Cockles & mussels, alive? alive? Oh.

'Mussels on drugs' found near Victoria sewage outfalls

Study finds concentrations of pharmaceuticals and
personal care products in 
molluscs exposed to wastewater

(CBC News Feb. 15, 2018)

"Drug tests on sea life near the sewage outflow pipes around Victoria (British Columbia's capital) are giving new meaning to the old expression "happy as a clam"!


"Monitoring by the Capital Regional District has found high concentrations of antidepressants, as well as other pharmaceuticals and personal care products in shellfish near the sewage outfalls around Victoria.


"Chris Lowe, who supervises environmental monitoring programs for the CRD has, said  the region has been collecting wastewater samples since 2003 to monitor pharmaceuticals. Testing expanded to sediment and mussel tissue samples as the ability to detect and analyze those compounds improved in recent years."

Victoria, British, Columbia. Too pretty for a raw sewage problem, but it's there.

"Everything from antimicrobials, pain medication, synthetic birth control, antidepressants... pretty much any pharmaceuticals that humans take" will be seen in sewage unless it's a very short-lived compound.

"Lowe said completion of the region's wastewater treatment facility, expected near the end of 2020, will keep most drugs and other harmful compounds out of the ocean. "It will substantially reduce the compounds and some may be gone completely.

"The treatment process will also remove compounds of concern for ocean life such as orcas, which are higher up the food chain."

Orca (aka "killer whale") leaping.
Orcas use breaching (jumping) to communicate when the noise of the ocean would mask acoustic signals.
Orcas are very family-oriented and travel in groups known as "pods."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killer_whale

Orcas, it says...orcas!  Higher up the food chain than clams?

Well, I must agree with Mr. Lowe on that! BC's beautiful Killer Whales (aka orcas) are certainly than more evolved than clams, and likely to be more intelligent.

When I grow up, I want to be a sewage biologist—I'm likely more intelligent than clams, too.

Okay, this is the 21st Century, sewage-folk. Why didn't you know all these facts before? Why wait until shellfish are full of poison? Must it take such a long time to fix the problem?

I despair for my country, perhaps especially for British Columbia, the province of my birth. Someone, somewhere in BC's capital city, must have known that Victoria's raw sewage has been going into the Pacific Ocean since 1843, and realized before the 21st century that it was probably a bad idea.

Why, then, is it going to take 17 years, from the year 2003 until the predicted year 2020 to fix the sewage problem? Surely there are sewer workers willing to work a 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. shift as I did?
I used to work for a company employing so many people in one department that 24 hours were divided into three shifts, with production around the clock.

No, I've never built a sewage system for a major city, but I whitewashed an outhouse once, and I do have an opinion on the subject of waste. My solution is: "Move faster, folks, get a move on, before the Pacific Ocean dies and takes Victoria with it!"

As readers of my blog have already been informed, I want to express my opinion on all of my pet peeves before I kick the proverbial bucket. I'm getting oldish, am in mediocre health, and could get hit by a bus tomorrow. Why, I've already waited for Spring, so I'm doing it now.

Posting for Fiona's memorable meme
Our World Tuesday

Are fish farms trampling BC's seas?

If you think the crude oil pipeline across British Columbia's beautiful wilderness is the only environmental issue about which I am passionate — well, it is NOT.

Mom loved river fishing, too

I still care about many other things,

especially the many other things

threatening CANADA'S WEST COAST!

Yes, Canada's West Coast!

This isn't just British Columbia's coast:

IT IS MY COUNTRY'S WEST COAST!

Take fish, for instance. I don't remember a time in my life when my father didn't love fishing. When we lived in the interior of British Columbia, he was an avid river fisherman. Dad and his friends, Nick and Tom, would have been exploring rivers every weekend if not for domestic responsibilities.

After I finished high school, Dad moved us to the coast: to White Rock, then a pretty little town sporting a nice long pier for walking, and ever-present hopefuls (adults and youngsters) with fishing rods, trying their luck.

Well, my Dad always got up to something with his buddies, wherever he was. As soon as he finished renovating the cute little house-with-a-wonderful-view that we bought soon after our arrival, he was able to turn his mind to saltwater fishing.

Not our boat but similar, circa 1960

Enter another of his buddies, an Albertan with similar dreams of saltwater fishing and trophy-size salmon. Together, Dad and his friend Ralph bought a boat, which they spruced up before launching it into the waters off Crescent Beach. Dad had just finished painting the name on the boat when two young boys came by and asked him what the name meant.
With a straight face, my father pointed to his work and said, "Non-A-Mee. It's an ancient name meaning Boat That Catch Many Fish."

