Sara Spike
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saraspike.bsky.social
Sara Spike
@saraspike.bsky.social
1.8K followers 970 following 360 posts
Cultural historian of rural communities and coastal environments in Atlantic Canada. The ocean and the woods. Visual cultures. Senses. Fog. Flora.
Adjunct Prof, Dalhousie University.
Executive Committee, NiCHE.
PhD, settler, she/her
https://saraspike.ca
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saraspike.bsky.social
Finally rain 🌧
Raindrops falling on the surface of the ocean at low tide with yellow seaweed all around. An assortment of small plastic and metal buckets set out on the grass to catch rainwater, each partially full.
August 25, 2025 at 6:40 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
Big high tide, the goldenrod is swimming xo
A patch of blooming goldenrod is partially submerged in water in evening light.
August 25, 2025 at 1:10 AM
saraspike.bsky.social
Blueberries 💙
A bowl partially full of blueberries placed among leafy blueberry bushes with ripe berries, a beagle is snuffling nearby.
August 17, 2025 at 8:33 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
Mackerel xo
Blue water over the gunwhale of an aluminum boat. Two people wearing sun hats and life jackets fishing with rods from a small aluminum boat. A beagle is sitting on one person's lap. Two mackerel caught on a line being lifted into the air. A white bucket on a wooden wharf with 7 small mackerel in it and a beagle looking in.
July 30, 2025 at 11:09 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
I was asked to write about my local section of the Trans Canada Trail. Here is my short essay called "Remembering the Blueberry Express," about rail to trail along the coast of Nova Scotia tctrail.ca/stories/reme...
#envhist #cdnhist @transcanadatrail.bsky.social
Two people walking away from the camera on a flat gravelled trail with bright blue sky and blue water around them.
July 24, 2025 at 4:09 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
Finally found the fog, at Cape Spear Lighthouse xo
A small white building with a red roof on a hill surrounded by fog, a yellow sign warns that the fog alarm may sound at any time.
July 18, 2025 at 10:09 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
Getting foggy at the Memorial U Folklore and Language Archive @munfla-archive.bsky.social
A reading room with large brown tables and filing cabinets along the wall. A MUNFLA Legend Index card with synopsis of a story from Change Islands: the cries of men drowned at sea could be heard on foggy summer nights until a priest rowed out and gave them a proper burial service.
July 17, 2025 at 7:55 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
My mom made a lot of the clothes for this fashion show, based on historical photos from our local archives. It promises to be a lovely time, and another great reason to come to the Eastern Shore 💗
visitmemorylane.ca/events/1940s...
A woman in 1940s garb on a poster advertising the 1940s Costume Magic Fashion Gala at Memory Lane Heritage Village, August 9 and 10.
July 16, 2025 at 12:56 AM
saraspike.bsky.social
Looking for fog in St. John's at @theroomsnl.bsky.social
A pile of yellowed paper on a wooden table beside a big window looking out over St. John's harbour.
July 15, 2025 at 5:03 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
Heading to eastern Newfoundland to visit archives and talk to folks about fog. Any suggestions for fog- or non-fog-related activities, great community museums, excellent food, people to connect with all greatly appreciated! Hoping to get back to Elliston, where I took this photo a few years ago ❤️
Three puffins perched at the edge of a rocky cliff, the foggy ocean behind them.
July 11, 2025 at 6:11 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
Fog dogs xo
Four dogs in a row standing on a sandy beach on a very foggy day. A bend in a channel, everything is grey and foggy. The horizon is a low strip of beach grass across a still channel in the fog. Ripples left on the sand by the receding tide in the fog.
July 6, 2025 at 5:44 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
Early July in the understory means wood sorrel (Oxalis montana) #wildflowers #bloomscrolling
A cluster of green shamrock-shaped leaves and a few delicate white and pink star-shaped flowers.
July 5, 2025 at 2:06 AM
saraspike.bsky.social
Onto tiny and pink, here's the wee, fragrant Twinflower (Linnaea borealis) carpeting the woods #wildflowers #bloomscrolling
A cluster of tiny pink bell shaped flowers on thin stalks.
June 28, 2025 at 11:51 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
Bunchberry now (Cornus canadensis) #wildflowers #bloomscrolling
Bright white four petalled blooms surrounded by prominent green leaves, growing on the forest floor. (Actually the white petals are modified leaves and the flower is the little yellow bracts at the centre of the bloom.)
June 16, 2025 at 8:19 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
On we go with Maianthemum canadense
#wildflowers #bloomscrolling
A cluster of tiny white starry flowers and their bright green glossy leaves on the forest floor.
June 12, 2025 at 11:47 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
Picking spruce tips to make jelly and syrup xo
A woven basket full of green spruce tree tips next to a spruce bough. Bright green spruce tips on a tree.
June 12, 2025 at 11:42 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
First ocean swim, summer is on.
View from out in the water of a rocky shoreline and background of leafy trees, a beagle is standing on a rock at the left of the image. A white house is visible through the trees. Looking down a small hill through the leafy trees toward the water where the other photo was taken.
June 6, 2025 at 8:38 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
Clintonia borealis blooming now in the woods xo

