Region Archives: Canada East

Premiering at Cinéfest this Sunday, Michael Zelniker set out to make a movie about the impact of toilet paper manufacturing on Canada’s boreal forest. …Zelniker has spent his life dedicated to film, television and theatre. But his newest project, which will premiere at Cinéfest Sudbury on Sept. 18 at 12:30 p.m., is more about his dedication to the environment. The Issue with Tissue: A boreal love story began as a look into a situation Zelniker was deeply troubled by, the act of cutting a vast number of trees in the boreal forests to be used predominantly for toilet paper. But as he began documenting the situation, travelling across the country, learning and filming as he went, the theme changed. “The movie is no longer about toilet paper, it is what I call the most obscene illustration for what’s gone wrong,” Zelniker told Sudbury.com. 

My name is Susan Bell Chiblow. I am Crane Clan from Garden River First Nation in the Robinson-Huron Treaty territory, which is part of the Anishinaabek territory. In 2015, Elder Willie Pine, a Mississauga First Nation told me that glyphosate was being sprayed in our territory and that he was working with Elders from the North Shore of Lake Huron in northern Ontario to stop it. Glyphosate is a herbicide. It’s the active ingredient in products like Roundup — it’s used to kill plants and weeds. While glyphosate is banned for cosmetic use and sale in certain parts of Canada, it is one of the most widely used herbicides on lawns, in gardens and in forestry operations. A number of scientific studies have shown that glyphosate can increase the risk of cancer. …In forestry operations in and around the Robinson-Huron Treaty territory, glyphosate is used to kill trees that compete with commercially valuable species. 

Peter deMarsh

OTTAWA, ON – Canadian Forest Owners (CFO) is proud to announce Master of Fine Arts student Lara Felsing at Emily Carr University of Art & Design and Maxime Saulnier, who is completing a Master’s degree in forestry at Laval University in Québec City, are the first recipients of the Peter deMarsh Memorial Bursary for research. Each have been awarded $10,000 to support the final stage of their studies. “Both these young people are using their talents to help solve social, economic or environmental problems,” explains Susannah Banks, CFO Co-Chair, and Executive Director of New Brunswick Federation of Woodlot Owners. “This bursary is a natural extension of Peter deMarsh’s achievements, a man who worked to convince millions of forest owners around the world to act collectively within local, regional, national and international organizations to create better policy to support sustainable forests.”

A concerned resident of Quirion Road in Barbers Bay was looking forward to attending a town hall meeting in Connaught last Wednesday to contest plans to harvest the forest behind her home. However, after The Daily Press requested comment from the Ministry of Natural Resources and Abitibi Forest Management Inc. in advance of the meeting, it was cancelled. “It has been decided that the licensing for harvest block German 161 has been put on hold until further notice from the MNRF Timmins District Manager,” said Abitibi forester Aaron Palmer in an email to the Barbers Bay Residents Association (BBRA). “In addition, it has been brought to our attention that the media has been contacted, and the intent of this meeting was to have a constructive conversation solely between ARFMI, MRNF and BBRA rather than to provide responses to the media or press.” 

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. — Yardi® is making a significant donation to help the Nature Conservancy of Canada (NCC) protect and care for the largest private conservation project in the country’s history – the Boreal Wildlands project in northern Ontario. The Yardi donation will help NCC permanently protect an area twice the size of the city of Toronto. NCC, which is dedicated to accelerating conservation, restoring ecosystems and caring for biodiversity, will execute the project in collaboration with communities, government, Indigenous Peoples and others. …”Yardi commends NCC’s dedication to slowing climate change and is pleased to support the transformational Boreal Wildlands project, whose impact will extend far beyond Canada,” said Peter Altobelli, vice president and general manager of Yardi Canada Ltd. …Yardi® develops and supports industry-leading investment and property management software for all types and sizes of real estate companies. 

Protect native species, eliminate invasive trees and plant more that belong here. Those are three tips that conservationists would like to see followed to halt the decline or even extinction of tree species across the globe. Malin Rivers is head of conservation prioritization at the Botanic Gardens Conservation International, which runs the Global Tree Assessment project and produced a paper warning about the risk of massive tree extinction. In Quebec, Rivers and her team assessed 78 species of trees and found that four of them are at risk: White ash; Eastern hemlock; Butternut; and American elm. …Invasive trees are common in Quebec as well. The Norway Maple, for example, was introduced to North America in the 1700s. Tree Canada says the Norway Maple can prevent native tree seedlings (sugar maple and red oak) from establishing, and its leaves release toxins that affect soil fungi and microbes.