"Oh, wow!" said the boys before they wandered off.

(The name Dad and Ralph had chosen was "NONAME" without a space between the O and the second N, but we did pronounce it "Non-A-Mee" after that!)

So, with boat and motor spruced up and launched, off they went in search of the wild salmon. Before they could catch anything, however, their boat was stolen, and found afterward wrecked on a beach just south of the international boundary.
No fish for Dad and Ralph.

SO...BACK ON TOPIC...are fish farms ruining BC salmon stocks?

Fish Farms Expose Wild Salmon to Deadly Virus, Study Finds

Wild fish exposed to farms are nine times more likely to carry virus linked to deadly disease. (This is not new news.)

Wild salmon in British Columbia face a number of threats throughout their life cycle: widespread destruction of upstream habitat caused by logging, roadbuilding; reduced food supply caused by exploitation of forage fish species; warming waters due to climate change; pathogens and aquatic pollution to destructive fishing practices and overfishing.

Sockeye stocks have been in overall decline since at least the 1950s, while chinook and coho stocks in particular have been in severe decline since 1990.

Dull grey sky and water but fishermen must work.
Victoria Times-Colonist photo

The Federal government and  the provincial government have gutted legislation protecting freshwater habitat for wild salmon in favour of industrial development, and the continues to support and promote open net pen salmon farming on the B.C. coast, as does the provincial government.

Among these threats, fish farming is perhaps the easiest to tackle through legislative changes to farm siting and practices.

Wild salmon are the foundation of the Great Bear Rainforest ecosystem. Killer whales, sea lions and other marine mammals feed on salmon at sea. Each autumn, black, Spirit and grizzly bears, wolves, eagles, gulls and a host of other wildlife gather in estuaries and along rivers to feast on salmon swimming upriver, returning to spawn in their natal streams.

At the end of their life cycle: 
salmon moving inland jump
upriver to reach spawning grounds

The end of the salmon life cycle brings renewal to the rainforest, delivering ocean-derived nutrients to the forests.

Wild salmon have been central to First Nations cultures on the B.C. coast for thousands of years (yes, thousands!) and coastal communities continue to rely on salmon for sustenance and sustainable livelihoods.

Wild salmon are also the cornerstone of B.C.’s tourism industry, whether they are featured in local cuisine or as the main food source for whales, bears and other wildlife which attract so many visitors to the province.

Sunrise, San Felipe,
Baja California, Mexico

And there is more...

'British Columbia's government:

complicit in contamination.'

Coming soon to a blog post near here.

Posting for Fiona's ever-so-popular meme

Skywatch Friday

Watch my blog for future Skywatch photos, some with no rants at all, plus some pictures from my parents' many winters on Mexico's Baja Peninsula. Wonderful skies, those Mexicans. I don't know how they do it!

Assorted skies for Skywatch

OFFERING A FEW SKY SHOTS (two with double meanings)
for Fiona's beautiful meme
Skywatch Friday

WE GET AROUND...or at least we used to! 
Not so much now, so these are from earlier travels.

HAWAII

SAN DIEGO

At home: hoar frost against deep blue winter sky. In summer, cirrus clouds stripe a pale blue sky.

If it takes a rant or two a day

Note:  
I have held back for some time before publishing this column for Our World Tuesday, even hoping that the live-and-let-live side of me might prevail but, no, the indignant, opinionated, never-say-die part of my brain continues to believe the rant I've written here. I'm doing my best to reign in my anger and disappointment, but I admit I may not have succeeded.

Alberta's Premier, Rachel Notley, a member of the New Democratic Party, recently abandoned her party's left-wing mandate, in order to vote with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in approving further construction of Kinder Morgan's crude oil pipeline across the Rocky Mountains, then across British Columbia to the beautiful west coast.
British Columbia's premier John Horgan has been left in their wake to explain the why and wherefore to his concerned constituents in BC.

SECOND NOTE:

Since I wrote this rant, and put off publication until I had my anger under control, something has happened here in western Canada...

There has been an oil spill in

Premier Notley's province of Alberta!

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/paramount-resources-zama-city-pipeline-leak-1.4621904

Now here is proof that oil spills can happen anywhere at any time.
Proof right here in oil-producing Alberta.

