Pelee Island continued to require a lot of time and energy on a multitude of issues. One of the main ones, was dealing with an Ontario Municipal Board hearing around the ongoing development and operation of a major limestone quarry, that affected a large area of habitat for endangered species.
This first photo shows what the base of Lighthouse Point Provincial Nature Reserve looked like back in the 1970s and 1980s. This open savanna habitat was almost right across the road from the largest quarry on the island. It also happened to be some of the most significant type of habitat for the endangered Blue Racer, as virtually its entire Canadian range was limited to Pelee Island. It prefers grassy/shrubby habitat, with a few openings where it could soak up the energy from the sun especially early in the season, and that was very important for this cold-blooded reptile.
I described finding probably the most significant location for this species overwintering areas in a previous post, and that location was less than a kilometre from this quarry. So once there was a better understanding of the racer's needed habitat, as well as its normal seasonal range, it was clear that at least the undeveloped part of the quarry was very significant, and so restrictions on its expansion were being put in place. And the quarry owner had the right to appeal to the Ontario Municipal Board, which he did. That began a series of many, many discussions, meetings, on site monitoring, research and negotiations over a period of about 10 years. The board chair kept urging both parties to come up with a solution. So we kept on.
There were two other significant species at risk to various degrees as well. The Eastern Fox Snake occurs across limited areas of southwestern Ontario, but occupies similar types of habitat.
The Lake Erie Water Snake is limited in Canada, to the islands in the western basin of Lake Erie, occurring mostly along the rocky shorelines, but as part of the quarry was quite close to the shoreline, it was a factor as well.
It took awhile, several years in fact, but eventually the right combination of people from both sides managed to make some progress. The end result was that some area of the quarry property was not available for extraction, and not only was the remaining area left for high quality habitat, but also there were several locations where four critical habitat needs were established. In addition, with the assistance of a great organization known as the Nature Conservancy of Canada, a significant amount of additional and adjacent property was obtained and allowed to be developed for habitat along with the critical habitat needs.
The four critical habitat requirements especially for the Blue Racer and the Eastern Fox Snake were:
-underground hibernaculum
-piles of material for egg-laying
-shrub piles for snakes to hide in for periods when they were shedding skin, which they did several times a year and were fairly immobile and therefore more vulnerable
-layers of rocks, known as 'hot rocks', which they could bask on
And so the improvements got underway. Pelee Quarries had the staff, materials and the equipment, and with appropriate direction from species at risk biologists such as myself, some real progress was made. A couple of these first photos show the equipment functioning to gather the materials, and also give an idea of the size and scope of the quarry operation, having been dug down several metres into the limestone bed of the island.
The following photos were not all taken at a single site, but are representative of several of the habitat construction areas, so the background for them will not always look like the same location.
The first step was using a back-hoe, to dig down well below the frost line, and start to add various size rocks.
Then one had to insert several long pipes from the surface, down to an open space in the lower rocks, so the snakes could emerge and roam around the spaces for their over-wintering period.
And then cover the entire area, leaving the openings of the pipes exposed.
The hibernacula required by far the most work. The upper surface will gradually be overtaken with vegetation to make them a little more naturally functional. The upside down white V at the left of the mound indicates where the pipe opening is.
Next was to create an egg laying pile of material, a rather simple thing to do. Snakes lay their eggs in a pile of material, where the embryo inside the egg can develop for several weeks until they are ready to hatch. Exposure of the material is essential to be able to warm up via the sun, so the embryo can develop. A sizeable amount of wood chips were made available.
Two items done, two more to go.
As there are grape growers on the island, there is a good supply of old grape vines, which were available.
And last but not least, some layered basking rocks, where the snakes can soak up the sun, and also escape to more sheltered parts of the hot rocks, as needed.
We made these sets of four habitat features, in fairly close proximity to each other, in about 8 different areas scattered across the Pelee Quarry property, as well as some available municipal property and some newly acquired area. It was quite an operation, but everyone felt it was the right thing to do. The Pelee Quarries owner even had this sign made up and posted along the main roadside.
When all was completed, the PQ owner had a celebratory dinner for the main participants on both sides of the operation. And the OMB chair declared the issue resolved.
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| A happy (?) Eastern Fox Snake |
One other thing was to re-write/upgrade the Endangered Species Act, which was originally done in about 1971 and was in need of improvement. Certainly with all of the focus on endangered species in the OMNR district I was working in, and especially with the issues on Pelee Island, I was most definitely one of the OMNR staff involved with this. Not in the actual re-writing, but as the OMNR person most involved with on-the-field experience.
As much time and energy as this required, in addition to several other significant projects going on around my work area which will be featured in a future post, life went on at home fairly normally.
Tim had played centre for his high school senior football team, and the team did fairly well. By the first decade of 2000, he gained a lot of interest in rugby, and became an active member of the Chatham-Kent Havoc rugby team. Tim is second from the right.
His position was as a prop, and he is number 16 in this next photo.
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| Marie watching a rugby game |
Kristin, on the other hand, played a bit of soccer, and also joined a cross-country running team. At least the one year, the team won the championship.
We even had some time for some traveling. In April, Tim was out on his own, but Marie, Kristin and I had a trip south to explore Shenandoah National Park in the Great Smokies, and also went to the coast of South Carolina.
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| Redbud tree at Shenandoah |
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| Marie and Kristin looking over a valley at Shenandoah |
The journey will continue featuring different aspects in the next post.
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