Wild Bog Tea

Patricia Morley is professor emerita of English and Canadian Studies at
Concordia University and an avid outdoor recreationist. She is the
author of several books, including The Mountain Is Moving: Japanese
Women’s Lives, Kurlek and Margaret Laurence: T

Grandfather’s bog is a unique wetland environment, a terrain in the
process of transformation. As a child, he had been able to fish there in
an old rowboat.

The young narrator of the story grows up among the bog’s sweet smells
and colored mosses, watching the cranes dance and playing hide-and-seek
with his grandfather. A birthday gift of binoculars extends his
understanding of the bog, while at every season it smells to him of
happiness. As the bog ages, the forest moves closer and begins to invade
it. His grandfather says that long after they are gone, the bog will
become a forest.

Years later the narrator, now an adult, returns to see the bog and his
grandfather, who is now too old to climb the overgrown path. Sadly, his
grandfather dies between this visit and the next, but the young man
continues to remember him vividly among the bright mosses and in the
taste of wild bog tea.

Wild Bog Tea is a beautifully illustrated picture book that offers to
children important lessons in ecology and preservation. An author’s
note provides readers with two full pages of information on bogs and
their vital place in ecosystems. Such systems change just as people do.
And like people, they need to be nurtured and protected.

Author Annette LeBox lives near Blaney Bog Regional Park in Maple
Ridge, British Columbia, and is involved in efforts to preserve the
bog’s integrity. Highly recommended.