What now, my fine-feathered friends?

Well, for what it is worth, here is the rant I wrote last week on the subject of mountains, pipelines, tanker ships, coastal waters, and oil spills.

Rachel Notley, left, Justin Trudeau, John Horgan (CBC photos)

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau may just have sealed the fate of the province of my birth: my beautiful British Columbia. I am very disappointed in young Mr. Trudeau, because even he, from his prime ministerial seat in our nation's capital, cannot guarantee that the expansion of the Kinder Morgan company's oil pipeline across the Rocky Mountains from Edmonton, Alberta, and from there through British Columbia, will not result in an oil spill of disastrous proportions.

Perhaps a mountain or coastal spill won't happen soon, maybe not in what's left of my lifetime, but crude oil pipelines can never be guaranteed safe. And spills do happen, and happen often, as Washington State residents, just across the international border from BC, can attest. And now, as Albertans have learned as well.

https://twnsacredtrust.ca/concerns/spill-record/

So bear with me (no pun intended, though bears can well be victims of a spill) and I'll give you my opinion. It is "an ill-favoured thing but mine own." (Thank you, Will S.)

Canadian Rockies.net

The Prime Minister, together with Alberta Premier Rachel Notley, would seem to have outwitted British Columbia's premier John Horgan in order to force on him, and on his fellow British Columbians, the hotly-protested continuation of Kinder Morgan's Trans Mountain pipeline carrying dirty crude bitumen more than 1000 kilometres (600+ miles) from Edmonton, Alberta, through the iconic Canadian Rocky Mountains, then across British Columbia to huge storage tanks built on the shore of Burrard Inlet, near the mouth of a beautiful steep-sided glacial fjord called Indian Arm.

As Trudeau and Notley and Kinder Morgan all know: any pipeline, anywhere, is a crisis waiting to happen. Certainly BC Premier Horgan knows spills happen, as do most residents of Canada's westernmost province. (See Alberta spill, above.)

The Kinder Morgan pipeline could break underground anywhere along its length, spilling the crudest of crude oil into a fragile ecosystem already strained by human usage. An underground break might take some time to be discovered, increasing the damage, as happened with this month's leak in Alberta.

The Prime Minister said that the oil is intended for foreign markets. This means, of course, moving it long distances in tanker ships!

https://clearseas.org/tankers/https://clearseas.org/tankers/

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/pipeline-kinder-morgan-analysis-chris-hall-1.4620823

Stanley Park, Vancouver

From beautiful Indian Arm, near the city of Port Moody, BC. huge tanker ships will carry Alberta's oil some 40 kilometres through Burrard Inlet, past the Burnaby Mountain Conservation Area, under the Second Narrows Bridge, past downtown Vancouver and North Vancouver, under the Lions Gate Bridge, past iconic Stanley Park, West Vancouver, and the University of BC Endowment Lands.

You might well wonder whereof I speak, and with what authority — and you'd be right to ask. Well, once upon a time in Vancouver long ago, part of my job at the Sun daily newspaper was keeping track of the ships that came in and out of Vancouver Harbour. It was interesting — I had to list the names of the ships and their countries of registration, some from far, far away, and I enjoyed the exotic names of some of the vessels. Marine traffic in the 1960s was nothing like it is now, of course, it wasn't unusual to see a dozen or more ships anchored offshore near English Bay, each waiting its turn to move under the Lions Gate Bridge to enter a terminal.
The port of Vancouver, BC, now has 25 marine terminals: 3 container, 17 bulk cargo, and 5 break bulk cargo. As of  this writing in mid-April, there are 104 vessels in port, with 55 expected arrivals.

159 ships is a whole lotta ships, and I don't know if Vancouver should be too nonchalant about the possibility of problems...maybe not this month, maybe not this year, but there is always the chance of disaster, which would undoubtedly be widespread.

According to an Angus Reid poll "67% of Canadians are concerned about the potential for oil spills in Canadian waters. Marine oil spills can occur when vessels are involved in accidents or incidents.  The consequences of large-scale oil spills on wildlife, ecosystems, coastal and Indigenous communities and local economies can be significant."

Any oil spill cleanup is a nasty business

POSTING FOR FIONA'S

OUR WORLD TUESDAY

BECAUSE THIS IS MY WORLD

Destroying the ancients

The Cheewhat Giant, a western red cedar in Pacific Rim National Park Reserve, several hours north of Lake Cowichan on Vancouver Island, is 56 metres (183.7 feet) high, and 18.8 metres (61.7 feet) in circumference. It is the largest tree in Canada.

