Dunbar Residents Association News and Events

Wadham’s Salmon Cannery Rivers Inlet B.C. 1940 , it was a place where Ravens Watched salmon fishermen and lady fisher people mending their gillnets on the huge net floats ! This gathering place was a place to work and get ready for next weeks fishing and to be happy or very sad , while talking about about this week catch .

One of the net repair floats was located near a huge floating out door bath room , with logs and old loose planks near its edges , you could not miss it ! it had low ars level railings all around it and some joker put “Mens and Womens Only” at each of the ends ! On the big flood tides the Inlet current ran through the marine pit toilet and cleaned every thing out !

The ravens were always watching for some one to leave his net and also leave behind his open net repair box unattended ! They would immediately swoop down and steal the net repair needles and balls of twine and fly off to their nest ! We kind of fooled the Raiding Ravens , we had a wooden ladder up to the nest and brought all our gear back and they took it from us again, it was a game that we all learned to play!

The cannery had notice boards that gave fisher people news from the big city to the south and lots of warnings about falling in to the monster outdoor toilet, especially after a night of drinking and card playing at the camp managers house ! The Rivers Inlet Sockeye over time kind of got fished to death and canneries like Good Hope , Goose Bay Wadhams and many others, closed and the old cannery places were left for the ravens to look after by themselves again !

The Wadhams fishermens notice boards and the glory hole toilet gave in to the tides and new returning forests ! The little white camp managers house crumbled down to the forest floor and behind one wall was a old glass covered notice board with the beginnings of a song written on it ! It went like this :

Now some of us think of the future
While others have things to forget
But most of us sit here and think of a school of sockeye salmon , just hitting and splashing in our net .

Terry” A Story From Rivers Inlet B. C. “

He is a little male male hummer no bigger than your thumb ! We thought he came on a south west wind just to visit Dunbar or just to maybe have a new” Great White North vacation , away from the desert heat and cactus that he loved so much down south . He arrived in June 2010, probably from Southern California and got stuck in our Greenhouse, we released him in one hand and had a bird book in the other ! Yes a positive I.D. he was a Costa ! Would he go back home to Southern Cal.or Oh My Gosh try to stay here for the 2010, 2011 winter seasons , and find a place some where in Dunbar ? Fall came and the brave little bird fed on the last wild flower nectar in our yard and other gardens near Camosun Street . We set up two different humming bird feeders to see which one he preferred and I panicked and made a hang down a electric heat lamp , ready just in case of a cold spell .

He came most mornings in the cold weather, as soon as it broke light and we had to have the feeder out, before our dog went out. As soon as the day time weather warmed enough for insects, including spiders, to be active, he was busy hunting for them ! Our grand-son asked ” where does he sleep at night grandpa? well thank goodness for old Dunbar houses that leak heat from under the eaves , outside of one of those secret houses, yes under the eaves, that where he finds the best place to sleep the night away ! By about 6.00 P. M. the little bird, snuggled under the eves, slips into a Torpor , “a strange death like sleep that lasts all night long” until he is awakened by the first rays of morning light ! All his energy has now slipped away, gone by his deep sleep and now he has to rush to the nearest feeder, that hopefully is not frozen, to renew his energy, with long drinks of early morning sugar water ! He must also find protein and that is the spiders that are still found alive under the eves of numerous old heat leaking houses !

He stayed all winter and then disappeared in the spring and summer of 2011 , well we all thought he has just got fed up with a Vancouver Winter and like the old Maizy, Lazy Bird in the children’s story book , he must have just headed back down south to his desert home . His vacation in the great North was probably over !

Not so , this year in the fall , sightings of him started to come in again from Dunbar , near Camosun Street , he was feeding from feeders again near our house ! Wow he is still here, amazing news to us all , but will he remember our winter back yard feeder from one year ago , well two cold weeks ago on a very frosty morning,, we grabbed for our binoculars, yes , yes our Greenhouse Costa had returned !

Its 6.30 am in the morning , have you put out the humming bird feeder yet ? ? ? ?

