McArthur Island - East and South

A sunshiny day
can take my camera just
about anywhere! 

~ carliewired

I had another sleep-in this morning so I didn't leave the house until almost 7:30. I made coffee my first priority so I did the drive-thru closest to McArthur Island. 

I drove into the park at the east entrance. I could see a good number of Canada geese in the slough on the east side. I drove over to the south edge where I could find lots of marmots gamboling about. They did not disappoint this morning. I could see where food has been left for them. I found one cleaning up the peanut litter around a bench. Another was scraping the last bits from watermelon. They are not supposed be getting handouts, but people do it regardless of the signs. 

I looked over to the Thompson River with the city in the background. Water levels are still high. I caught a flock of Canada geese heading down the river to the west. A pair of marmots were having a tussle in the sand. They must be siblings. 

I moved my car over near the Xeriscape Garden by the east entrance. I walked back to the entrance hoping to find geese, but they must have all launched into the river while I was busy with marmots. I walked back through the Xeriscape Garden trying to stay out of the way of the city crew tending it. They were busy mowing, weeding and weedwhacking. 

I walked down to the boat launch on the east slough. All was quiet there this morning. No birds to be seen anywhere. The trees along the edge of the slough still have their trunks in water. 

The City of Kamloops has been trying to promote xeriscaping for some years. This garden in McArthur Island is a demonstration garden. We are the driest city in the province of British Columbia with an average annual precipitation of less than 14 inches. Yet, we are waterhogs.  The average Canadian uses 326 litres of water per day. We average 800 to 850 litres per day, but in summer that figure can rise to1800 litres per person per day. Most of that goes to watering grass, hosing driveways and washing vehicles. Xeriscaping requires 50% less water than a traditional landscape and usually less mowing, pruning and fertilizing. We all need to get on this bandwagon. 

I'm in for the day. Looks to be a warm one coming on. I might need to close up windows and doors to let my air conditioner finally do some work. 

We have a sunny day in the forecast with a high of 34 C. This is more typical summer weather for us than we've been having thus far!