Prince Edward County, Ontario, Canada
O U R N A T U R A L H E R I T A G E
ONE THIRD OF ONTARIO SPECIES ARE AT RISK
Thursday, June 11, 2009
They nested in apple trees, and they nested in the hawthorns and quite often even chose the red cedars that grew in pasture fields. One year there were five nesting pair, spread out over a 350 acre farm. Today, there is none, on a farm we once owned, near Demorestville.
There are memories of red-headed woodpeckers, and across the same farm, butternut trees with their pinnately compound leaves dotting the fence rows from which bushels of felt surfaced nuts would be gathered at end of season. A 1930 faunal survey suggested that king rails were so common in the Big Island Marsh that the author could easily obtain a same day specimen, if the need to do so ever arose. Today, the butternut trees and loggerhead shrikes are gone from this farm, and so are the king rails from the marsh. A location where a pair of red-headed woodpeckers is nesting at Sandbanks has been cordoned off like a crime scene and posted with polite notices to stay behind the roped area.
These are all species at risk, just a few of the more than 190 species currently listed for Ontario. Many of the listed species have occurred in Prince Edward County – Henslow’s sparrow, short-eared owl, black tern, grass pickerel, bigmouth buffalo fish, and numerous plant species.
One of the main purposes of the provincial Endangered Species Act (ESA) which came into force last year, was to identify those species at risk, based on the best available information. A more important purpose of the ESA is to protect these species and their habitats, and to promote the recovery of identified species at risk.
Prince Edward County is so fortunate to still have lots of wild places and wild species. However, due to habitat loss, pollution, invasive species like European buckthorn and dog strangling vine, some species are at risk. Compared to Ontario’s previous Act, the new ESA provides broader protection for species at risk and their habitats, and offers greater support for volunteer stewardship efforts of private landowners, resource users, and conservation organizations. The new Act also provides a much stronger commitment to recovery of species, and more effective enforcement.
A poster produced recently by the Prince Edward Stewardship Council lists nine species at risk, among them, the stinkpot. Not a very flattering name for a turtle to be sure, but certainly unique in its ability to secrete a smelly musk from two glands on each side of the body. Also called musk turtle, it has become threatened due to habitat loss from wetland damage. Many get killed too from contact with boat propellers.
Sounding the death knell for the butternut has been the butternut canker, a disease caused by a fungus. The red-headed woodpecker, also on the poster, has declined by 60 per cent due to several reasons – competition from starlings, removal of dead trees in which it nests, and from being killed by cars as they feed near roadsides. Even the lowly milk snake is listed, because of its habit of being found near buildings where it is more prone to being killed by humans. Four-leaved milkweed (found in only two locations in Prince Edward County), Blanding’s turtle, ginseng, and the king rail are other species listed on the poster.
A Species of Special Concern (formerly “vulnerable”) is one with a characteristic that makes it sensitive to human activities or natural events. Species listed as “threatened” are at risk of becoming “endangered”, a term that is applied to any species facing imminent extinction or extirpation. A species that is termed “extirpated” may have totally disappeared from Prince Edward County, but may occur elsewhere. A species that is “extinct” means that, like the passenger pigeon, woolly mammoth and the great auk, they are gone forever, and no amount of effort will ever bring them back. A sobering thought indeed.
We need to work together collectively in ensuring that those species at risk in Prince Edward County remain for future generations of residents to enjoy, as part of our natural heritage.
This is the eighth in a series of columns by Terry Sprague on the natural heritage of Prince Edward County, sponsored by the Prince Edward Stewardship Council. For more information, check out their website at http://www.ontariostewardship.org .