Local News from Across the Rainy River District
When people hear the word peony, they most often think back to the garden of their grandmother or great-grandmother. Peonies have been around for generations because they are reliable, winter-hardy, quick-growing perennials with one of the most favoured flowers. These easy care perennials provide a garden with a sweet scented […]
Well, spring certainly felt as though it arrived over the weekend and I’m hearing only warmer temperatures are in store for this coming weekend. Monday’s drizzle certainly made things feel more like spring—icy and messy in the barn yard. But I’m sure those people experiencing water problems are welcoming some […]
One of the most plentiful fish we have in lakes across our region is also the least targeted by anglers. The lake whitefish has long been popular with commercial fishermen because they are great to eat, but have received little pressure from sport anglers. Whitefish prefer cold water so that […]
Subsurface, or tile, drainage is an aid to agricultural production, as well as a very important soil and water conservation practice. In essence, it is a technique for controlling the water table by means of drainage pipe installed at a certain depth in the ground. The depth and spacing […]
Often in the world of hockey, the best teams in the regular season fail to win out in the playoffs. Just ask the Ferris State Bulldogs, who were one of the top teams in the NCAA all season but fell in their conference quarter-finals Sunday to the Bowling Green Falcons—a […]
There are two species of cuckoo in Ontario—Black-billed and Yellow-billed. Casual observation shows that they are very much alike, however, since the Yellow-billed is nowhere near most of Northern Ontario, you don’t have to worry about mixing them up. The Black-billed Cuckoo is a fairly plain bird, brown on top […]
This past week, the Conservative government of Stephen Harper defeated an NDP motion to help Canada’s veterans during what is sure to be a slash-and-burn budget process this spring. As part of the Conservative government’s spending review and desire to cut its massive budget deficit, each department has been asked […]
In the past six weeks I’ve written about outing the “elephant” (suicide), how joy is medicine, how books take me places, my black cape, a roller-coaster ride, and my desperate need for tweezers and for advocates who will listen and not give advice. The latter are worth their weight in […]
I don’t like to drink coffee. Actually, I’m not particularly fond of any hot drinks, so it isn’t just coffee. Tea, hot chocolate, and hot toddies all fall into the category of “I don’t like.” My mouth burns easily compared to my friends, who can swallow steaming coffee straight from […]
I originally thought of Bill Fontana as being irascible. The first time I learned of him was in the office of the Fort Frances Times that then was located on Church Street; he was in meeting with Carl Schubring, the newspaper’s editor at the time. Bill was loud. He seemed […]
When I first met the poems of Toyohiko Kagawa, I was 21 years old. Young and carefree! My good friend, Margaret Meyer, and I were roommates as we worked at the church publishing house for the summer. We were both writers and loved poetry. So that summer, we read poetry […]
In recent months and years, a great deal of attention has been paid to the impacts of bullying in our schools. A lot of this attention has been focused on high-profile suicides that have been caused by bullying. As a result, the government introduced Bill 13, better known as anti-bullying […]
