Sept 2 2017

 

 

 NATURE MONCTON’S INFORMATION LINE – 2 September 2017 (Saturday)n

 

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Edited by: Nelson Poirier nelson@nb.sympatico.ca

Transcript by: Catherine Clements

Info Line #: 506-384-6397 (384-NEWS)

**Jean Renton is at their Canaan Forks camp at the moment. She reports there are three doe WHITE TAILED DEER [Chevreuil] coming out into a field below their camp. One has two fawns, one has one fawn, and the other with no young. Jean comments they all come out together sometimes. Jean also comments her sister was very surprised to have five BAY-BREASTED WARBLERS [Paruline à poitrine baie] all at once visit her bird waterer in Berry Mills recently.

**Nature Moncton member Lindsay Gauvin has become the new Executive Director of the Petitcodiac Watershed Alliance. Past Director Christine McLauchlan has resigned to further her education, and Lindsay is now deep into her new position. We look forward to hearing from Lindsay what is going on with the Petitcodiac Watershed Alliance, as it is very much in line with the interests of Nature Moncton. Lindsay has done a beautiful job of an overall update of activity, and I’m going to quote her message below, that describes Petitcodiac Watershed Alliance activities so well.

“Here are some updates on the Petitcodiac Watershed Alliance activities:

We started a new bird conservation project in August called “80 million birds” which is an outreach initiative where we discuss the impact that domestic cats have on local wildlife populations. In Canada, it is estimated that domestic outdoor cats kill 80 million birds each year and people are trying to find new ways to reduce the amount of bird deaths by cats. The Cat Collar Covers by BirdsBeSafe have been scientifically tested and shown to reduce the hunting efficiency of cats and therefore reduce the amount of bird deaths by cats. These collar covers are made of brightly coloured fabric which songbirds can easily see and the collar covers also have a reflective trim to make cats safe by making them more visible to motorists at night. These collar covers are available at Global Pet Foods in Moncton and Dieppe. The project has been very successful, we originally purchased 250 collar covers from BirdsBeSafe and we have less than 25 left.

The Waste Warriors Project is still on the go until the end of this year. We have been hosting community clean ups this summer and will be hosting more community clean ups this fall to prevent waste from entering our waterways and preventing harm to habitat. We will be looking for volunteers to help us with stream cleanups. If you would like to volunteer, please contact volunteer@petitcodiacwatershed.org. Microplastics are now a big concern and their impact to aquatic ecosystems are on the rise. Therefore, we are conducting microplastics sampling as part of Adventure Science’s Global Microplastics Initiative, the world’s largest microplastics study and dataset, to monitor the amount of microplastics found in the Petitcodiac and Memramcook River watersheds. This summer, we sponsored an artist, Bordalo II, to create a Wood Turtle mural made entirely of garbage as an outreach initiative demonstrating our everyday waste culture for the Festival Inspire. This mural was voted the Best 2017 Festival Inspire mural by The East Mag. The mural is displayed on the “Starving Artist Gallery and Gifts” shop on 80 Assomption Blvd. We hope to continue educating communities on ways to reduce waste in aquatic ecosystems.

The Water Quality Monitoring is still on the go until the end of this year. This year was the 20^th year of water quality monitoring for the Petitcodiac Watershed Alliance! We monitor changes in water quality within the Petitcodiac and Memramcook River watersheds on a monthly basis by looking at 7 different parameters that indicate water quality to ensure the local communities know the health and impacts related to their local streams and rivers. We will publish a report at the end of the year on our website for anyone interested in water quality monitoring in the Petitcodiac and Memramcook River watersheds. 

The Broken Brooks Project is almost done for this year! The goal of this project is to assess culverts in fish bearing streams throughout the watershed to determine the amount of uninhibited access to habitat available for fish and determining locations of blockages. This year, we assessed many culverts, performed numerous debris removals and installed many rock weirs on streams within the Pollett and Little River sub-watersheds. We hope to continue working on this project in the following years as it is an ongoing process to make sure culverts are still fish passable year after year.

Other projects can be found on our website at: 

http://petitcodiacwatershed.org/science/projects/.” 

Lindsay Gauvin

nelson@nb.sympatico.ca
Nelson Poirier

Nature Moncton