I am too old to tie myself to a tree in order to protect it from loggers, as do so many good people who believe in the conservation of old-growth forests. However, I am able to post my objections here on my own blog.

These dignified old-growth trees are so large it is often impossible for a hiker to see the sky. They form a wilderness cathedral for those who believe in conservation rather than destruction, decimation, annihilation, devastation and destruction.

“The old-growth forest and lichen-covered rocky outcrops on Juniper Ridge are endangered, sensitive ecosystems growing on extremely thin soils. It would take centuries for the old-growth forest to fully recover here after logging. With the trend of harvesting smaller sized trees with shorter logging rotations, these old growth Douglas Fir ecosystems will never have the chance to return.” 

“This forest is heavily used by wintering deer, and was intended to be preserved for this purpose.” 

Those are the words used by experts in ecology who, like me and so many of my friends, mourn the looming loss of giants in British Columbia's old-growth forests, on the mainland and on Canada's offshore islands, especially on Vancouver Island where logging companies have grabbed up so much of the land.

BC is home to some of the largest, oldest and most impressive trees in the world, but many of them are not yet protected. (British Columbia Magazine)

The only options open to protesters used to be forming human chains to block logging trucks and stand up to the loggers, and to send letters (which may or not get printed) to newspapers— but now environmentalists can send e-mails to editors, and can twitter and tweet to give voices to the animals and birds who live in these forests but cannot tweet for themselves.

Tweeting is popular with some very powerful people now, so why shouldn't bird-lovers join the chorus? I must admit I don't know how to tweet, although of course I blog, and I also use Facebook, so now I beseech the tweeters among you to tweet to give voices to the birds in the trees.

If the trees are still standing, that is. If they haven't gone the way of the dinosaur.

I am trying, here, to be as calm and rational as I can, but the words "rape" and "pillage" come to mind, and might offend readers of my blog. However, I have reached old age without changing my opinions on environmental matters, so I want to do something, somehow, while I still have the time. And there are so many environmental matters!

We haven't done much traveling lately, so I am using my blog as a platform for protest. Bear with me, blogging buddies...I will have other topics sometimes, you can be sure.

Posting for Fiona's
Sky Watch Friday

Will they shut down Venice?

Photos Kay Davies and Richard Schear

Young Venetians
who love the canals

Richard and I have been to Venice more than once, and I can't honestly say there are no unattractive parts, but it's a large city, so I acknowledge that there might be some less-than-perfect places!
However, there are so many lovely spots, as in the photo above, and so many quintessential Venetian scenes (see the canal below) that imperfection is somehow hard for tourists to imagine.

Rumors and stories now have it, however, that this ancient city will soon be closed to cruise ships.
I think I can understand that. Passengers who disembark to explore the city might buy souvenirs, yes, but they don't stay in local hotels, and might not even visit local restaurants.
Some tourists, instead, leave trash on the narrow sidewalks, and throw things into the canals so beloved by Venetian citizens.

It's all very well, however, for me to say "off with their heads!" because neither of us had ever been averse to exploring the city before sailing away with hardly a look back...

I don't know if there is any one answer to the cruise ship question that will satisfy all, but Venetian officials are studying the situation seriously and, of course, at some length.

A wide range of water transport is available beneath Venetian skies.

While wandering Venice during our first visit, years ago, we loved to spot our hotel from a short distance, knowing that this church door marked our stop to leave the vaporetto and turn left to the bridge and from there to to the hotel's own door. Not simple, but certainly scenic.

And my question
in the header above?
Much has been written about the possibility of a Venetian cruise shutdown but we'll never know until everything has been discussed, until all the decisions have been considered, made, reconsidered, and probably re-discussed.
http://www.travelandleisure.com/cruises/venice-large-cruise-ship-ban

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/08/venice-cruise-ship-traffic-restricted-amid-concerns-over-damage-to-buildings

Meanwhile, I'm very grateful my husband and I have been able to explore Venice.
I'm not quite so grateful, however, that he made me walk a vast distance from his hotel to the cruise ship port a year or two ago when I joined him for a cruise down the Adriatic Sea and up the Mediterranean Sea to Barcelona.

