typical winter landscape looks like here ordinarily, and that's a pity.

There were so many people out and about, from family groups of adults, adults with young children, and teen-agers, marking an unusual occasion. We knew some of those people, but for the most part many more were unknown to us. Everyone appeared happy with where they found themselves, and no doubt that happiness owed a good deal to the fact that Christmas Day was finally approaching.

Jackie and Jillie had the opportunity to meet up with some interesting dogs of all sizes and breeds. From the observations I'm making it might seem that the trails were packed with people, but nothing could be further from reality. In a half-hour stretch of hiking some trails that interconnect we saw no one out beside ourselves.

In other places, where there were others about they weren't too far from some of trail entrances. Everyone was cheerful, for if anything can be guaranteed at this time of year on the approach to Christmas and New Year's the general mood is always uplifted.

And it was, after all, a bright, sunny day, with a modest temperature of -2C, and light wind. Who wouldn't be happy in such a landscape under these conditions?

It 's an inexorable process and one we all share; that as each successive year goes by we celebrate another birthday. For me that time is nigh; two weeks from now I'll have attained my 82nd birthday. My husband is forever 'catching up' with me. His birthday comes along four weeks later when he too will be 82 years of age. We have shared this little scenario since we were both 14 years old, when we first met and became fast companions.

Yet when my birthday rolls around he is caught in a dilemma, a compulsive need to present me with something that will reflect the event. Every day of our lives together he offers me happiness and contentment. That gift surmounts any trinket that could be viewed as a memento of our love. He knows that but is overwhelmed by the need to please me with something expressing how he feels about me. His expansive loving smile that competes with the sun does that, and so do the hugs he proffers constantly.

At a time of year when the community around us is frantically shopping for gifts at Christmas time, my husband ponders what it is that he can present to me as a surprise and a gift for my birthday. There have been quite a few of those; gifts and birthdays. The gifts are redundant, the birthdays are not. But it excites and pleases him no end that we are in a position financially that he can look about and select something, usually a piece of jewellery, to surprise me with. From the time I was a little girl in a family struggling to surmount poverty, jewellery fascinated me. Now I have those things given me for my birthdays; a watch, a bracelet, a ring, a necklace. And so, I have many such items.

When he succeeds in finding something that he decides is appropriate to the occasion, the panic he feels subsides slightly, he is reassured that the deed is done. But he is functionally incapable of putting the item away for presentation on my birthday. And anxiety begins to build back up again; he has the gift, why not give it to me, his reasoning nags at him. And so, he does just that. It doesn't matter that I suggest I have no need for anything more, and not to bother. He usually turns a deaf ear to such recommendations in any event.

This time, he told me, he bought two items because he couldn't resist the impulse. So, he said, he was prepared to give me one of the items immediately and withhold the other for my birthday. That's what happened. Until a day later he said he could no longer stand the suspense and needed to give me the second item, long before my birthday. So that's what happened.

What else happens? He sets himself a target of creating a birthday card for me. They're usually large-format, painted in water-colour, depicting scenes of our lives at any given time, or of gardens and flowers, or of our little dogs, now that our children are grown and middle-aged. It is the resulting card that he props up on my bedside table the night before my birthday dawns that is the meaningful gift. One for each of my birthdays.

July First, Canada's official 'birthday', and Parliament Hill is crowded with celebrants, young, old and in between, to enjoy the social occasion, the free entertainment, the crushing heat... Oh wait, that's not official, but it is, unfortunately, reality. Nature loves throwing a spanner into the works and she's done a doozy this year, marking the festivities with a prolonged heat wave that is certain to break records in its severity. The heat is heavily oppressive. But not to despair, despite the 33C that 'feels like' 45C, there's a nice stiff breeze.


That breeze is wafting about in the most generous manner possible, stifling, oven-like, scorching heat. It's also a sunny day, so the heat is intensified by the burning rays of the sun. Even when there's a bit of an overcast and the sun temporarily withdraws the relief is so minor and so brief it hardly matters. The crowds this year will be just as large as they always are; preparations have been made to have ample water available, to have officials patrolling the venue to spot anyone in medical trouble. It's a grand public, social occasion and people, wearing the official colours of the Canadian flag are out to enjoy themselves.


As for us, we won't be venturing too far. Even early this morning the heat was well enough advanced to take our breath away venturing out to the back garden. And the exterior thermometer already read 32C, the low that we experienced at the height of the day yesterday. Which led us yesterday morning, anticipating the gathering heat, to the garden at back and front of the house to do a bit of watering and  tender-plant tending, taking stock of what looked heat-oppressed and what did not. In total, no problems.

And then off we went with Jackie and Jillie for a ravine ramble. We thought that if the heat seemed too overwhelming we'd simply cut our junket short and return home. No need, however; the shady canopy of the forest kept us well protected from the sun and the prevailing breeze made the ambient heat seem tolerable. For a change, Jackie and Jillie responded swiftly when they were offered water, unlike previous days when they spurned the offer.

Once again, we had the circuit of forested trails to ourselves. Not another soul, man nor dog to be seen anywhere. We did have the company of cardinals and their exquisite songs. Happily, given the circumstances of extreme heat and a breeze, those other forest denizens we fail to appreciate, did not gather and search out our tender flesh; mosquitoes and black flies, it seems, have no love of this kind of oppressive heat, and were conspicuously absent.

