Bug Search 2001 gets rave
reviews
In September and October,
about 330 Grade 7 and 8 students from six Sudbury schools took part in Bug
Search 2001.
Bug search starts in the
classroom with a slide show presented
by the coordinator. It outlines how the
creek deteriorated over time, restoration that has already taken place due to
Land Reclamation and improvements in industrial practices, and what the
Junction Creek Stewardship Committee is doing now.
It is then explained how
students can take part in the restoration effort by monitoring water quality in
Junction Creek. By this time the
students are usually squirming like bugs themselves, itching to get to out to
the creek.
Once there, the students use
the “kick and sweep” method to collect organisms that live in the bottom of the
creek. It works just how it
sounds: in a shallow part of the
creek, one student kicks the bottom as
hard as they can while their partner collect everything in a net. A white tray
and a magnifying glass are used to view the organisms and each student has an identification
key to help figure out what type of organisms they have found.
Bottom-dwelling creatures vary
in their sensitivity to water quality and they can be classified into groups on
this basis. The types of organisms
found in a particular section of creek give a good idea of the relative health
of that section of creek.
All the equipment needed for
the project is provided, made possible by funding from Environment Canada’s
EcoAction 2000 program.
Both teachers and students completed surveys after the session, and,
overall, both had a very positive reaction.
One student summed up a lot of others’ comments when she wrote, “It was
very fun and I learned a lot about gross bugs I used to dislike.” Another said he liked “getting to play in
the water and learn about bugs at the same time.” Teachers generally thought the students gained a lot from the
experience and were glad to have the opportunity to take the classroom outside
for a change.
Twenty mature shade trees were
planted along Junction Creek this fall, thanks to the Ontario Ministry of
Natural Resources’ Community Fish and Wildlife Involvement Program (CFWIP).
CFWIP has been contributing to the brook trout reintroduction
program from the beginning, providing the hatchery-raised fish and $13,000
towards equipment for the research and monitoring done by the Co-operative
Freshwater Ecology Unit at Laurentian University.
This fall, $1,000 in CFWIP
funding was used to purchase 20 mature shade trees that were planted along
Junction Creek in Garson and just off Lasalle at Paquette. Southview Greenhouse Growers allowed the
purchase of several extra trees by offering a discount price.
Many sections of the creek
lack sufficient shade, which is important to keep the water cold enough for
trout to thrive. Last summer, research
carried out through the Co-op Unit showed the brook trout favoured shady
sections of Junction Creek. It is hoped
that further funding will be secured through the CFWIP program in coming years,
to allow the purchase of more shade trees.
Brenda Harrow, a biologist
with the Ministry of Natural Resources deserves a special thank you for all the
work she has done over the past couple of years with the stewardship
committee.
Thank you also to Peter
Beckett and Guy Gionet, for planting the trees.
Ben Landry was walking along
Junction Creek behind Notre Dame last fall when he noticed something white
flowing into Junction Creek. “It was
right near the Food Basic’s store, so I thought it was milk,” says Mr. Landry.
“I went into the store and spoke to the owner.” Mr. Landry says it wasn’t the first time residents had noticed a
white substance in the creek. Store
owner Gary Crawford insisted that the store returns unsold milk to the dairy,
and never dumps anything into the creek.
Mr. Landry called the City,
and the Ministry of Environment was notified.
After some investigation, it was determined the substance was white.
The paint was traced to a
nearby storm sewer. City workers used
paint to draw lines on the grass at the sports field at Brebeuf Park. They used acetone to clean equipment that
became gummed up with paint, then dumped the acetone/paint mixture into a storm
sewer. The practice has been
discontinued.
In October of this year,
another creek watcher noticed something unusual, also in the Flour Mill
area. Pat Proulx was walking with her
family near the Agnes Street bridge when they saw something oily in the
water. They decided to walk further
upstream to try to see where it was coming from. Standing on the bridge behind Burger King, they could see much
more of the oil, which smelled like diesel.
Mrs. Proulx wasn’t sure who to
call, especially since it was the weekend, so she called the police. They told her they would notify the Ministry
of Environment. Forty minutes later,
Mrs. Proulx saw no evidence the spill was being investigated, so she found a
toll-free number for the Ministry of Environment. A City of Greater Sudbury vehicle arrived a short time
later. According to Mrs. Proulx, the
worker got out of the vehicle and “peered over his sunglasses” at the creek,
getting no closer to it than about 30 yards.
She was on the other side of the creek, trying to get his attention, but
he quickly left. Mrs. Proulx says the
oil was still flowing at this time, but the municipal employee would not have
been able to see it from where he was standing.
Later, a spokesperson for the Ministry
of Environment told a member of the Junction Creek Stewardship Committee that
current policy allows for municipal employees to respond to calls on
weekends. If the municipal employee
deems it necessary, the Ministry of Environment will investigate further. In this case, the municipality did not ask
the ministry to investigate further.
