Wetland Centre End of Year Recap
/Happy November everyone!
With the weather cooling down, the Boreal Wetland Centre is wrapping up its onsite activities. We’ve had some great events over the summer and fall including:
-Air and Watershed Stewardship Division tour (July 25th): The Air and Watershed Stewardship Division from the Government of Alberta (Environment and Protected Areas) toured the Boreal Wetland Centre discussing wetlands and wetland conservation.
-Junior Forest Rangers maintenance day (Aug 9th): The Junior Forest Ranger team came out to the Boreal Wetland Centre to help with site maintenance. This included a clean-up the site, brush cutting of the trails, and removal of noxious weeds.
The Junior Forest Rangers get ready to clean the site
-DUC HAM tour (Aug 16th): The DUC Habitat Asset Management team toured the Boreal Wetland Centre during their two-day team meetings. While touring the site they learned how to identify, classify, and delineate boreal wetlands.
-Inside Education (Sept 11th-15th): Inside Education delivered educational programing at the Boreal Wetland Centre utilizing the habitat and on-site installations to provide real world examples for local school curriculum.
-National Forest Week tour (Sept 19th): In recognition of National Forest Week, a week devoted to raising awareness and educating about vital forest habitat, DUC hosted a tour with local professionals from Canfor and Weyerhaeuser teaching attendees about the value of forests, sustainable forest management, silviculture, growth and yield, and the connection between forests and wetlands.
Weyerhaeuser explains forest growth to attendees
-Homeschool Tea-time Part 2 (Sept 20th): In the summer, the homeschool community took part in a unique experiment, burying tea bags around the Boreal Wetland Centre to test decomposition. The group returned to the Boreal Wetland Centre in September to dig up and weigh the tea bags and analyze our results!
DUC discusses experiment results with homeschool children
-Boreal Wetland Centre Site Improvements (July-September): The Boreal Wetland Centre received an update in 2023 with several inactive demonstrations being removed. The existing trail was replaced with gravel for easier access and the entrance to the Boreal Wetland Centre was expanded. In addition, entryway posts, a sheltered trailhead sign, several trash cans, a pair of benches, and an outdoor classroom were all installed on site.
-New Demo Installation: Smash & Sons Contracting donated a new demonstration to the Boreal Wetland Centre. A pipeline topsoil cutter was refurbished and placed near the entrance with signage soon to come!
Pipeline topsoil cutter
-Wetland Centre of Excellence Launch event (Sept 28th): Back in early 2023, Peace Wapiti Academy joined the Wetland Centre of Excellence program (a national student led initiative of wetland projects, mentorship and community outreach). In September, Peace Wapiti Academy and DUC celebrated the start of the program with roughly 100 students, teachers, County of Grande Prairie officials, and media representatives touring the trails and learning more about the program.
Peace Wapiti Academy Students celebrate the launch of the Wetland Centre of Excellence
-Inside Education (Oct 2nd-6th): Delivered educational programing at the Boreal Wetland Centre utilizing the habitat and on-site installations to provide real world examples of topics for local schools. Alliance Pipeline also came out on October 3rd to tour the new amenities and participate in Inside Education’s programming.
-Hammerhead Energy Corduroy Road Restoration Monitoring (October 5th): After a portion of the corduroy road at the Boreal Wetland Centre was restored earlier in the year, monitoring plots were installed on the restored area to collect data and monitor whether restoration was successful.
Corduroy Road Restoration Monitoring plots
-Wetland Centre Funders Group tour (Oct 24th) and Wetland Centre Advisory Group tour (Nov 2nd): The Boreal Wetland Centre funders, advisory group, and members of Evergreen Park all came out to the Boreal Wetland Centre to tour the site, view the upgrades, and discuss future opportunities for the site.
During the season our staff and volunteers also collected valuable data in the form of wetland hydrology well levels and phenology board photos. Thank you to everyone who collected datapoints for us this year!
And still to come, the installation of a gateway entrance sign is well underway at the Boreal Wetland Centre. Men’s Shed is collaborating with DUC to create an entrance to be proud of!
Men’s Shed starts the trailhead sign
Though our programing slows down in the winter, the Boreal Wetland Centre will be open for anyone to tour. The trails aren’t cleared of snow, but the main trail is often packed down by foot traffic. In addition, if you want to tour the side trails, feel free to bring your snowshoes!