Because we weren't suffering any kind of discomfort and being out in the forest is always such a refreshing experience, we decided to just keep going, and so we ended up with a longer-than-anticipated ramble in the woods, and we felt quite good about that. Making our way back up the last long hill to ascend to street level we could feel the heat pressure increasing, and when we left the protective shade of the forest canopy that heat seemed to slam into us.

The predicted thunderstorms that Environment Canada warned would arrive with some ferocity never did relieve the heat yesterday, not during the day nor throughout the night hours when there was a 70 percent chance of their occurring. And it would have been appreciated if they had. For one thing we enjoy them, the sound and sight of the electrical fury, the authority of the thunder, the over-ample rainfall, and the aftermath of brilliant colour and garden relief.

As nature's creatures, among many, we have been fortunate to inherit a world of wonders. The seasons come and they give way to others, each of which brings their very own fascinating transformations of the living theatre we call existence. Of the four discrete seasons, spring and summer likely rate as favourites for most people, but then, thinking about autumn's transition and winter's arrival our thoughts linger fondly on memories and landscapes both have brought us through the years.

In nature, immersing ourselves in our natural surroundings from time to time, we renew our relationship with the force that bred us. We happen to be personally irreligious, with no faith or belief in a deity, but perhaps it could be said that our veneration for nature is a type of faith; our creator, our nurturer. At this time of year the frenzy of believers and non-believers alike preparing for the festivals linked to religion that mark the arrival of the Winter Solstice, translated for Christians as the birth of Christ marks that great public holiday of Christmas.

We enjoy the excitement, the good feeling, the lights and celebration at a remove. For Jews, the festival of Chanukah, a time of historical Judaic deliverance and perseverance for a perpetually persecuted people, often corresponds in time with Christmas. It has, of latter years, been brightened up in reflection of that coincidental timing, from a tranquil remembrance of gratitude to one of excited joyfulness, lest all the fun and favour be exclusive to Christianity. A kind of inclusivity that children of all religions are able to share.

While many of our neighbours light up the night sky with colourful displays of lighting, the festive atmosphere encompasses those for whom Christmas is a majority time of happiness and nostalgia. The frenzied shopping excursions people fling themselves into is the less admirable function of the holiday, however, one we're happy to absent ourselves from.

We seek our daily comfort in the solace of the winter forest in the company of our two little dogs. There we amble about on snow-laden trails, the forest floor deepening in its winter snowpack, trees looming gaunt and unleafed above, and on a sunny day the golden rays of that life-giving orb illuminating the forest canopy as it begins to set in mid-afternoon.

This is our treasure-hunt, our daily ambulations through the forested ravine where each day brings us renewal and gratitude.

July 1st, Canada Day, to mark the country's 150st anniversary since Confederation, was not welcomed by auspicious weather. All night rain the night before, following on months of incessant rain, made for a pretty damp atmosphere. People were showing up on Parliament Hill from 5:30 a.m., some from as far away as Manitoba, to witness the official entertainment staged by the federal government to help its citizens celebrate that milestone in history.

And because of the justified concerns over the threat of terrorism possibly planning to strike where great numbers of people tend to congregate, security was tight. So tight that would-be celebrants waited, drenched, for hours in impossibly long line-ups to be able to enter the Parliamentary precinct to take part in the festivities up close and personal.

We had done that many years ago when our children were young, when we first moved to the nation's capital. Security decades ago was not much of a concern. We enjoyed, to an extent, mingling with the crowds and watching the entertainment as some of Canada's then-most-popular entertainers, from opera to concert to pop and comic, took turns adding to the glamour and fun of the day.

Soon after breakfast, when the pouring rain seemed to hesitate, we dressed our puppies and ourselves in rain gear and set off for the ravine for our daily hike. It was drizzling by then, but lightly, and we were covered by a canopy which, albeit sopping, kept us relatively dry. We heard small squadrons of jets roaring overhead from time to time. An hour later as we exited our circuit, we prepared to drive to a small Ottawa-Valley town, for their annual antique show.

As we drove along the highway for the hour's drive to Perth, it was hard not to notice the presence of viper's buglos flowering in drenched abandon; though drenched, the spires of blue flowers stood erect and plentiful. On our return journey, we passed a completely bare-of-bark dead tree beside the highway and as we drove past, caught a fleeting glimpse of a pair of eagles perched on top.

The venue had changed this year, to the Civitan Club building from the Legion hall where it had for years been held, close by the Tay River. As we passed that site, we saw hundreds of people lining the Tay River for a Canada Day regatta. As usual there were booths set up outside at the new site, for the overflow dealers in collectibles and antiques. Since it had briefly stopped raining at that point, we reconnoitered the exterior before entering the building. Mostly country stuff, once of much greater interest to us.

Everyone is friendly, open and courteous, a hallmark of the bucolic setting and the type of people who tend to live in those environments. We wandered along, our two little black imps settled into their carry bags slung over our shoulders, peering at the offerings at the various stalls. Seeing items of interest and of particular interest those items with some historical background.

Just as interesting as attending such a show to scrutinize the wares and familiarize ourselves with what happens to be available for a price to the enterprising collector, is the sight, driving down the town's streets, of old stone and buff-brick homes of truly majestic architectural appearance. The pride taken in the upkeep of these century homes is obvious, and to my delight the colourful presence of gardens augmented the grand appearance of these buildings.