Every fall since I returned to British Columbia twelve years ago I’ve photographed the spectacle and aftermath of the salmon returning to spawn in Vancouver Island rivers. When I started photographing the autumn event I was using black and white film. I shoot mainly digital now, although still shooting some B/W film when out on the rivers, but feel this particular project looks better in …
All posts tagged: Salmon
Salmon Triumph Followed By Tragedy
This photo was taken two weeks ago along Colquitz Creek. The youngsters were being shown a large spawned out male Coho salmon. The volunteers at the creek were ecstatic. They’d been seeing the largest returns of spawning salmon in years. Later that afternoon, an oil spill occurred sending the fluid into the creek. The salmon have disappeared and attempts continue to try and clean the …
Omen of Bones, British Columbia
I’ve been working on a project the past few years, shooting every fall when the salmon return to spawn. These aren’t the images you always see of scarlet bodied fish fighting their way upstream but instead are images of the dead and decaying bodies of the spawned out fish. I’ve been calling this project Omen of Bones and when people ask me what it’s about …
Remembrance Day
The CBC was just announcing that we were coming up to 11 AM and the observance of Remembrance Day as I pulled up to park at Goldstream Park this morning. As I stood on the riverbank in the rain looking at the grey bodies of salmon it was hardly a stretch to make a connection to the bodies of men on the fields of Europe. …