Waterloo Region Nature Teens — Project 2 — October 27 2018
Non-Native and Invasive Plant Removal at ‘rare’ Charitable Research Reserve
WRN Teens have been at it again! Our second project happened on October 27 when we showed up at “rare” Charitable Research Reserve in Cambridge — along with cold, wet, windy weather!
To help us brave the elements, we put on our new and very cool WRN tuques! We met Alissa Fraser, a conservation technician at ‘rare.’ She explained what this huge nature reserve is all about and how staff, volunteers and community groups are helping ‘rare’ become more and more natural.
Our project was to continue an on-going job that Alissa oversees, removing some non-native and invasive plant species from the forest behind the ‘rare’ offices in the old Lamb’s Inn. We had a crash course in identifying Day Lilies, Lily of the Valley and Periwinkle in their late fall condition.
Then, we started in digging, trying not to leave a trace of these intruders. The space we covered was a tiny drop in the bucket of the large area ‘rare’ hopes to free of invasives and replant with native plants. It was slow, muddy work and the highlight of the afternoon may have been the cookie break we took!
While munching cookies, we took advantage of having expert Alissa with us to hear about her other work, retrieving threatened turtle eggs, incubating them, and re-introducing the baby turtles to the wild. A nice follow-up to our September project!
Many thanks to Alissa for hosting and teaching us, to volunteers Linda, Zack and Josh for coming out, to the Teens parents for driving and picking up — and of course, to the awesome team of WRN Teens for their hard work and stick-to-it-iveness! I hope you managed to get the mud off everything you wore — including your new tuque!
Our November project will involve habitat restoration in a Kitchener natural area. If you’ve just heard about us, there’s still room for more interested Teens! Check us out at waterlooregionnature.ca/teens or get in touch at teens@waterlooregionnature.ca
Marg Paré
WRN Teens coordinator