A month later, Mrs. Proulx
spotted the oily substance in the creek again.
This time it was on a weekday, and she called the local Ministry of
Environment office. It turns out the
spill had already been reported earlier that day, by Ben Landry.
An investigator with the
Ministry of Environment says the substance is diesel fuel, but the source has
not been determined. It is not entering
the creek through a storm sewer, but seems to be bubbling up to the surface, as
if it is leaching out of the creek’s banks or bottom. Devices were set up to
absorb the oil, and he says that appears to be working well.
The oil seems to flow out at
certain times, and not at others. The investigator says he will wait until
spring to see if it continues.
Meanwhile, Ben Landry, who has
lived in the area for 49 years, remembers when there were no strip malls or
businesses behind the creek. “It was a swamp.”
He wonders what was used as fill when those buildings were put in, and
whether the oil might have been in something that was used for fill. “Back then I think they would use pretty
much anything as fill, so you never know.”
Mr. Landry says he’ll continue
to keep an eye on Junction Creek. “I’m
concerned about it,” he says. “I saw
some ducks out there that day, and you could see they were trying to stay away
from the oil. It’s been nice seeing all
the animals around here again. I’ve
seen martens, weasels, muskrats...The oil can’t be good for them either.”
Junction Creek Fall Gathering
2001 featured a keynote address by guest speaker Gary Michalak, entitled
“Healthy Creek, Healthy Community.”
About 70 people attended the
event on October 24 at Science North. Following the keynote speaker, an update
was given on activities of the past year, including slides showing the many
volunteers who hauled garbage out of the creek and planted trees during the
past year.
Dr. John Gunn presented some
research findings relating to Junction Creek.
This included the very good news that the Frood branch appears to be
recovering well.
After a short break,
participants moved into smaller brainstorming sessions. There were lots of interesting new ideas,
which were discussed further at the November stewardship committee
meeting. The ideas have been compiled
into an action plan.
Special thanks go out to Mark
Simeoni and the Ontario Professional Planners’ Institute Nothern District for
making Gary Michalak’s appearance possible and to Science North for providing
the venue and audio-visual equipment at no cost to us. François Prevost volunteered his time to
keep that equipment running smoothly.
Crawford’s Food Basics, once again, kindly donated refreshments. Northern Life provided a large advertisement
at a greatly reduced price.
Thank you also, for donating
door prizes, to Marlies Schoenefeld for the watercolour painting of Killarney;
Lynn and Lynzy Boeswald, for the fall gift basket; Dawn Pickard/Wildflowers
Studio for the stained glass suncatcher; David Wiewel/White Trash Ink. for the
manipulated Polaroid photograph of Junction Creek; and The City of Greater
Sudbury, for the composter and the Healing the Landscape book.
Last, but definitely not
least, a huge thank you to all the committee members and other volunteers who
made the event a success, and to our ongoing supporters:
Environment Canada/EcoAction
2000
INCO Ltd.
Nickel District Conservation
Authority
Ontario Ministry of Natural
Resources/Community Fish and Wildlife Involvement Program
The City of Greater
Sudbury/Land Reclamation Program
Science North
Laurentian University
Collège Boréal
Centre de Santé
Communautaire/Ontario Trillium Foundation
Sudbury Community Foundation
Home Depot
TD Trust Friends of the
Environment
Crawford’s Food Basics
Topper’s Pizza
Northern Life
ISYS Technologies Inc.
Junction Creek goes to Harvard
Junction Creek made quite a
splash recently at Harvard University.
Dr. John Gunn from Laurentian University was invited to make a
presentation at an international conference looking at ways of remediating and
restoring degraded environments. The
conference was organized by the Department of Landscape Architecture and Centre
for Technology and Environment, part of the Harvard Design School.
Dr. Gunn says much of the
conference was quite technical, with engineers, municipal planners, and
scientists discussing various ways of addressing environmental problems. His presentation focused on the Junction
Creek restoration project as an example of the effectiveness of community
involvement. “All these planners and
engineers and so on were really impressed with the pictures I showed of little
kids releasing fish into Junction Creek,” Dr. Gunn says. “A lot of them were focused on technical
solutions, and had never thought of involving the public in their work.”
Thank
you to everyone who came out to plant trees on September 29th. This was our best attended “work” event in
the last two years, with 54 people in attendance. It was so well attended that all the seedlings, about 1500 of
them, were planted within an hour.
About
20 Home Depot employees were among those participating. Thank you to Mark Getty, Steve Pugh, and
Sarah Lindsay for recruiting the ‘Team Depot’ volunteers.
Collège Boréal donated the seedlings. This winter, Marc Hébert is growing several
thousand more seedlings in the College greenhouse for next year’s Junction
Creek tree plantings.