It’s been a quiet forest fire season in northern Ontario so far. There have been 226 confirmed forest fires in the region so far, compared to 1,176 during the same period last year, according to the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry. The fire season in Ontario runs from April 1 to Oct. 31. Isabelle Chenard, a forest fire information officer with the ministry, said the season started later than normal due to a lot of precipitation in April. “Then we saw a bit of a short fire flap in early to mid-May and since then, the numbers of fires have been very low in comparison to previous years,” she said. This year, forest fires have burned a total of 2,517 hectares of land in Ontario. In 2021, they burned 784,000 hectares of land.

Researchers have discovered an invasive insect infestation near Cobourg, Ont., which they say could have a detrimental effect on hemlock trees essential to their ecosystems and used in certain wood products. Scientists with Natural Resources Canada’s Canadian Forest Service accidentally discovered the outbreak of hemlock woolly adelgid, which they say had gone undetected for some time, this summer while collecting data on hemlock trees in southern Ontario. Chris MacQuarrie, a research scientist with Natural Resources Canada, says the Cobourg finding is concerning because it’s much deeper in Ontario than the only other known active population of the species in the Niagara region. “That’s hundreds of kilometres away from other places where we know the insect is,” said MacQuarrie. “We think it’s been there for quite a while because it was fairly large and rather easy to see, and it has already started to kill trees.”

OTTAWA — About 70 per cent of the tallest trees in Pine Grove and Pinhey Forest were lost to a devastating windstorm in May, according to the National Capital Commission (NCC). To put that in perspective, the area of upper canopy loss (about 1,890 hectares) in those two Ottawa Greenbelt woodlands alone is nearly the size of five Central Experimental Farms. The farm sits on about four square kilometres of land. About 180 hectares of red pine in those two woodlands — planted in straight lines by the province in the 1950s and ’60s to be harvested for utility poles — were particularly battered by the derecho, added NCC biologist Alexander Stone. Red pines have no central taproot, making them more susceptible to toppling by wind, Stone said. The NCC no longer plants this species.

If Toronto’s mayoral elections were decided based purely on the number of policy announcements — Gil Penalosa would be the heavy favourite going into this fall’s election. …Penalosa seemingly has a plan for everything: most intriguing, for me: trees and math. The campaign is pitching what they call a 3-30-300 plan. Based on research done by Cecil Konijnendijk, a professor of Urban Forestry at UBC, that can offer significant public health and environmental benefits First, at least three trees should be visible from your home. Second, the tree canopy in every neighbourhood should cover at least 30 per cent of land. Third, you should be no more than 300 metres from the nearest public park or green space. …According to city figures, annual spending on urban forestry… brought tree canopy coverage from 26.6%-28% per cent in 2008, to somewhere between 28.4% and 31% in 2018.

PARRY SOUND, Ontario — Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Environment and Climate Change, Julie Dabrusin announced that the Georgian Bay Biosphere Reserve is receiving more than $585,000over three years from Canada’s Enhanced Nature Legacy. These funds will support the biosphere reserve’s biodiversity conservation efforts and support Canada’s goal to conserve 25 percent of lands and inland waters by 2025, working toward 30 percent of each by 2030. These funds will …restore, maintain, and enhance biodiversity conservation in the buffer zones surrounding the core protected areas of the biosphere reserve, which encompasses the eastern shore of Georgian Bay and stretches approximately 175 kilometres from the Severn River to the French River in Ontario. It is hoped that the managed areas within the biosphere reserve’s buffer zone will become part of Canada’s conservation network.

They’re the most destructive pests to be found in eastern Canada’s softwood forests in eastern Canada, currently infesting forests in parts of Quebec, New Brunswick and Newfoundland and Labrador — and their numbers can be in the billions. But in spite of the the horror-movie scenario, Nova Scotia officials say doing nothing — in some places — might be a viable option for the next spruce budworm infestation. “On certain parcels of land, maybe we should do nothing, maybe we should let nature take its course,” said provincial forest entomologist Jeff Ogden. “On other parcels of land that will be used for industry, we may want to protect that area.”  …Spruce budworm infestations are part of a natural 30- to 40-year cycle in softwood forests. The last time there was an outbreak was 1979 to 1987 and Ogden said 2.5 million hectares were impacted. …work has started to decide on strategies for the next infestation.

The 2022 forest fire season has been quiet when compared to the record-breaking forest fire season we lived through last year. In 2021, the province saw a record 1180 fires reported that burned well over 770,000 hectares. Crews with the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry spent a brutal summer working to slow the fire’s advancement while several communities, including Red Lake and Wabaseemoong Independent Nation, were put on evacuation notice. Thankfully those communities were safe and a cooler fall allowed crews to get a handle on the record-breaking forest fire year in the province. “In 2021, parts of the northwest saw no significant rainfall for six to eight weeks in a lot of places, so the resulting drought conditions caused the soils to be three to four times more receptive to lightning fires than average,” said MNRF Fire Information Officer, Chris Marchand. …Even though this season has been quiet, it’s not close to breaking any records.