Large and healthy husband
Richard Schear

Dick had gone to Venice early...not, however, to clear the way for his unfit wife, but to make sure he would get to see all the sights on his list before I arrived to slow him down!
I might, some day, forgive him for dragging me, on foot, speedily (not my preferred speed: I couldn't keep up) through all the ups and downs from the Venice airport to the cruise ship terminal.

I had been quietly and peacefully visiting with friends in Scotland and England while he wandered Venice to his heart's content. I then flew out to join him for a cruise down the Adriatic, then up the west coast of Italy, and across to Barcelona.
It's been a little while now since that trip, and I still let him get away with being flagrantly healthy in spite of my hobbling ways.

Posting for  Our World Tuesday 

that marvellous meme from Fiona in Sweden.

Grey, green, blue, sky and sea: Montenegro

Montenegro, meaning "Black Mountain" is a sovereign state in Southeastern Europe. It has a coast on the Adriatic Sea to the southwest and is bordered by Croatia to the west, Bosnia and Herzegovina to the northwest, Serbia to the northeast, Kosovo to the east, and Albania to the southeast. (Wikipedia)

After visiting friends in Scotland and England a couple of years ago, I joined my husband, Richard Schear, for a cruise down the Adriatic Sea with a stop in beautiful, legendary Montenegro, and then up the Mediterranean. I was thrilled and excited about Montenegro.

 Cruise ships on of the Bay of Kotor (Wikipedia photo)

Once upon a time, long ago and far away, an American author named Rex Stout wrote a series of books about a reclusive Montenegran detective named Nero Wolfe.
Wolfe was the main character, along with his assistant, Archie Goodwin, in Rex Stout's 33 novels between 1934 and 1975.
Portly and ponderous, Wolfe does not reveal much about himself, keeping his Montenegran past murky while confining himself and his detective work to his luxurious brownstone in New York. He is loath to leave his home for business, or for anything that would keep him from reading his books, tending his orchids, and eating gourmet meals prepared by his personal chef.
Archie Goodwin, Wolfe's sharp-witted, dapper young confidential assistant, narrates the cases and does the legwork for the detective genius. (Paraphrased from Wikipedia.)

Montenegran monk
walking along the shore path
(Kay Davies photo)

When I found out we would be visiting the town of Kotor in Montenegro, I was ecstatic. Since I was a youngster and first discovered Rex Stout's most famous fictional character, Nero Wolfe, I was fascinated by the idea of Montenegro, said to be the land of that fictional character's birth.
I don't remember when I started reading Rex Stout's novels. I was a prodigious reader from a young age and when I discovered the Nero Wolfe books at the public library, I was hooked. 
Montenegro, sigh! Oh, yes, I know Nero Wolfe is a fictional character, but I somehow understand how he felt about Montenegro. It is so beautiful even, and sometimes especially, in the fog that creeps down the mountains.

From the time our cruise ship turned east from the Adriatic Sea to enter magnificent Kotor Harbor, I was excited. More than excited!
While casually shopping and exploring in the town of Kotor, occasionally looking upward to look for my husband walking the zig-zag path to the top of the mountain, I was thrilled just to be there. (I couldn't see him, but I did see a monk on the shore path, and I met many friendly Montenegran cats.)

I could live here!
(Kay Davies photo)

Richard walked this zig-zag path
to the top of the mountain
(Wikipedia photo)

In my excitement, I announced to my husband that I wanted to move to Montenegro, until he reminded me of the effect wet weather has on my fibromyalgia — the reason, I had to agree ruefully, why I had moved away from British Columbia's wet west coast to the dry interior of BC and from there to Alberta's dry, desert prairie some years ago. Sigh.



Cats roam everywhere in Kotor. The Montenegrans, especially fishermen, feed the cats but give them free rein to explore and to discuss the day's events with passing tourists, perhaps earning treats, or else just enjoying some stroking and skritching. (Kay Davies photo)
See Wikipedia

(Wikipedia photos)

There are two islets off the shore of Kotor, but my photo above does not show detail, better seen in these photos from Wikipedia. Note the dome visible on the island to the right. It is a church called "Our Lady of the Rocks." You can see an overhead view of the islands in the photo below. "Our Lady of the Rocks" looks almost like a ship when seen from above. For details about the church and its significance: See Wikipedia

Looking down to the Bay of Kotor and the islands mentioned above. (Wikipedia photo)

Posting here for Fiona's fabulous... 

Skywatch Friday!