Terry

Hi This is a a Old Slack Family Christmas Story, its kind of sad , but a part of early life in Canada for the Slack Family ! It was a cold and wet winter in 1951 and 4 float houses were anchored or tied next to old abandoned lumber scows under the cliffs of Point Grey, at a place know by the log boom tug boats, as the C. M. E. booming grounds ! Grand dad Frank Slack , Jack and family and Alf and Family moved their float houses from Iona Island to this place under the cliffs, in July 1950 ! A slippery trail followed beside a roaring creek and up to” civilization a , road” , as mom put it ! It was a long walk east along the S. W. Marine Drive road to P. O. Box 13 and a little shopping center at Dunbar and 41st Avenue., it was at last our first introduction to the real Vancouver and had no river to cross to get there !

It was about 2 weeks before the Christmas of 1950, when the rain storms started and they never stopped , the snow melted and the big tides and southeast winds rocked our float house ,. Jack and Alf managed to get more ropes to tie the houses and shore catwalks to trees on the shore line under the cliff ! We had a good supply of cut firewood for our stoves, they made it warm and cosy and it was kind of nice listening to the wind and rain, as we were sleeping next to the warm stove ! We opened our Christmas presents from England a week early and I was really happy to get a Tiddly Winks game and a Boys Own book ! Valerie opened her present to find a Snakes and Ladders game , boy that was great we all enjoyed tossing the dice and moving up the ladder and passing by the snakes ! Just a few days to go to Christmas and the rains came down harder and harder and dad and mom could hear trees cracking on the top of the Cliff ! The tap water from the cliff springs got muddier and muddier and then it clogged up the hose pipe , dad said he would fix it in the morning and we all went to bed, with rain water coming off the roof in sheets,it was like sleeping under a waterfall !

The crashing of trees continued long into the night and then there was a roaring noise , it was the steep bank of mud and shrubs crashing down on top of our float house , the trees missed Franks and Jacks float house and scored a direct hit on the roof of ours !

One large fir tree caved in the roof of our house , just missing us in bed and dad yelled get out , but the deep mud was all around the float house and dad got mired in up to his waist in it ! Jack and Frank came to lend a hand in the pitch black dark and helped us get to a safer place, away from the falling trees ! It was morning and the tide was coming up and flooded out the float house, for it was stuck in the land slide mud and trees and mom just looked and cried and cried ! We had lost every thing that was so precious to us , all our “Christmas Presents” , clothing and food was covered in mud ! It took Dad , Frank and Jack all day to dig the float house free of the mud and thank goodness it floated on the next high tide ! We all pitched in and cleaned up the float house , fixed the roof and got the wood stove going again all in time for Christmas ! Val and I glued up the coloured paper chains to decorate the inside of the repaired roof and I cut off the top of a Hemlock tree that missed our house, it made a lovely well earned Christmas tree ! About 5 days later we celebrated Christmas, next to our old but warm stove and we all played the Tiddly Winks Game long into the night ! This was a never to forget Christmas at the Booming Grounds . I still go down the cliff trail today to see the slide that nearly killed us all and remember that Christmas of 1951 !

Terry

I can remember as a boy when I lived on Iona Island and in the Blenheim Flats , during this time of year I was always siting on the front porch and watching flock after flock of calling Geese moving by , high in the sky ! It was something special to see the V formation leader changing positions and giving another bird the leadership role .

As kids living on Iona Island in the 1950ies, we all ways ran from our floating scow house and watched in wonder as a big flocks swooped down on a foggy evening, to settle on the tidal marshes of Sea and Iona Islands ! The Geese hunters with their camoflaged Duck Punts and strings of decoys were waiting , just as it got dark . My cousin and I always held our ears when the gun barrels and camoflaged hats popped up out of the duck punts and the shooting started ! The hunters Black Labrador retrievers always got very excited when the shooting started and jumped in the” chuck” and paddled around looking for instructions to a downed bird . The hunters called the dogs with a whistle and we thought that was real funny as we blew on our whistle also and that confused the dogs no end, the dogs went splashing kind of round and round and the hunters got real mad . Many of the hunters set up camoflaged blinds on the beach made out of driftwood and cattails, we always ripped them down when they left .

Next morning we got up early and the the Iona kids hunt was on for the spent shot gun shells and pop bottles that we collected and took back to Mr. Piats Confectionary in Lower Dunbar! We got the the 2 cent deposit if we lugged them in our row boat back to Dunbar . Now Terry, Mr Piat would say , I told you before, there is no refund on those Spent Shotgun Shells, but there should be ,Yep Mr Piate was one of the first historic Lower Dunbar recycler,s ! He was nice and always took our muddy pop bottles, but no beer bottles .

