Ministry of Forests representative Jeremy Campbell, arriving at the airport at 4am, to go scanning blocks for fire activity.
A coyote.
Chantal, our assistant cook.
Glenn, digging a dishpit.
Duct tape is so useful to tree planters that they've now made a chocolate bar to commemorate it!
Watching a machine move logs near the road.
Stephen Campbell, expected to be one of our camp's top planters this year.
Scooter, training the rookies on day one of the season.
Jim Logan, trying to dig out his truck, after "boldly [foolishly?] going where no man has gone before ..."
Tim Bachiu, foreman.
Three of our trucks, trying to pull Byron's Excursion out of a mudhole one night after supper. This was really quite a minor hole and the vehicle should not have gotten stuck, but the clearance on it is pretty low.
A wash-out in the roadway.
One of our favorite animals - the beaver.
Byron's crew, loading up a quad.
Flying over an older plantation in the chopper. Note the growth patterns on the block - the smaller trees are spruce. There appears to be a block of about 225 trees planted in a square under the chopper, in the middle of a taller pine section. These trees are probably about five to seven years old. Pine grow quickly at the start, but after about twenty years the spruce trees catch up and often become the predominant species. On some blocks we plant mixed species together, but often the requirement is to mix both species up in the bags, rather than alternating full boxes, to blend the trees better and prevent this kind of growth pattern.
Pierre, our pilot for the morning, with Vancouver Island Helicopters.
Craig Mackie in the front seat of the chopper, with Carmen De Menech looking on in the background.
A photograph taken in the Bowron Valley. As you can see, altitude makes a huge difference in temperatures. The blocks in the foreground on the valley floor are only a couple hundred metres lower in elevation than the ones on the hillsides, yet you can see the difference in snow coverage.
The view through the infared scanner camera, showing Jeremy Campbell standing at attention. The scanner can be fine tuned so accurately that it can clearly see the patterns of the sole of your boots after walking across the pavement, and it can pinpoint small bear cubs hiding in tree-tops.
Carmen.
Daniel Talstra.
Byron Dohms, foreman.
Colin Wedron.
Duncan Filipek.
Roddy Ward.
The snow on the road going into one of our blocks.
Our snowplow - a front-end loader.
A view of one of the blocks in Dome Creek.
Kevin Theissen, Byron Dohms, and Barrett Dohms.
Some sort of butterfly.
Terry Froese.
Prince George at quarter after five in the morning.
An innovative use of the generator. The warm exhaust is drying a pair of track pants that are propped up in a milk crate. I'm sure someone could make a lot of extra money by bringing coin-operated washers and dryers out to camp!
Scooter, going over some maps.
Doug Baxter, one of our experienced planters. Doug has been planting since about 1987, and was a foreman for a while before electing to return to the [relatively] stress-free life of the mercenary planter.