Canadian Geographic articles from March 1994

Canadian Geographic archives from March 1994

Our largest woodpecker is thriving. (Canada's pileated woodpecker) (Editorial)
March 1, 1994... WITH ITS flaming red crest, the pileated woodpecker -- Canada's largest -- is one of our most striking birds. Its name perfectly describes its appearance: in Latin pileatus means a "red pointed bonner," and once you've seen one of these...

The age of wind power dawns in Alberta. (windmills in Alberta, Canada)
March 1, 1994... The spiky silhouettes of oil derricks have long been a fixture in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. Now a new breed of structure is rising against that majestic Alberta skyline, designed to tap a different source of natural energy. A...

A chemical-free battle against mosquitoes.
March 1, 1994... Waging war against mosquitoes is practically a national summer ritual for most Canadians. In many prairie cities and towns the battle is fought by spraying sloughs and other breeding grounds with chemical insecticides -- which can kill more...

Living with Pinatubo's fallout.
March 1, 1994... SINCE THE FIERY eruption of Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines in June 1991, the weather in many parts of the world has taken an unusual twist. For the second year running, temperatures in 1993 fell below the record warm levels of the 1980s -- a...

The enchanted woodland. (Ontario's Backus Woods)
March 1, 1994... ON A RAINY, late-April morning, the damp cold seeps through layers of clothing and deep into the bones as Arthur Langford -- a retired professor of botany, now an energetic 83 -- leads a small group of naturalists through a soggy patch of...

Probing the neutrino universe.
March 1, 1994... IT'S DARK as a dungeon way down in Inco's Creighton nickel mine near Sudbury, Ont. And that's the way Queen's University physicist Dr. Art McDonald and an international team of astrophysicists need it to stay. Miners have blasted a gigantic...

Trekking a forgotten land. (Canada's Torngat Mountains)
March 1, 1994... "INCREDIBLE...I'm in heaven!" declared the masked figure beside me. The wind had whipped away some of his words, but it was clear that my travelling companion did not share my own sombre mood. If hauling a heavy sled through a raw, wind-ravaged...

The bird the Haida call the 'trickster.' (ravens)
March 1, 1994... Witb its bigbly evolved brain, tbe raven is a bird of extraordinary intelligence; it also bas a sense of bumour, sometimes at our expense. ONE NORNING IN November 1992, Betty Carpick heard a commotion outside her home in the north end of...

Omen of evil or bird of all knowledge? (ravens)
March 1, 1994... THE COMPLEXITY of the raven's life in nature is richly mirrored by its enigmatic, often paradoxical, place in folklore and literature. Over the centuries, the bird has been portrayed by storytellers and writers as both benevolent and evil, a...

The other Mississippi River.
March 1, 1994... PICTURE IT. I am driving over a long bridge on Highway 7 at Innisville, Ont. -- some 60 kilometres southwest of Ottawa -- when my out-of-province passenger stops talking in mid-sentence and asks incredulously, "Did that sign say Mississippi...

The Legendary Jackrabbit Johannsen.
March 1, 1994... If you seek adventure, a message of hope, and a story of one life that has inspired many, this is the book to have on the bed-stand as this winter winds down. Herman Smith- ("Jackrabbit") Johannsen was a winter character. To this native of...

Prairie Skies.(Brief Article)
March 1, 1994... Anyone who has lived on the Prairies or driven across that seemingly endless expanse would agree with Courtney Milne's description of the prairie sky as "the big blue roof." In his third book of photographs of the vast western plains, Milne, a...

Tatshenshini River Wild.(Brief Article)
March 1, 1994... Like the region it depicts, Tatshenshini River Wild is truly an international book. Forty-nine writers and photographers from Canada and the United States have produced a portfolio of the world's largest internationally protected wilderness....

The World of William Notman: The Nineteenth Century Through a Master Lens.(Brief Article)
March 1, 1994... William Notman was Canada's pre-eminent 19th-century photographer. Born in Scotland in 1826, he came to this country when he was 30 years old, setting up as a portrait photographer in Montreal. His business thrived and eventually he established...

The Company of Adventurers: A Narrative of Seven Years in the Service of the Hudson's Bay Company.
March 1, 1994... There was once great adventure in getting fur out of the Canadian woods, and equal glamour in wearing it. Today, the Canadian fur trade has dwindled to economic insignificance, while the wearer of fur on a city street risks harassment from...

Dr. J. Gordon Nelson awarded Massey Medal.
March 1, 1994... THE SOCIETY'S PATRON, Governor General Ramon Hnatyshyn, presented the Massey Medal to one of Canada's most prominent geographers, Dr. J. Gordon Nelson, on December 17, 1993. Attending the elegant ceremony at Rideau Hall in Ottawa were Dr....

Geographic education efforts well under way.
March 1, 1994... SINCE ITS inauguration last August, the Canadian Council for Geographic Education, a committee established by The Royal Canadian Geographical Society to improve the teaching of geography in Canadian schools (CG Nov/Dec '93), has wasted little...