O Canada, how we mourn for thee

More than one generation
of my family played hockey

Life,
and death,
on the ice

The game of ice hockey has long been Canada's favourite sport, although not our national game. Therefore, it is no wonder that our country is now deep in mourning following a terrible bus/truck crash on a lonely stretch of Saskatchewan highway.

When I was young, no one in our small hockey-playing town even considered the idea that there might be any other kind of hockey than ice hockey. We had never heard of field hockey and, when our dad told us about it, my brother and I just laughed. Backyard ice hockey, yes. Down-the-middle-of-an-icy-road games, we played those, too. But hockey without ice, no way!



ICE, however, that so-essential part of the game, contributed to 15 deaths in the cold of a prairie winter, as a team bus carried the Humboldt Broncos hockey team toward a game scheduled in Nipiwan, Saskatchewan.

But the Nipiwan Hawks waited in vain for their opponents to arrive.
Canadians later learned that the team bus would have had the right-of-way, rather than the truck also involved in the fatal collision.
So far, as of April 9, I have no details except for the aerial photo and the links below.

CBC photo of the intersection where the transport truck and the team bus collided

Over the course of this past weekend, the death toll rose to 15...players, coaches, a young math whiz who was the team statistician...and no one came out of the crash unscathed, either physically, mentally or emotionally.

Families, friends, nationally-known hockey personalities, and Prime Minister Trudeau and his son...gathered in Humboldt, Saskatchewan, while the rest of our nation followed the memorial service on television.
"Not a dry eye in the place" barely suffices as a description of that gathering, and yet, there was some small degree of healing as neighbour embraced neighbour, brother hugged sister, and visiting sport legends shared their solidarity as only fellow hockey players can.
Mourners included survivors of previous team bus crashes, members of Canadian Olympic hockey teams, members of the National Hockey League, sports broadcasters and many others.

Across Canada, news stories continue as details unfold, and as the world mourns.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/st-albert-raiders-humboldt-broncos-1.4610779

www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/humboldt-broncos-team-bus-crash-1.4610242

http://www.kamloopsthisweek.com/news/swift-current-broncos-1986-bus-crash-survivor-reflects-on-humboldt-tragedy-1.23259306

Sharing with Fiona's Our World Tuesday

Beautiful Barcelona, Antoni Gaudi, and me

Grey skies never deter devoted visitors to Spain...

I have always loved Barcelona.

It seems to me that work never stops on La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, Spain.
Cranes and scaffolding can be seen behind the greenery behind and on either side.

Famed Spanish architect Antoni Gaudi's masterpiece cathedral,
on which he worked for 43 years, is still under construction,
but is expected to be finished in 2026.

Gaudi was born in 1852 in Baix Camp, then the second city in Catalonia.
In 1859 he took over the design of Spain's most widely known church, La Sagrada Familia.
In 1914, Gaudi left all other work to concentrate exclusively on this project,
until a tragic accident led to his death on June 10, 1926.

His funeral cortege went through most of Barcelona, and finished
in the cathedreal—a grand event in recognition of his status as
the greatest architect Barcelona has ever seen. He was buried
in the chapel of Our Lady of Mount Carmel in the crypt of the Sagrada Familia.

Sharing here for the ever-popular meme,
Skywatch Friday

Helpful information found

This is my second Our World post for this week, because I wanted to share what I'd found. I typed miles of information, all of which looked awful on my page preview: it looked like I'd clipped it and pasted it onto my page, with all the type on white strips. Plug ugly, so I deleted it. That didn't help, so here it is, white strips and all.

So I'll keep it brief because the cut-and-paste look hasn't gone away. It's still good information, although probably not complete, because I'm no expert.

This morning while toying with the idea of  doing a bit of gardening, I came up with extensive information about plants that are poisonous to pets.

Our little terrier-cross is pretty much omnivorous...she'll eat anything that isn't nailed down, so I did a bit of research, and it turned into a lot of research, none of which would show up properly on my page here, according to the preview button.

There are a great many things that are poisonous to pets, so I'm just going to list some of them and include a helpful link.

Autumn Crocus

Azalea

Cyclamen

Kalanchoe

Lilies

Oleander

Dieffenbachia

Daffodils

Lily of the Valley

Sago Palm

Tulips and Hyacinths

More information can be found at
Pet Poison Helpline
(A 24-hour animal poison control service available in the US, Canada and the Caribbean.)

Sharing with Our World Tuesday