I thumped down the 2 cases of Pop Bottles on his pride and joy Black Marble counter ! He pointed to his Candy Display Case, now how many jaw breakers do you want for them Orange Crush ones ? We left his store with two bags of spent shotgun shells and a big bag of Jaw Breakers ! We walked 3 miles, along S. W. Marine drive , down the hill to the Booming Grounds and rowed home to Iona Island sucking on our last Jaw Breaker !

Terry

Its July 10 1957, I can see the first light breaking over the city as I start picking up my salmon gillnet from between the old W.W. 2 Searchlight Towers and the Bell Bouy on Point Grey . The smell of burning wood from the night beach fires that are still l sparking on Wreck Beach ! In the stern of my little gillnetter its also the smells of my navigation kerosene lantern fastened on top of the cabin that I also remember !The silver Sockeye and the few Jack Springs I am saving under the net drum to later take home to eat , each one of them has its own a distinct fish smell !

The rising sun now that seems to be sliding slowly up from behind the West Vancouver mountains and bursting gold off the many windows in the pink apartment over in West Van. is a sign of a great day coming on ! The night stars and the full moon that have been above the beach all night and have been lighting up the corks of my gillnet, they now have all slipped away in the first morning light . !

The gulls above my little gillnetter are calling and looking down trying to see what the night tide might have provided for them ! The big ebbing tide coming out of the harbour now and grabs my gillnet and pushes my boat south across the shallow sand bars off the North Arm of the Fraser River and on to the green light on the end of North Arm Jetty ! The nets wooden corks are down indicating a big catch and the Early Stuart Sockeye are still trying desperatly trying to pass by the net and enter the river ! A early morning cool Westerly Point Grey Wind picks up as I fill the hatch with sockeye !

I watch seaward as other fishboats turn off their “stern pickup lights” and finish picking up their nets ! I see a man on one boat close to me, reach down and lift up the net end light and blow out the sputtering wick inside the hurricane lantern . The night of fishing for Fraser River Sockeye off Wreck Beach is over, yes I am tired its been a long but lovely night under the stars and full moon waiting patiently for the Sockeye !

I watch as other boats near the Point Grey Bell Bouy and Green Light, crank up their night iddling engines and their exaust pipe puffs out grey smoke , yes the night of gillnetting for Stuart Lake Sockeye between the”Wreck Beach Search Light Towers and the North Arm Jetty is over , Yes we are all very tired and at last on our way home !

Its just one of my fishing stories from the past and I always enjoy telling it with my 4 year old grandchild on my knee !

Terry

We can only hope that in the ocean just off San Jaun, deep in the salt water there is enough Early Stuart Fraser River Sockeye moving home to just fill a little piece of their spawning grounds, north of Prince George !This year I can only hope they are just some how late again !

Many times in the past, only during El Nino events on the West Coast of course, those” Sneaky Stuarts” come from the deep ocean and through Johnstone Straits following the mainland shore to the mouth of the Fraser River ” the north entrance route” and on July 10, they will move past Point Atkinson , have a quick peek at Siwash Rock and the mouth of False Creek and pause to drink some Fraser River Freshet Plume Water ! Now they can really smell home ! On the big evening tides during the week of July 10 to July 16th, jumping with joy, on a full moonl rising , the historic Great Stuarts on mass, move in to the river mouth to start their long River Migration home !

Yes for all the years that I gillnetted the Stuarts I was amazed with their precise migration timing and they were the week of Full Moon travellers, as they entered the Fraser River Estuary ! I can only hope to day they have avoided detection and are waiting all along Spanish and North Sturgeon Banks for the full moon of July 15th , to send them all on their way home to Stuart Lake and the spawning streams they are longing so hard for !

Terry Slack ” The Stuart Sockeye Guy”

Hi

I was down at a dock in the North Arm a few days ago trying to bring back my fishing childhood with my trusty AND REPAIRED NUMEROUS TIMES,$12.95 Army and Navy Fibre Glass fishing rod . I found the old Penn Reel, that had a loose button that put it in and out of gear most of the time, It was great, scrounging through the old rusty tackle box, getting ready to fish for Chub again ! Wow whats this warning thing, do I really need a Federal fishing licence to fish for CHUB , BULLHEAD and PIKE MINNOW in Celtic Slough !, my gosh I have been doing my spring chubbing ever since I was 7 years old and it cost me nothinG BUT A SLICE OF BREAD !! Bait , I always took a ball of wet G. B. White Bread,” Chub do not like the brown whole wheat stuff “, a few worms and a little” Knobbly Wobbler Half and Half spoon” that my mom bought for my dad at the Army and Navy Store in the 1950ies . It was great to mosey off down to the little slough at the south foot of Blenheim Street , to fish with the other Blenheim Flats kids and of course the sloughs GREAT BLUE HERON we all called BIG FOOT, was always waiting for a Chub or two !

