(Opinion) Bear Flat Dispatch: Tariffs, Blue Jays and a death trap for deer

BEAR FLAT, B.C. — I really liked that Ontario government TV advertisement with archival footage of President Ronald Reagan denouncing trade tariffs.

It was not surprising that the current thin-skinned president became furious and retaliated in a childish manner, but the ad was accurate and very effective in helping to educate people, especially American voters, and that is important.

I see Trump as a bully, and I wish the whole world would quit trying to appease him and instead do more of what Ontario just did to call out his lies. Of course, it is easy for me to say that, and I do sympathize with leaders like Mark Carney who are trying to look out for an entire nation’s interest.

Meanwhile, there is another Canada versus U.S. showdown happening with the World Series. I am not a baseball fan, but I have taken up cheering on the Blue Jays like many others now.

In fact, I am doing what I can to help blue jays by putting out sunflower seeds at our winter bird feeder station earlier than normal. 

Yesterday, a few blue jays showed up and were complaining loudly in their obnoxious way about my lack of caring, so I relented and started putting out feed. Were they thankful? Hard to tell with the raucous noises they were making, but they sure ate a bunch of food, so I hope they are happy.

On a less cheerful note, there has been a high number of traffic impacts with mule deer along Highway 29 here at Bear Flat in the last month.

Fall is always a bad time when more driving is done in the dark and deer are more often on the move. The increase in traffic due to ongoing oilfield activity to the west has also played a big role.

However, another factor we have noticed is the design of the new highway realignment due to the Site C reservoir.

The big sweeping curve coming down the hill into Bear Flat just to our east is a death trap for deer trying to cross. Due to the embankments on both sides and the concrete barriers, drivers often cannot see the deer until they are jumping over the curbs into their lane.

In hindsight, it probably would have been relatively simple to put in a couple of wildlife crossing tunnels under the highway inside the giant embankments that were built up. The money saved from insurance claims likely would be substantial over time, not to mention the reduction in suffering and carnage.

Talking about suffering and carnage, vehicles continue to crash into the bad ‘S’ turn corner further up the hill here.

Those two corners are totally out of sync with the highway and are at the bottom of the steepest stretch. Not a good combination.

In 2003, the contractor that was straightening out the corners above offered to fix those two corners for a good price while he was already mobilized here, but I remember that offer was turned down.

So, more suffering, carnage and cost.