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EMC Lifestyle – The first-ever Constance Bay Shoreline Cleanup took place Sunday afternoon, Sept. 26, led by Coordinator Hank Jones, the Ottawa Riverwatcher for the Torbolton Reach, which includes inter alia Constance Bay.
A World Wildlife Fund (WWF) recent study on the ecological wellbeing of Canada’s major rivers found the Ottawa River in not too bad condition, but on a downward spiral, so its future does not look so good.
No single government authority oversees the wellbeing of the Ottawa River’s 150,000 square kilometer watershed. This is an area larger than almost 40 per cent (or 138) of the world’s countries! So, the river takes lots of hits affecting its human amenities and wildlife uses. Its outflow is comparable to the total outflow of most of western Europe’s rivers combined. It alone has more species of freshwater mussels (13: aka, clams) than in all of Europe’s rivers!
Fortunately, the watershed has Ottawa Riverkeeper, Meredith Brown, a licensed member of Waterkeeper Alliance, an international grass roots advocacy organization founded in the USA by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., now operating worldwide. The Ottawa Riverkeeper is a full-time, non-governmental ombudsman whose special responsibility is to be the full-time public advocate for our Ottawa River Watershed. Fundamentally, it is the Riverkeeper’s job to advocate compliance with environmental laws, respond to citizen complaints, identify problems that affect our Ottawa River watershed and recommend appropriate solutions.
The Riverkeeper appoints Riverwatchers to help. Riverwatchers identify themselves with specific sections of the Ottawa River or a tributary and become involved in ways that reflect their own interest, time and skills.
Jones is now the Riverwatcher for the Torbolton Reach, spanning from the Port of Call Marina, upstream to MacLarens Landing. Each Riverwatch group identifies the activities in their local community that may be having an impact on the river. Together, they work with Ottawa Riverkeeper to find effective solutions to their local problems.
The just-past delittering Constance Bay Shoreline Cleanup event is just one of hundreds done across Canada, as part of the Great Canadian Shoreline Cleanup, which in turn feeds its data to the world’s Ocean’s Conservancy for global compilation. Many organizations, from national to local , including Riverkeeper, Vancouver Aquarium, WWF and our local sponsors and supporters, including Centrum Loblaw, Kanata Home Depot, Friends Against Privatization of the Constance Bay Beach (FAP), the Constance and Buckham’s Bay Community Association (CBBCA), the Lighthouse Restaurant, The Legion 616, The Point Dining Lounge, Constance Bay General Store and MacEwen Gas, all working together in 2010 to drive this annual event.
Thanks to all involved, these annual September Cleanups around the world are making a measurable difference to the ecological wellbeing of our planets’ hydrosphere.
This year, the Constance Bay Shoreline Cleanup’s team of 12 put four managers at headquarters in the Constance and Buckham’s Bay Community Centre: Vera Jones, Susan Henderson, Sarah Simkin and David Goodkey. Our field team of eight, lead by Angus Daniels, data recording by Jeremy Kingsbury and Rahul Gupta, photographer Maggie Currie (backed up by photo-archivist Jane Currie), supported by Allan Blunt, Sam Daniels, Hank Jones and Sarah Simkin (doing double duty!) worked the shoreline and riparian zone from 412 Bayview to 485 Bayview.
Jeremy and Rahul were able to write off three hours each of their community service requirement, as well.
The event was a great success for its first time out! A great big thank you to the whole team.
The group got good delitter data and made unexpected finds. They noted that the shoreline may be in transition from its original 20th century beach habitat to a new 21st century marsh habitat, with emerging aquatic plants increasingly blocking access to open water. This trend will likely continue and may accelerate as long as the river’s environmental flow continues to be impeded and its waters eutrophied.
To learn more about this, call Jones at 613-832-2745.
All Ottawa Riverwatchers across the whole Ottawa watershed should undertake this shoreline patrolling activity in synchrony in their respect reaches every year from now on. This is the best way to build a comprehensive time series dataset on the changing wellbeing of the river.
Thanks to all who made the first time Torbolton Reach (Constance Bay) Shoreline Cleanup event successful, and the hope is to see everyone Sunday, Sept. 18, 2011 for the next big Shoreline Cleanup then.
© 2009 – 2010 West Carleton EMC.