MÉTABETCHOUAN–LAC-À-LA-CROIX, QC – The caribou is an iconic species for Canadians. It is at the heart of the boreal forest ecosystem and plays an important role in the culture and history of Indigenous Peoples. The Government of Canada is determined to work in collaboration with the provinces, Indigenous Peoples, and all stakeholders to protect and re-establish the caribou. That is why the Minister of Environment and Climate Change, the Honourable Steven Guilbeault, is visiting a number of regions in Quebec to meet and engage in discussions with Indigenous nations and other stakeholders about the collaboration required in order to protect the caribou and the progress made in the discussions with the Government of Quebec….Minister Guilbeault is announcing $4.6 million in funding in 2022 to support five Indigenous communities in Quebec in their efforts to conserve the caribou and caribou habitat.

ONTARIO — An invasive insect that can wipe out hemlock forests has been discovered in the Cobourg area — and researchers suspect they may have been there for years, unnoticed. The hemlock woolly adelgid was confirmed by scientists and students from Natural Resources Canada’s Canadian Forest Service who were collecting data in the area as part of an inventory of the province’s hemlock trees. …“Hemlock woolly adelgid (HWA) is a serious invasive forest pest, originally from Japan, that has killed hemlock forests across the eastern United States since the 1970s”. The insect was first found in Toronto in 2012. …Cobourg’s hemlock forests stretch continuously to the Kawartha Lakes and Muskoka regions, meaning landowners and cottagers risk losing large stands of old-growth hemlock trees.

Anthony Taylor & Rob Vaughn

Two scientists from the University of New Brunswick are working together to understand the impact of climate change on the Acadian forest. Anthony Taylor and Rob Vaughn are conducting a two-year experiment studying how different species of tree seedlings will grow under different climate change conditions. …The UNB experiment exposes seven different coniferous species native to the Acadian forest to 12 levels of warming. The species are the red, white, and black spruce, balsam fir, white pine, jack pine and hemlock, all species. …According to Vaughn, they’re growing the species under 12 different temperature treatments ranging from baseline, which is roughly the average daily baseline climate conditions for Fredericton from early May to September, to18 degrees above that baseline. “That data can then be used to inform forest models and to get some really good empirical data that will allow those models to be more accurate,” said Vaughn. 

Natural Resources Canada announced an investment of more than $1 million over three years for the Bras d’Or Lake Biosphere Reserve in Cape Breton, which will receive $463,140, and the Southwest Nova Biosphere Reserve in southwestern Nova Scotia, which will receive $585,362. The funding, from Canada’s Enhanced Nature Legacy program, will support enhanced management of biodiversity conservation areas in Nova Scotia, with the goal of recognizing them as Other Effective Conservation Measures (OECMs), to become part of Canada’s conservation network and bring the country closer to meeting its target of protecting 25 percent of lands and waters in Canada by 2025, while working towards 30 percent by 2030.

Tory Rushton

The Nova Scotia government is taking steps to preserve old-growth forests in the province, although at least one sustainability advocate would like to see the effort come with more teeth. Natural Resources and Renewables Minister Tory Rushton announced Thursday that an updated version of the province’s old-growth forest policy is effective immediately. Rather than adding legal protection to all old-growth forest on Crown land that isn’t already part of a protected area, the government is extending “policy protection” to those lands in question. …Policy protection means stands of old-growth trees will eventually become part of conservation areas in the so-called triad model that determines where and what type of forestry activity can take place on Crown land. …the triad model breaks Crown land into three areas: one for conservation with no forestry activity; one designated for light-touch ecological forestry; and one designated for high-intensity forestry.

HALIFAX, Nova Scotia — Canada and Nova Scotia marked their shared commitment to nature conservation next to the Blue Mountain – Birch Cove Lakes wilderness area, the site of the first proposed national urban park in Nova Scotia. The two governments agreed to work on a funded Nature Agreement that will focus on a number of nature-related opportunities, including protecting more natural spaces in Nova Scotia and increasing habitat protection for species at risk and migratory birds; complete the pre-feasibility assessment and work toward the designation of the proposed national urban park at Blue Mountain – Birch Cove Lakes; seek new opportunities for connecting key areas of protected and conserved lands, including by completing a pilot project in Nova Scotia under Parks Canada’s National Program for Ecological Corridors; and develop a funding agreement to conserve old-growth forests and address the hemlock woolly adelgid.