Little River – Essex County Nature

Earth Day 2019 Planting Event

By essexcountynature|2019-06-10T17:18:09-04:00June 10th, 2019|The Egret Article|

Earth Day 2019 Planting Event

Written by Gina Pannunzio and Ian Naisbitt for The Egret – Issue 35 – Number 2

“When we plant a tree, we are doing what we can to make our planet a more wholesome and happier dwelling-place for those who come after us.” — Holmes

On Sunday, April 28, the Windsor-Essex community celebrated Earth Day 2019 by planting 2,200 trees and shrubs. We planted in Little River Corridor Park: along the Ganatchio Trail and around the pond, west of the Florence Avenue and Beverly Glenn Street junction in East Riverside.

Over 1,400 community volunteers participated in this event and many were first time planters. Volunteers worked from 10 a.m. to noon. There were 60 volunteer groups that registered to help plant. Event organizers appreciated the efforts of the 40 How 2 Crew volunteers who were an incredible force for planting trees.

Tree planting — *Volunteers plant trees in Little River Corridor Park on Earth Day. Photo by Ian Naisbitt*

Saturday’s foreboding forecast: “Cloudy. Periods of rain beginning this evening then changing to periods of snow or rain after midnight. Local snowfall amount: 2 cm. Wind becoming northeast 20 km/h near midnight. Low plus 2.”

Yowzah, snowfall?

Sunday morning’s forecast: “Periods of rain ending early this morning then clearing. Wind northeast 20 km/h, which is moderate according the Beaufort Wind Force Scale. High 11 Celsius. UV index 6 or high.”

After the foreboding forecast, what an enjoyable surprise it was to see the sun emerge from the overcast sky.

The species of trees we planted included: white oak, American elm, pin oak, red maple, burr oak, sycamore, basswood, swamp white oak, silver maple, Shumard oak, tulip tree and eastern cottonwood.

Little River Corridor Park, between Riverside Drive and Tecumseh Road, has now benefitted from the planting of 20,681 trees and shrubs since May 1990. The recreational trails throughout the area will permit people to make the desired connection with nature. They may even be lucky enough to experience the different species of wildlife that call this area home. Wildlife observed in the area on the day of the tree planting included: Canada goose, mute swan, red-winged blackbird, turkey vulture, American robin, killdeer and mallard duck.

Planning for the event was done by the Essex Region Conservation Authority, Detroit River Canadian Cleanup (DRCC) and City of Windsor. The DRCC paid for the trees with funds from the Ontario Ministry of Environment and Climate Change.

“Never say there is nothing beautiful in the world anymore. There is always something to make you wonder in the shape of a tree, the trembling of a leaf.” — Albert Schweitzer

Little River Spring Cleanup Event 2019

By essexcountynature|2019-06-10T17:16:02-04:00June 10th, 2019|The Egret Article|

Little River Spring Cleanup Event 2019

Written by Gina Pannunzio, Kelly LaForest and Ian Naisbitt for The Egret – Issue 35 – Number 2

On Tuesday, April 2, Essex County Nature was invited by the City of Windsor, the Detroit River Canadian Cleanup and the Essex Region Conservation Authority to participate in a river cleanup in the Little River watershed. Caesar Windsor’s CodeGreen group coordinated the event, which included bringing many supplies and numerous volunteers to the cleanup. Thankfully, Mother Nature cooperated with sunny, mild weather.

About 50 community volunteers cleaned up the section of Little River between Lauzon Road and Tecumseh Road East, adjacent to the Canadian Tire Store. We refer to it as “the Hawthorne site.” This was the 15th time the community has cleaned up the human debris from this site since the autumn of 1996. Volunteers worked from 5 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.

Little River cleaned up — *Volunteers who cleared garbage out of Little River stand next to the new Detroit River Canadian Cleanup sign. Photo by Claire Sanders*

Along with the CodeGreen group, there were volunteers from the City of Windsor, Detroit River Canadian Cleanup, University of Windsor, Essex County Field Naturalists’ Club and Little River Enhancement Group. This hard-working crew pulled out eight shopping carts (the Hawthorne site is infamous for shopping carts), one lawn chair, a bicycle, a garbage pail, two recycling bins, industrial hoses, two children’s tents, a large pile of wood, a stove pipe baffle, and 55 bags of recyclable and landfill waste. One of the unusual items removed from the river was an aquarium.

Garbage — *Some of the garbage collected during the cleanup of Little River. Photo by Claire Sanders*

We are always pleased to observe local wildlife surviving in the Little River watershed. During this cleanup we noticed a belted kingfisher. A pleasant first-time surprise for us: there were many people kayaking and canoeing this section of Little River, and they were thankful the group was cleaning up the river.

We appreciated the CodeGreen group coordinating this event and look forward to working with them in the future.

TD Tree Days Windsor, 2018

By Gina|2018-12-12T12:31:17-04:00November 22nd, 2018|The Egret Article|

TD Tree Days Windsor 2018

Gina Pannunzio, Kelly Laforest, Claire Sanders and Ian Naisbitt

Written for The Egret Newsletter – Volume 34 – Number 4 – December 2018

On Saturday, 20 October, TD Bank sponsored their TD Tree Day program by inviting our Windsor-Essex community to help TD employees plant trees. Groups that participated included: City of Windsor, Detroit River Canadian Cleanup, Essex Region Conservation Authority, Essex County Nature – Little River Enhancement Group, TD Friends of the Environment Foundation and Caesars Windsor – CodeGreen.

The planting site is located in the Detroit River Watershed in East Windsor’s Little River Corridor Park, west of Florence Avenue and north of McHugh Street. This natural area is the same site that our community has planted to celebrate numerous Earth Days.

We enjoyed a typical and pleasurable Autumn day: a mix of sun and cloud, mostly cloudy, temperature in the morning of 8 Celsius increasing to 12 C by 11 a.m. There was a calm breeze of 30 km/ hour and the UV index was 3 or moderate. All of this created a pleasant planting experience for the 70 eager tree planters.

Children, their parents and other community volunteers participated by digging holes; planting, wrapping and mulching 300 trees! We started planting at 9:00 a.m. and the job was completed at 11:15, what an effective group!

Once the volunteers walked into the field, hundreds of grasshoppers took flight. A little later on a gaggle of Canada Goose flew overhead, but they were flying in a northern direction, their inner compass must be spinning? A solitary Monarch Butterfly was checking out the purple New England asters in the area, it too was flying in the northern direction. Maybe they were looking for cover since they knew a thunderstorm was on its way? The heavy afternoon rain will be a great help to settle the soil around the newly planted trees.

The species of trees that we planted included: Burr Oak, Swamp White Oak, American Elm, Red Oak, Basswood, Hackberry, Freeman Maple and American Sycamore. About 80% of the trees that we have planted at this site over the years survived and their leaves are providing fall colours for us to enjoy.

Essex County Nature – Little River Enhancement Group would like to thank TD Bank, Essex Region Conservation Authority and the Detroit River Canadian Cleanup for planning this well – organized community event. This TD Tree Day 2018 volunteer effort addressed the Beneficial Use Impairment, “Loss of Fish and Wildlife Habitat” of the Remedial Action Plan by improving the ecosystem health of the Detroit River Watershed.

Today’s TD Tree Day planting event brings the total number of trees and shrubs planted by community volunteers in the Little River Watershed to 42,169. This is definitely a “Gain of Fish and Wildlife Habitat!”