#wildflowers #bloomscrolling
A large clump of bright green leaves and small yellow bell-shaped flowers growing on the forest floor. Close up of the yellow flowers, frilly bells on tall stalks.
June 5, 2025 at 8:55 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
The Rhodora (Rhododendron canadense) is blooming now in the woods, as it ever was 💜

"if eyes were made for seeing,
Then beauty is its own excuse for Being"
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1834)

#wildflowers #bloomscrolling #envhist #envhum
Feathery purple flowers blooming against the backdrop of the green forest floor. "The Rhodora: On Being Asked, Whence Is the Flower?" In May, when sea-winds pierced our solitudes, I found the fresh Rhodora in the woods, Spreading its leafless blooms in a damp nook, To please the desert and the sluggish brook. The purple petals fallen in the pool Made the black water with their beauty gay; Here might the red-bird come his plumes to cool, And court the flower that cheapens his array. Rhodora! if the sages ask thee why This charm is wasted on the earth and sky, Tell them, dear, that, if eyes were made for seeing, Then beauty is its own excuse for Being; Why thou wert there, O rival of the rose! I never thought to ask; I never knew; But in my simple ignorance suppose The self-same power that brought me there, brought you.
May 30, 2025 at 7:02 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
And now the Starflower (Trientalis borealis)
#wildflowers #bloomscrolling
Small white star-shaped flowers with glossy green leaves blooming close to the forest floor. Another view of the flowers showing more of the forest floor around the plants.
May 30, 2025 at 6:54 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
Sun dog xo
My beagle is sitting on my lap on my stone patio with a backdrop of green clover and a blue gardening bucket, evergreen trees, then blue sky and water.
May 27, 2025 at 8:55 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
Serviceberry (Amelanchier spp.) blooming now xo
#wildflowers #bloomscrolling
A tree branch with white blossoms and rusty brown young leaves.
May 22, 2025 at 8:27 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
Goldthread (Coptis trifolia)
One of the tiny white flowers that will carpet the forest floor over the next few weeks.
#wildflowers #bloomscrolling
A tiny six-petaled white flower on a thin stalk, in front of a background of green leaves on the forest floor.
May 20, 2025 at 11:35 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
I took this foghorn to the excellent conference on material culture in Atlantic Canada at Dalhousie this week and honked it at the audience. What fun! Thanks to Memory Lane Heritage Village for the loan! visitmemorylane.ca
A red wooden box with a handle on top and a round opening on the front, sitting on a tool bench under a window.
May 17, 2025 at 4:20 PM
saraspike.bsky.social
Sobeys Jeddore, 5:45pm May 14, 2025.
A grocery store aisle with partially empty shelves and curtains drawn over the refrigerator section. A grocery store aisle, the shelves on the left are partially full of pop bottles, those on the right are empty.
May 14, 2025 at 11:54 PM