I can always remember many year ago spending lots of time polishing the Knobby Woddler Spoon with moms Brasso and getting ready for a fishing trip to the Green Light on the west end of the North Arm Jetty . Dad said do not foget my Knobby Wobbler spoon for it would catch all most every thing that has fins on it ! It was a 39 cent Army and Navy Coho Blueback and Chub killer and I kind of always liked the little fish lure for I was incharge of looking after it ! We chugged out of Celtic Slough on a outgoing tide, in our Easthope powered Gillnetter, with lots of fishing friends on board . Destination was the Green Light on the sea ward end of the North Arm Jetty. It was dark so i turned on the Puffs running lights and lit the cabin top Hurricane Lantern ! Boy were we ready for a morning of Spring Blue back Coho salmon fishing out in the Big Sea . The 5 horse power Easthope engine with its model T, 6 volt wooden box coil egnition, sparked in tune with the one lung engine that we salvaged from a wreck on Point Grey ! I loved to steer the old boat with one hand, trying hard to miss the many dead-heads in the river . It was hard peeking by the cabin door that slid back and forth when a tug boat went by! The dangerous to kids, high amperage buz coil sparked and went buz buz as it sat on the windshield shelf ! Do Not touch it dad warned or you will be electrocuted ! The heat from the” Easthopes Goose Neck Exhaust ” was very welcomed inside the carbon monoxcide laced air of the cabin, it kind of made you sleepy, unless the cabin door was wide open ! Dad and friends ,”we for -sure were overloaded with fishermen friends from up the Blenheim Street Hill on this trip ! They ” were very busy polishing the Knobby killer and other spoons and shivering in the cold morning air ! They all kind of huddled under the net drum in the back of the boat with their fishing rods and complained a lot ! Time for a hot breakfast dad announced , as we passed the Inner Light , he took a can of beans, punched a hole in the can and hung it close to the now cherry red goose Neck exhaust pipe of the engine, for we had no stove to cook our breakfast on ! It was a great fishing trip and the “Knobbly Wobbler Half and Half out fished all the Gibbs spoons and flashers ten to one !

So today I am again fishing for Chub, Bullheads and Pike Minnow, with no licence of course and oh my gosh it seems they all kind of like the G. B. White Bread paste and here they go, the nasty Pike Minnows grabbed the old Army and Navy Knobby Wobbler too !

Terry

Hi : On Wed. and Thur. last week the cement sidewalk workers stamped the Salmon and Historic First Nations creek name on the new sidewalk additions at Crown and King Edward Streets .I volunteered with the stamp placings for the Salmon and Khahtsulek Creek name and the pressings went very well .

Click to Enlarge

The Coho Salmon stamps on the east side of the Street are in a design and a direction that focuses on the juvenile migrating salmon moving from the Historic Convent Stream, now Saint Georges Junior School property . This little brook twisted and bubbled it way to the main creek at 29th. and Wallace Street . A little fresh water spring and stream , a eastern tributary of Khahtsulek Creek, historically provided fresh water for the Convent buildings and a spawning place for Wild Dunbar Coho and Sea run Cutthroat Trout !

I gathered Blue stones from a creek to the north, that drains onto South Spanish Banks and i used them to represent the meandering stream and Coho spawning gravels ! Sandra Thomas of the Courier was very interested in this Dunbar event, but was on holiday during the First of hopefully many historic salmon Creeks of Vancouver Sidewalk stampings . Loretta Woodcock of the Parks Board was on hand to see the first official recognition of a historic Salmon Spawning stream on the west side of Van .

Waiting for the cement to dry, for just right time, to make the stampings , was like the Historic Coho Salmon waiting for the right weather and creek conditions, to enter the Creeks mouth at the North Arm of the Fraser River !

Yes it was exactly a hundred Years ago that the last Wild Coho of Dunbar, spawned in our neighbourhood !

Terry