Bog Elfin - the march west continues (but only just)

[rick cavasin]

Hi All,

Last week, I spent some time visiting some remote bogs west of Bissett Creek Road, on the north side of Algonquin Park.  Last year, I had the species at a bog just East of the road.  Morning temperatures were cool, which may have impacted some searches.  On Thursday, I visited a couple of bogs near Gardiner Lake without success, but the searches were brief and early in the day.  Later in the day, I visited a couple of bogs further south, near Cranberry Lake.  I did manage to find Bog Elfin in one of those bogs.   On Friday, I scouted out routes to another bog complex early in the morning, and then tried a bog along Brent Road, just north of 4 mile Road (south of the 2 bogs I visited in this area last year).  This bog seemed perfectly suitable for the species, but I failed to find it there despite a prolonged search.

So although the range for the species has been extended in the Bissett Creek area, it's not by much.  There is a series of significant hills between Bissett Creek Road and Brent Road (Gardiner Lake is up in those hills).  It may be that these hills acted as a barrier that kept the species from spreading further west.  But we've been wrong about this species so many times before, it's probably premature to be trying to rationalize why it hasn't been found further west.  Someone will likely find it further to the west before long.

Cheers, Rick